UN:Millions of North Koreans could go hungry if they do not receive much-needed food aid soon, the World Food Programme (WFP) said yesterday. The UN agency appealed to its biggest donors, including Ireland, to keep diplomacy separate from humanitarian aid for the impoverished Stalinist state.
International efforts to end North Korea's nuclear programme have hogged the headlines in recent months, but North Korea is facing a food gap of one million tonnes, or about 20 per cent of its needs, of which the WFP can only fill a fraction because of a huge drop in donations over the past two years.
"We are losing ground in the struggle against hunger in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea," said Tony Banbury, WFP Asia regional director, in Beijing after a five-day visit to North Korea.
"Last year's harvest was smaller, due in part to summer flooding, and that, combined with major reductions in international assistance, has left millions of North Koreans more vulnerable to food insecurity.
"People are going hungry as we head into the lean season. It's time for WFP and the donors to respond," he said.
Ireland is the eighth-biggest donor of food aid to the WFP's North Korean operations and has contributed €476,000 to date. Other major donors include Russia (€3.7 million), Switzerland (€1.8 million) and Cuba, which has donated €1.27 million.
North Korean officials had indicated the country faced a shortfall of one million tonnes of food, and expressed a new openness to receiving increased food assistance from the WFP.
Food donations to North Korea - both through its main benefactors China and South Korea and through the WFP - fell significantly last year. This was largely because North Korea was avoiding six-party talks aimed at ending its nuclear programme.
North Korea became an international pariah after it conducted its first nuclear test.
Mr Banbury said North Korea had "expressed a new openness to receiving increased food assistance" and openly acknowledged its food gap. He spent three days in the North Phyongan province and visited 12 WFP food delivery sites and projects in Sinuju and Ryongchan cities and Yonju and Tongrim counties, including orphanages and schools.
He was keen to separate progress in the six-party talks, which include both Koreas, the US, the host China, Japan and Russia, from humanitarian efforts. "While political discussions continue in other channels, those political discussions ought not to prevent simple citizens, civilians, normal people, from having the food they require to provide a healthy life for their children," he said.
North Korea suffered a famine in the 1990s that killed up to 2.5 million people.