Television images of Korean celebration

Music

00.02.05

 Davis in hotel room speaking to camera

Davis:  I'm in the middle of the most secretive country on earth and this hotel room is the only place that I can film freely.  Within one hundred yards of this room there are families slowly starving and I'm not allowed to report on it.

00.02.24

Although the government here has requested international assistance it's extremely difficult for aid workers to gain access here and for journalists it's impossible.  Without access and without images, a mere trickle of aid is coming in.

Television images of women working, celebration on streets

Music

00.02.54

Simon Williamson at a meeting with a few Korean men

Williamson:  You want to see what we can bring.  We also want to see what sort of relationship we can have but our primary objective is to help the people in need so we don't ...

00.03.12

Davis:  This man holds the resources of one of the aid agencies but to date he's made nothing but a token contribution to North Korea. 

He's negotiating an agreement with the government but he's suspicious about how aid is delivered here.

You can't direct where it goes nor who it goes to.  He knows there is a need but he's not allowed to see it.

Williamson:  ... CARE will not bring, CARE can bring in small projects if you want a bit of help here, a bit of help there then you can have that.  But that's not really, you're not using the benefits that CARE can provide in a major way.

00.03.45

Korean man at meeting speaking, Williamson speaking, another Korean man speaking

Man:  When I met with CARE for the first time I had very high expectations.  Since then six months have passed already and there has been very little yield.

Davis:  Simon Williamson knows that in the past six months, people have been dying in the remote regions of North Korea.  But his plan to launch relief project there has been rejected by the government.  No foreigners are allowed.

00.04.19

Without access to the people in the most need, he's refusing to deliver aid to the places the government want him to, places that don't need emergency aid at all.

Man:  I want to tell you that your activities have been below our initial expectation.

Man:  What I want to mention is that your activity is under our expectation, our first initial expectation ...

Intv with Simon Williamson

Super:

SIMON WILLIAMSON

CARE International

Williamson:  If you want to come in and help out, the North Koreans aren't letting you bring those resources in, in a way that you can be sure that the people who need it, get it.  So how do you address that, what do you say?

The North Koreans are saying, well, look, we've got our system, we ensure that everybody gets what they need and you just give us the money or the food and we'll take care of that, this is our country.

00.05.00

And this is their country but that's not the way humanitarian aid works.  If you walk down the street and you see a starving child, that's the child that you're going to target with your resources.

Tracking shot,

Kids singing, music

00.05.32

kids marching,

tracking shots street, tunnel, Williamson riding in car, tracking of country road

Davis:  There are no starving children in the capital nor in the fertile rice bowl areas that surround it.  But it's to these regions that the government is trying to direct all aid.

Williamson message that no access to the remote areas means no aid at all has had an impact.  Today he's been given a rare permit to travel north out of the capital and his recommendations will be made at the end of this seven day journey.

Williamson walking, camera points to ground, Williamson with group of men

I've been given permission to film his investigation.  I can't film on the street or from the car.  I can't do interviews and we've been told not to approach civilians.

00.06.17

We've been given a minder and the man in the background has been assigned to watch over him guarding the guard and taking down every word that he utters.

It's a level of control which seems totally normal to everyone around us.

Williamson speaking, bowl of food in hand, eating

Williamson:  They've spent years and years developing this idea of socialism and independence and the last thing they want to do is expose to themselves and especially to foreigners that they've got problems.

00.06.45

Yet they know they do and they do want the help and it's just a dilemma for them.

Kids bowing,

Kids singing and Music

00.07.08

woman playing

accordian, kids sitting and looking at camera, Williamson there

Davis:  As we travel north through the central provinces, we stop as many kindergartens as possible. 

Children are the first to show signs of famine and in place of a proper survey, these visits enable Williamson to gain an impression of the region and devise a strategy for assistance.

But discovering exactly what the needs are is easier said than done. 

Williamson speaking with a few people outside building

Williamson:  With that in mind, when he's preparing the list of the nurseries and kindergartens, I wonder if he could also identify which nurseries and kindergartens need sanitation facilities.

00.07.57

Man speaking

Man:  After your project is being under operation we are going to have some cleaning around this area and I'll show you ...

00.08.10

Williamson:  Well, if I'm going to do the project, I really need to see the sanitation sites.

Man:  I think later you can see.

Williamson:  When?  We've only got about ten minutes.

Man:  After documents approved ...

Williamson:  I'm not going to ... no, the documents come after I see them.

Davis:  This argument about devising a sanitation program without seeing the toilets seems petty.  But to us it becomes a symbol of the aid impasse in North Korea.  Help is available but the problem is too embarrassing to show.

00.08.35

Williamson speaking to people

Williamson:  But it's the last chance I have to do this project.

Man:  No, it shouldn't be the last chance ...

Williamson:  It is.

Man:  ... You will come several times if the project begins here.

Williamson:  The project won't begin unless we have a chance to see some of the problems.  You understand what that means.  Come on, convince them.

Man:  After seeing toilet, I think you've got to keep up.

