Here is a real must watch video of North Koreans working in logging camps in remote areas of Siberia in Russia by journalist Simon Ostrovsky:

To the West, North Korea is a pariah state, best known for its secrecy, famines, belligerent politics and its leader’s brutality.

At home, North Koreans live under total government control and the watchful eye of the Dear Leader, Kim Jong-il.

But in the Amur region of Russia, almost 1,000 miles (1,600 km) from the border, North Korea has created a home away from home at a series of remote logging camps in which nearly 1,500 workers are employed.

I travelled to one of the camps deep in the forest. A giant monument bearing the words “Our greatest leader Kim Il-sung lives with us forever” stood in the middle.

One of the buildings had a sign which read “Laboratory of Kim Il-sung’s Theory” a commonly used slogan found on North Korean administration blocks. The camp even had its own theatre.

Further into the forest we found a group of North Koreans hard at work. They lived in a mobile wagon, decorated with portraits of the North Korean leaders.

Although reluctant to speak, one told me that he earned the equivalent of $200 per month. Another said that he earned $1 for each truck he loaded and that he could load up to nine per day, but he had not been paid since May.  [BBC - Korea Economic Reader]

Make sure to click the BBC link to read the whole article and watch the great video put together by Simon Ostrovsky.  What I really found interesting about this report is that a British company is profitting off the backs of North Korean slave labor.  It is also pretty amazing that the cult of Kim is still kept alive and well to keep these workers indoctrinated even in the remote areas of Siberia.  It hasn’t stopped thousands of defectors from escaping these logging camps though as depicted in the report.

I also highly recommend reading one of my prior postings about a North Korean defector that escaped from a Siberian logging camp and eventually made his way to South Korea.  His accounts of the slave labor conditions at the logging camps is quite interesting considering the Kaesong Complex is operating on this same model.