It's business as usual for the Kims:
The National Intelligence Service said on Monday that North Korea is spending around US$330 million on amusement parks and the cult surrounding the ruling Kim family.
The NIS told a National Assembly hearing that the North Korean regime is building huge outdoor swimming pools and water parks modeled after theme parks in Europe like Switzerland's Alpamare.
The agency said the plaza in front of Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, where the pickled bodies of nation founder Kim Il-sung and his son Kim Jong-il lie in glass coffins, is being transformed into a luxurious garden modeled after those of French and Austrian palaces.
The $330 million would be enough to buy 1.1 million tons of corn, which can feed the entire people of North Korea for three to four months, the NIS pointed out. The North is reported to be experiencing a worse food shortage than in the famine of the 1990s.
There are other signs that the new regime under Kim Jong-un is reverting to type. The agency said Kim's wife Ri Sol-ju has not appeared in public for 40 days, apparently because senior apparatchiks are worried that her westernized ways could corrupt public morals.
There are now rumours that the Ri Sol-ju is in fact pregnant - perhaps carrying the next-in-line of the immortal Kim dynasty.
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