North Korea is cracking down on street traders and food sellers as “enemies” of the people, provoking physical brawls between officials and a population increasingly desperate amid growing food shortages.
Official documents set out the regime’s policies for tackling so-called “grasshopper merchants”, as street traders are called, with the coronavirus pandemic being cited as a pretext. However, the campaign is the latest manifestation of a long-term dilemma faced by the regime: whether to tolerate private enterprise as a means of feeding its hungry population or to quash it as unacceptable capitalism.
