£37,500 to f ly Kim Jong Un’s henchmen here from North Korea for ‘British lessons’
OFFICIALS from the rogue state of North Korea spent four weeks in Canterbury, Kent, on a junket paid for by UK taxpayers.
Led by despotic ruler Kim Jong Un, North Korea is one of the world’s most secretive countries and is paranoid about outsiders.
It has an appalling human-rights record and a history of belligerence and aggression towards neighbouring South Korea.
Yet the Foreign Office spent £37,500 bringing ten of the totalitarian regime’s civil servants to Britain to learn about ‘UK practices in media, justice and education’.
The aim of the 2013 project was to ‘increase understanding of civil and political rights’. During the trip, the delegation was taken to the Pilgrims language centre in Canterbury for lessons in English. Details of the trip were published by the Foreign Office in 2014, along with six other projects involving the pariah state since 2011, costing a total of £724,000.
Three members of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea were hosted on a visit in 2011 aimed at improving understanding of the UK’s political system.
The UK has also made a donation of £3,772 to help a North Korean athlete compete at a Paralympic Games qualifying event in Berlin.
Other initiatives related to English language education, healthcare, women’s rights and energy.
North Korea’s human-rights record is among the worst in the world, with no right to free speech. The only legal media outlets across radio, TV and music are those run by the government.
The regime has been repeatedly condemned by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the EU. Each year since 2003 the UN has passed a vote in its General Assembly urging the government in Pyongyang to end its ‘systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights’, which included public executions and arbitrary detentions. North Korea rejected the resolution, saying it was politically motivated and based on fabrications.
An FCO spokesman said: ‘Our aid spend is just one part of our critical engagement to try to improve the lives of the people of North Korea and we have a number of projects to help the most vulnerable.’