In Liaoning Province and elsewhere in China, Chinese traders who deal with North Korean trading companies continue to prepare for trade, but freight train service between North Korea and China has yet to restart. North Korea appears quite worried that with cases of COVID-19 recently rising in China, trade could reintroduce the virus into the country.
According to multiple Daily NK sources in China on Thursday, with cases of COVID-19 on the rise in Dandong, Shenyang, Dalian and elsewhere in Liaoning Province, Chinese authorities have shut down public facilities and strengthened inter-regional travel restrictions.
Travel is restricted between cities, and administrative districts are even inspecting people moving from one village to another. In fact, the sources say police now frequently board inter-village buses at random to inspect the passengers’ ID cards.
China has also instituted partial or full lockdowns in Shijiazhuang and Zhuozhou County, Baodin in Hebei Province, near Beijing, with COVID-19 cases once again on the rise in those communities.
North Korea is reportedly on high alert as COVID-19 spreads not only in Chinese cities near North Korea, but also in the greater Beijing area.
One source in China said North Korean trade delegations send detailed reports on China’s COVID-19 situation to Pyongyang every day.
“Because North Korea takes the coronavirus situation in China seriously, it seems it won’t be easy to expand trade for the time being,” he said.
Even after North Korea declared victory over the coronavirus during a recent meeting to review national quarantine efforts, the authorities have refused to ease quarantine standards in the China-North Korea border region. They appear gravely concerned about letting the virus enter the country or allowing a resurgence of the disease.
In August, Daily NK reported that North Korean authorities have maintained an intensive emergency quarantine system in regions that border China or South Korea, even after they lowered the nation’s quarantine poster to “normal.” They also issued an order calling for new quarantine measures to stop the coronavirus from entering the country from abroad.
Kim Yo Jong, the deputy director of the Publicity and Information Department and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s powerful sister, used the quarantine review meeting held in Pyongyang on Aug. 10 to blame objects that floated into North Korea from South Korea for introducing COVID-19 into the country.
However, North Korean cadres and residents of North Korea’s border region reportedly believe that if the virus entered the country from outside, it very likely did so through China, with which North Korea conducts 99% of its trade.
The sources say North Korean authorities have responded by receiving constant, region-by-region reports on China’s coronavirus situation, and will keep a close eye on the numbers when deciding when to expand trade.
So far, however, the authorities have issued no orders to the customs house in Sinuiju regarding freight train service between North Korea and China.
“I hear the coronavirus situation in China is serious,” said a source in North Pyongan Province. “The government is on guard, believing it would be a huge problem if even one person with the disease enters the country, so won’t the situation in China have to die down before the trains start running again?”
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