Kim Jong-un warns starved North Koreans to ‘tighten belts’ before 4-year famine

Kim Jong-un has told starving North Koreans that they'll have to get by on scraps until 2025 at the earliest.

Food shortages have been a growing issue in North Korea since it closed its border with China in 2020 due to Covid.

The virus was a massive concern due to the rogue nation's limited health care system but the blockade has created a problem of its own.

Earlier this month, a UN analyst warned of a 'devastating famine' in North Korea due to how the China blockade and UN sanctions following missile testing have devastated the country's economy.

Now, officials have told citizens to accept the shortages and tighten their belts, reports the Mirror.

"Two weeks ago, they told the neighbourhood watch unit meeting that our food emergency would continue until 2025," a resident told Radio Free Asia.

"Authorities emphasized that the possibility of reopening customs between North Korea and China before 2025 was very slim.

"The food situation right now is already clearly an emergency, and the people are struggling with shortages.

"When the authorities tell them that they need to conserve and consume less food until 2025… they can do nothing but feel great despair."

Along with reports that people have been starving to death, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization is projecting that North Korea is about 860,000 tons short of food – around two months’ worth of consumption.

The UN World Food Program has estimated that about 40% of North Korea’s population is undernourished.

The response from the North Korean regime has been a push for people to grow their own crops.

The Korean resident said that there is considerable resentment towards the authorities and many feel that telling people to keep going until 2025 is 'like telling them to starve'.

The government has blamed external factors for the lack of food such as US and UN sanctions and natural disasters.

The country has been badly impacted by floods and droughts this year, just as it was last year.

In April, authorities told people to prepare for something worse than the 'Arduous March' which is the name given for a famine in the mid-1990s which killed an estimated 10% of the country's population.

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