North Korea Reacts to Ebola Pretty Much Exactly the Way You’d Expect North Korea to React to Ebola

Around
30 countries have responded to the Ebola outbreak with travel
bans of one kind or another. But one state stands out for the
intensity of its response, clamping down on people’s movements in
ways that might strike even
Peter King as excessive.

It’s North Korea, of course. The place is located nowhere near
the outbreak, and it isn’t exactly a destination point for West
African tourists, but what is probably the world’s most paranoid
and xenophobic regime isn’t taking any chances. The Washington
Post‘s Anna Fifield
reports:

North Korea abruptly told the handful of travel
companies bringing western tourists into the country that all tours
would be indefinitely suspended. Most have had all their November
tours canceled and are waiting to hear about December. The ban also
extends to Chinese tourists, who make up the bulk of visitors to
Pyongyang, by far.

Then on Thursday, North Korea announced all foreigners—including
diplomats, and regardless of where they’re coming—arriving in the
country will be quarantined for 21 days. That’s more than three
times the length of the average tour….

But it’s not just foreigners who are considered potential carriers
of the deadly virus….People wanting to go to Pyongyang on
personal business, such as for family events, are being denied
entry to the capital, while state officials now have to go through
a cumbersome process involving getting an epidemiological
certificate from the provincial quarantine office, the site
reported.

When diplomats from countries as close as Japan enter the
country, they are greeted by Koreans in hazmat suits. The
government is also putting new limits on its subjects’ already
severely curtailed ability to travel abroad. Fifield notes that a
“group that had been set to travel to seminars in Singapore last
week was abruptly grounded,” Singapore presumably being too close
to the Sierra Leone for Pyongyang’s taste.

And then there are images like this, which cross the line
separating “public health precaution” from “elaborate purification
ritual”:

Juche
in action, I suppose. To read the rest of Fifield’s report, go

here.