Only Beautiful Please: A British Diplomat in North Korea

At one end of the spectrum, the European missions were frequently critical of the regime. Other embassies were less outspoken, while at the other end of the spectrum the North Korean regime actually funded the Palestinian mission, providing a vital monthly stipend from which the mission paid all its outgoings.

Many North Koreans seemed to consider it their right to leave a reception with a bottle or two of expensive foreign liquor, and embassy staff members often had to be quite direct in preventing them from doing so.

Koreans were very conscious of their country’s image and any attempt to photograph any aspect of their country that was less than flattering angered them.

It is chic among the youth of Pyongyang to speak with a South Korean accent,

There were newspaper kiosks all over Pyongyang, often with “newspapers” written over them, but I never found one which actually still sold newspapers.

Amputations, with or without anaesthetic, were a common procedure for bone fractures that would be easily treated in Western hospitals.