Mass starvation ranks as a horrible crime against humanity but the world is allowing the North Korean Government to hold its own people hostage. The great powers are co-operating with Pyongyang to play out a grim and unconscionable diplomatic game - as if the 22 million starving North Koreans were no more than a negotiating chip.
In the 20th century, the outside world has stood by while secretive and closed off regimes in the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia starved millions of their citizens to death. This time we are better informed about what is happening inside North Korea but the West's current negotiating strategy with Pyongyang is being justified by some very dubious assertions.
The first lie holds that the massive famine is not the fault of North Korea's rulers but due to unusual weather and floods.
The same excuse was given for the terrible man-made famines which killed 30 million in Mao Zedong's China and huge numbers in Josef Stalin's Soviet Union. If it were true, then both South Korea and neighbouring parts of China would also lack food but Jilin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang have all had ample harvests.
The lie implies that North Korea was previously self-sufficient, just as its juche self-reliance philosophy claims. Instead it has always relied on the former Soviet Union and China to feed itself. Since the collapse of Communism, Moscow no longer cares to deliver this grain on special terms, and neither does Beijing.
This crisis is not a temporary misfortune afflicting the North Koreans which will be resolved by giving a handout of grain to tide over one bad year. With the best of all possible weather, North Korea cannot meet more than two thirds of its grain needs. Even in better times, most North Koreans have survived on an inadequate diet which has left them an average of seven to 10 centimetres shorter than their countrymen in the South.
