SEOUL – Punters in North Korea who once risked three years hard labor for gambling are now able to bet on local horse races as the isolated country…
SEOUL – Punters in North Korea who once risked three years hard labor for gambling are now able to bet on local horse races as the isolated country scrambles to unearth new sources of hard currency amid intensifying international sanctions.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has been building resorts, swimming pools and other luxurious leisure facilities in what experts say is a bid to capture some of the individual wealth generated by growing private markets for goods and services.
A series of races took place at the Mirim Horse Riding Club, one of Kim’s flagship leisure developments, near Pyongyang on Sunday, according to North Korea’s official KCNA news agency.
Racegoers aged 12 or older were allowed to bet on jockeys in a raffle-type system, broadcaster Korean Central Television said on Friday ahead of the races.
Pictures from KCNA showed hundreds of spectators watching and filming with their phones as a field of mostly white-grey horses and their riders stormed out of the starting gate.
In the communist North, horses – especially white ones – have traditionally been a propaganda symbol associated with the ruling Kim family.
“Kim has been pushing for vanity projects for a theme park, sky resort and the horse riding club for the sake of propping up the people’s well-being but their real purpose was to earn foreign currency,” said Na Jeong-won, head of the North Korea Industry-Economy Research Institute in Seoul.
