The unusual reason why North Korean gardeners are taken prisoner to the gulags

Several gardeners North Korea They were sent to forced labor camps for an unusual reason: not making the “Flower of Kim Jong-il”, the father of the current leader, bloom on time for the date of the anniversary of his birth, next Wednesday the 16th.

The flower growers who were not taken to the gulags had to write “self-critical reports” in which they recognized their failure in the traditional annual goal of the sector, according to the US site NK News, based in Seoul, the capital of South Korea.

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North Korean cities traditionally display thousands of “Kimjongilias,” a deep red variety of begonia created in honor of Kim, to celebrate his birthday, also known as Bright Star Day.

This year, however, growers struggled in the boreal winter in get firewood to heat and maintain humidity in the greenhouses where the plants were grownreported NK News, while it has rained less across the country than in previous years.

Quoting a member of its network of underground reporters in the North, NK News said that the manager of a cultivation farm in Kimjongilia had been arrested and sentenced to six months in a labor camp for failing to care for the plants properly.

The man, identified as in his 50s and surnamed Han, had been unable to get an adequate supply of firewood during the winter months, leading to crop failure.

Han’s carelessness came to light when the regional party committee ordered an exhibition of Kimjongilia and Kimilsungia, a hybrid orchid that was first cultivated in 1988 in honor of Kim Il-sung, the nation’s founder and grandfather of the current Han. leader Kim Jong-un, the third generation of the family that rules North Korea.

The traditional kimjongilia. (Photo: Eric Lafforgue – Corbis News).

Han tried to explain why the flowers hadn’t bloomed as planned, but was accused by the party of neglect, fired from his post and sentenced to six months hard labor.

A farm employee in charge of ensuring the constant care of the greenhouse boilers he was sentenced to three months in prison, according to NK News, for failing to “properly regulate the temperature.”

Other employees were also punished, and a flower grower in her 40s was summoned to the party’s regional headquarters every day to update officials on the state of the flowers and “write self-critical reports,” it added.

Kim Jong-il’s birthday is one of the most important dates in the North Korean calendar, in which large bags of candy are traditionally given to children, it is the occasion for military officers to receive their promotion, new postage stamps are issued and Fireworks are launched in Pyongyang. Kim Jong-un is expected to pay his respects at his father’s mausoleum outside the capital at midnight that day.

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Source: Elcomercio