North Korea-owned restaurants are spreading across Asia and providing a much-needed source of income for the cash-strapped country, according to the Atlantic.
The magazine reported that the Pyongyang Cafe, which offers traditional Korean fare along with musical entertainment from hanbok-clad women, has carved out a niche in many popular tourist cities in the Far East and beyond.
North Korean government-run restaurants have existed for years in China, in regions adjacent to the [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea]’s northern border, but in the past decade the business has truly gone global.
In 2002, a branch of the Pyongyang restaurant chain opened in the Cambodian tourist hub of Siem Reap — the first outside China — and it became an immediate hit with South Korean tour groups visiting the nearby temples of Angkor.
Since 2003, the Atlantic reported, branches have opened in far-flung places such as Thailand, Laos, Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Nepal and Dubai. Another branch is reportedly
set to open in Amsterdam. One North Korea expert estimated the chain of state-run restaurants numbered in the “low hundreds.”
In addition, DPRK watchers say the restaurants may also be a money laundering enterprise, although no hard evidence of such was presented in the article.
“The restaurants are used to earn additional money for the government in Pyongyang — at the same time as they were suspected of laundering proceeds from North Korea’s more unsavory commercial activities,” said [Bertil Lintner, author of Great Leader, Dear Leader: Demystifying North Korean Under the Kim Clan].
“Restaurants and other cash-intensive enterprises are commonly used as conduits for wads of bills, which banks otherwise would not accept as deposits.”
