PYONGYANG: On New Year’s Day, usually customs at the North Korea-China border is at its busiest, but this year has seen a marked decline in activity. This is because North Korean customs officials have been demanding too many presents from local traders conducting business with China, creating a dip in supply passing through the border.
“These days is when the customs office is supposed to be busy with products coming through for the New Year, but things are quiet,” a source based in North Hamkyung Province told.
“This is because of the burdensome ‘homework’ trading companies have received from customs officials.”
The so-called “homework” refers to individual requests security officials make to traders working with various Chinese companies in return for expedited meetings and preferential treatment when doing business in the future. Included in these requests are expensive liquor, snacks, and fruit that are sometimes demanded in loads comprising dozens of boxes. In extreme cases, they even ask for computers, television sets, and other high-end electronics, according to the source.
The items collected from this “homework” are then offered up to provincial Party cadres and security officials as bribes. What one offers up at the beginning of the year can determine the tenor of his or her next 365 days, so customs and security officials bend over backwards to order these “presents” from traders.
“The officials have been swarming around traders whenever they appear, asking, ‘How about doing some homework for customs?’ and then writing down a long list of their requests.” according to the source. “If you deny their request for free gifts, the next time they pass through customs, it always comes back and bites them,” he explained.
Ordinarily, North Korean trading companies receive approval for meetings with Chinese firms each quarter through the provincial security unit, which usually takes at least one or two months to process the request. However, during this period around the Solar New Year, those who have done their “homework” are granted one or two special meetings– without the need for permission or lengthy processing times– highlighting why many traders have no choice but to bite the bullet when it comes to these requests, according to the source.
Because of the excessive burden from customs officials, traders even propose to their Chinese counterparts that they hold meetings and reopen trade after the New Year’s holiday. “Chinese traders who are familiar with North Korean customs don’t even show up at customs ahead of the holidays,” he concluded.
