It’s rare to find a Japanese business openly operating in North Korea, because of strained relations between the two countries
Sushi in Pyongyang? At a restaurant run by a Japanese sushi chef famous for working for North Korea’s late leader Kim Jong-il? has opened his sushi restaurant in the North Korean capital, according to Canadian Michael Spavor, a consultant with a long record of working in the communist state. He was involved with NBA star , and the two spent days with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who succeeded his father after his death in 2011. Spavor said he was introduced to Fujimoto just last year, when he learnt about the chef’s plans to open a restaurant in Pyongyang and tried to track it down early this year. “I was quite excited, because I’d heard quite a lot about him,” Spavor said. “So one day, for lunch, we met up, and we got along great, he speaks fluent Korean, so we spoke Korean, and that’s when he mentioned to me he was planning on opening up a ramen restaurant or a sushi restaurant in Pyongyang.” It’s rare to find a Japanese business openly operating in North Korea, because of strained relations between the two countries.
