North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has reportedly begun rounding up pet dogs.
Kim issued a ban on pet ownership in July because of the “decadence” of owning them, according to the South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo. He reportedly branded the practice of owning dogs as “a ‘tainted’ trend by bourgeois ideology.”
“Authorities have identified households with pet dogs and are forcing them to give them up or forcefully confiscating them and putting them down,” a source told the newspaper, adding that some of the confiscated canines were placed in zoos or sold for their meat.
North Korea has struggled during the coronavirus pandemic. Kim recently said that the hermit nation is facing “two crises at the same time,” in reference to both the pandemic and wide-scale flooding that has damaged more than 16,000 homes and nearly 100,000 acres of farmland, according to the New York Times.
The area where a lot of the destruction occurred has also face food shortages, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service estimated that about 60% of the country is facing food insecurity this year.
Despite the issues, Kim said that the situation “requires us not to allow any outside aid for the flood damage but shut the border tighter and carry out strict anti-epidemic work,” North Korean state-run media reported.