Travelling shot from car, mountains ahead, handheld shot of corridor, nursery, children watching

Davis:  We're in the county of Huichon, north of the capital and heading up into the mountains.  It's an area rumoured to be in trouble but it seems that we're being shielded from it.

00.09.11

Until we break the schedule and start visiting nurseries at random. 

00.09.30

Williamson:  I work for CARE INTERNATIONAL, it's a non-government aid agency.  So we're looking at trying to assist, improve the nutritional status of children in Huichon  I'm sure you should be familiar with some of the work ...

Children

Davis:  There is not a lot of singing in this group.  Many of them no longer have the energy.  Their stillness is chilling.  If these children slide into Category Three of malnutrition, they'll lose all of their powers of movement, even the power to eat.

00.09.56

Intv with woman

Woman:  Among these children acute diarrhoea and intestinal infections are now prevalent.

00.10.14

Tilt down to kids sitting, CU kid,

Davis:  And these are the healthiest kids in this nursery.  We're told that up to twenty percent of the class have stayed home today probably too sick to attend. 

Intv with Williamson

Williamson:  You've got skin problems, these kids are stunted.  There's a sort of lethargy amongst some of those kids.  It's not a situation where they are dying instantly, they are deteriorating very steadily. 

00.10.30

So without some attention or without nutritional support to these kids, you'll see them move into Category Three and into a critical state where they would need to go to hospital.

Williamson walking down hospital corridor with staff, kids sleeping

Davis:  As we discover over the next few days, the kids that make it to hospital are a lucky few.  There are simply not enough beds or medicines to cope with the need.

00.11.04

Man:  Usually ... five or six times of diarrhoea ...

Davis:  We're being told by the government that we can't film in hospitals.  In a state which specialises in creating images of it's own perfection.  They are concerned that sick and hungry children reflect badly upon them.

00.11.29

Local officials are far more obliging.  They desperately need help and they give us access to get it.

Intv with nurse

Nurse:  Because of the shortages the children haven't been able to get any proper food - any food that they can digest.

00.11.51

Baby on floor, Williamson asking questions of staff, mother with baby, kid crying

Williamson:  What are they doing about that?  What sort of medicines do you have or what sort of ...

Davis:  The aid organisation MSF has been able to deliver medicines to this ward but the hospital has no food at all.  The mothers have to supply it and they've no more food now then they did when their children began to starve.

00.12.13

Intv with Williamson in hotel room

Williamson:  We know that there are definitely people dying and people who are in danger of dying - hundreds, thousands, but we don't know, we're not able to assess that with any degree of accuracy but we know it's happening.  The proportion of it ...

00.12.38

Davis:  Why don't you know?

Williamson:  I think it's, we're not able to go to the places randomly and do any objective assessment.  They control their own information so tightly within themselves. 

So to have somebody come in here and ask questions and want to take pictures and tell the world what is going on so we can bring them assistance is completely alien to them.

Williamson walking along with a few men asking questions

Williamson:  When people come from outer areas, people in the more remote parts of Dongsin how do they get access to ...

00.13.19

Davis:  We've arrived in the village to Dongsin as far north as we're allowed to go.  Aid groups are either discouraged or forbidden from working in remote areas like this. 

The government wants to direct all resources to wealthier regions of high production and presumably of high political value.

Intv with Williamson

Williamson:  The North Koreans want to target the more resource intense areas so that they can produce a higher yield and then therefore, their argument is distributed throughout the country. 

00.13.52

We don't think their system is functioning that well.  If you're not in the system you don't get the food.  As one fellow said, you don't work, you don't eat.

Well, that's not our philosophy.  If you starve you get assistance if we can provide it.

Williamson walking along, through

Davis:  Where are we going now?

00.14.15

gate, greets woman

Williamson:  We're just going to visit one of the families where some of the children live and are in some of the more severe conditions.

Davis:  It's the first day that we've been given permission to visit the families of our choice.  Again thanks to a local official, more concerned with getting help than the image of the state.

Tilt down from pictures to woman holding child, man with young girl,

This woman lives with her mother, her daughter and her baby son.  The men in the room have come with us.

00.14.44

woman and child,

Williamson:  Her husband died just ... did the husband die before the baby was born?

Davis:  The baby is fifteen months old, he looks no more than half that age and it's unlikely he'll survive the coming winter.

CU Williamson speaking

Williamson:  She understands and ... your child looks like it might be marasmic.  The marasmic condition of the child looks fairly serious.  What can they tell us about their food situation.

Woman with child speaking, answering question

Woman:  When there was some food we could maintain our family.  Then our breadwinner died in the floods.  I'm left alone with the child.  And now there is no food distributed at all.

Tilt up to young girl, older woman

Davis:  Her other child is fourteen years old.

00.15.42

speaking

Older woman:  She has no specific disease - but often she can't move at all for days.  She's like any other malnourished person.  She can't digest her food anymore - it passes straight through her.  She is so weak.

Woman holding child, man and young girl, man taking notes

Davis:  This family has been living on about 100 grams of food per day.  Maybe a cup full of rice each.  We are told that everyone receives the same ration but clearly those that are working have much more.

00.16.06

This is no socialist famine, none of their neighbours are suffering like they are.  It seems that only the non-productive are left to starve.

