Is North Korea Opening Again to Aid Agencies? 4 million vaccine doses flown to North Korea : Rebecca Root / The Guardian

Article shared by Richard Bridle

Here's an interesting article. Nagi Shafik, who is quoted here, was a UNICEF Health Specialist in DPRK in the early 00s.  All the best!
Richard

https://www.brownhatstories.com

“I’ve got a feeling they’re going to open again to UN agencies and NGOs,” said Nagi Shafik, who previously consulted for the UN on public health in North Korea, a country he described as “fussy about their security”.

Shafik said the North Korean government may have used the hiatus to consider how it would like to work with aid providers. It no longer wants to be looked at as a recipient of aid, Shafik said, but as more of a development partner. “They hate to be reliant on other people,” he said, but are open to ideas and want to be engaged on issues including health. North Korea was voted on to WHO’s executive board last year. “They are open more than people expect,” Shafik said."The return of essential vaccines marks a significant milestone towards safeguarding children’s health and survival in this country,”

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"The reopening of the border and the return of Unicef’s full team to DPR Korea will be critical to ensuring more essential support can be provided in 2024 and programmes can be scaled up as necessary to meet the needs of children and women,” said Roland Kupka, Unicef’s acting representative for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea". 

In 2019, Unicef had about 13 international staff in the country.