Below is part of a post at One Free Korea's blog. I will link for the rest of the post at the end:

Question: How can a banker and investor in overseas gold mines get sympathetic innocent-victim treatment from the International Herald Tribune?

Answer: Go into business with this man.


That’s the upshot of this IHT story on Colin McAskill, successor to Nigel Cowie as the new primary foreign stakeholder in the Pyongyang-based Daedong Credit Bank. Reporter Donald Greenless writes that among McAskill’s other functions, he is ”helping to operate North Korea’s foreign gold sales.” McAskill offers “dossiers” of proof to disprove any connections between his bank and illegal activity, and like Nigel Cowie, insists that all of DCB’s activities are “legitimate.” Greenlees then commits journalistic malpractice by failing to ask McAskill the questions that were obvious even to a pajama-clad blogger with a day job. So I found McAskill’s e-mail address and asked him myself:

• Which of North Korea’s gold mines have you personally visited? What observations can you offer about working conditions in those mines?

• Given that gold is a fungible commodity, can you vouch for where the gold you sell is mined? If possible, can you give a specific breakdown?

• Can you offer any information about working conditions in the Unsan District mines, or other mines from which you, DCB, or The Chosun Fund purchase gold?

• What are the North Korean companies and entities for which you are selling gold?

• Can you state with any degree of certainty that the gold you sell is not mined with forced labor, or in any of the camps I name here?

That was last Sunday. I told McAskill that I would publish the post, with or without his reponses, “in a few days.” McAskill never did respond. Now, I will explain why I asked those questions: because at least three of North Korea’s gold mines are also concentration camps.



To continue reading, visit One Free Korea's Post here...