Older woman speaking

Older Woman:  After the troubles began, we all got sick.  Now we just manage to survive each day. 

Young girl sitting, pan to others, woman holding child, Williamson asking questions, young girl's hands tilt up to face

Davis:  The world food program claims that it's delivering to this area through the government distribution system but it has no staff here to insure that families like this get what they need.

The government can't keep these people alive and neither CARE nor any other agency are allowed to deliver food to them directly.

00.16.43

They can't even beg.  Their only option is to sit and wait for a starvation ration which often doesn't come at all.

Williamson and man looking at corn

Williamson:  There's just nothing there.

00.17.22

cobs, Williamson

speaking, Williamson and man checking more corn

Davis:  This is the harvest that was to save Dongsin but floods and now a drought have taken their toll.

Williamson:  If this is your best crop, it looks, what we're seeing at the moment is less than fifty percent.  Yeah, the rest of the county must be worse.  Really the corn harvest has been totally devastated.

Davis:  From a distance it looks as healthy as any other crop.  But like everything else here you need to peel back the covers to see it.

00.17.56

A town that looks okay on the surface, until you start knocking on the doors, a child that you think is just thin until you feel their arms through their clothes.

Young girl, zoom out to man

Williamson:  When did you receive your last ration?

00.18.17

speaking, kid,

Williamson speaking

Man:  The last ration was about ten days ago.

Davis:  This man broke his back last year.  He can no longer work and now his daughter is starting to starve. 

Williamson:  And the families that we've seen with the malnourished children and the ones that have lost their homes or their relatives or their husband has died or their situation is in some way more vulnerable, they are the ones that are suffering most.  And so that's why you are seeing pockets of it.  You're not seeing starvation everywhere.

Davis:  There will be no surplus to keep people like this alive through the winter.  And it's likely that the situation is even worse further up the mountains where there is less arable land.

00.18.57

Intv with Williamson

Williamson:  They want to focus whatever resources they can get, sort of in an arc around Pyongyang.  It would appear as if they have decided to let the more remote areas go. 

00.19.09

If they've got a problem they think they can control it by losing that part of their country, not losing it but letting that part go and focusing on the area that they've got control over.

That's why we suspect that things are much worse in the more remote areas but they won't let us up there. 

They won't let us up there maybe because they don't want to see how bad it is and if we see how bad it is that's where we'll want to work or because they really want us to keep away from that and focus on the rice bowl areas.

Television images of crowds, people clapping, groups of people

Reporter voice  The Dear Leader Kim Jong Il is about to be appointed General Secretary of the Party.

00.19.47

Davis:  In the face of natural disasters, the dear leader King Jong Il is committed to maintaining the world's last totally socialist system.  But it's not just droughts and floods that have created the crisis here.

North Korea has never had enough land to support an agrarian communist model and since the collapse of its only patron, the Soviet Union, it's had no other economic inputs to make up the difference.

Tracking shot of road, tunnel into city

It's a nation of edifice, spanned by huge highways but virtually no cars.  Grand factories with nothing to make and nothing to sell.

00.20.27

A capital city designed to look like a commercial hub but with no commerce at all.

Williamson in lift, speaking in meeting

Williamson:  I'm confident that if we can sit down here and identify the need of food security for nurseries and kindergartens, that if we're working together on this, we can probably do two or three hundred nurseries and kindergartens, maybe even more. 

00.20.58

But we're starting with a small number to build confidence for you.  I mean, it's a learning, as you said, this is the first time that the DPRK has asked for international assistance but it's also the first time that international assistance has come to the DPRK ...

Davis:  Williamson is having his final meeting with the deputy chairman of the government's relief committee.  He's restating his position that there will be no un-monitored national donations.  That he will provide assistance for the areas he has seen.

Williamson speaking at meeting

Williamson:  I've been to Dongsin and to Huichon and it's clear that there is great need and CARE will respond to that need immediately.

Davis:  He'll supply green houses and winter clothing directly to the kindergartens.  If it's successful he'll expand the program.  But it's not how the government wants to receive aid nor where it wants it to go.

00.21.51

MidShot Williamson speaking in meeting

Williamson:  It's been generally agreed that we focus on two provinces connected and probably in three or four counties, in those two provinces to begin with and that's being Dongsin, Huichon ...

Man speaking at meeting

Man:  Dongsin and Huichon are not farming areas.  The western coast is where we want to do farming.  The west is the major area.

You can help us focus on farming in this area and then we'll have much more yield - more than other provinces including Dongsin and Huichon. 

Of course they do some basic farming in the northern areas of our country, but their output is very limited.  That's why we want to focus on the west and then we will provide for the northern areas.

Davis:  In a more open society the government's logic might be believable.  It's a position which is costing them and more importantly people who are starving a fortune in potential aid.

00.23.02

Williamson:  ... Maybe we can get much more than that ...

Davis:  Williamson gets his program for the kids of Huichon and Dongsin but for thousands of others starving, unknown and unseen, there is no one coming to help.

Williamson:  ... children will die because of the severe winter and we definitely don't want that to happen if we can avoid it.