Sydney Morning Herald 26th May 2002

Korea still the people's choice north of the divide

By Elisabeth Zingg

May 27 2002

While almost every corner of the globe goes World Cup-crazy this week, people in the secretive, shut-away state of North Korea will barely be able to follow the sporting extravaganza taking place in their own backyard.

The southern border of the world's most reclusive nation is just 60 kilometres from Seoul, where the opening game of the tournament co-hosted by South Korea and Japan kicks off this Friday.

For North Korea's 22 million inhabitants, watching the event is an almost impossible endeavour given acute electricity shortages and a total ban on outside news.

Nonetheless, foreign reporters on a rare trip to the country found that every North Korean they asked - all officials, as contact with ordinary people is banned - would be cheering on their official enemies in the South.

"Of course we support the Korean team, the Korean nation will win," snapped Lieutenant Kim Gwang-Gil of the North Korean army as he led reporters around the truce village of Panmunjon, inside the demilitarised zone (DMZ) separating the two Koreas.

However even if South Korea did triumph, it might be some time before their northern cousins know about it.

"Maybe some matches will be shown on a delayed broadcast, but it is most likely people will have to make do with highlights," said Kim Chol, a guide from state travel agency Koryo International, who said he would also be cheering on the South Koreans.

While the rest of the world will be bombarded with live or pre-recorded matches, North Korea viewers are reliant on state broadcaster Pyongyang Television, which operates only from 5:00pm to 11:00pm.

Access to satellite TV and the Internet is prohibited in the Stalinist state, where only a tiny amount of strictly-controlled foreign news is broadcast each Sunday by Pyongyang Television.

However, the principal obstacle to would-be World Cup fans is the shortage of electricity, which runs for little more than two hours a day in parts of Pyongyang and is practically non-existent elsewhere.

Beyond that, it could be argued that people in the famine-wracked country, where around a quarter of the population rely on international food aid to survive, have other things to think about.

Although football is not the most popular sport in North Korea, which prefers table tennis and volleyball, the country holds its own piece of World Cup history through pulling off perhaps the greatest shock the tournament has ever seen.

At the 1966 event in England - a country with which Pyongyang had been at war only 13 years before - North Korea's team of complete unknowns defeated Italy, then one of the best sides in the world.

The North Koreans, who eventually lost in the quarter-finals, were never heard of again by the outside world, amid rumours players had been banished to labour camps by "Supreme Leader" Kim Il-sung after reports of alcohol-fuelled victory parties reached him.

However a British film crew recently allowed to interview the seven surviving players from the Italy game found they all appeared to be treated as stars, especially Pak Do-Ik, scorer of the winning goal against Italy.