North Korea

It has been so long since the sound has been heard in the North Korean capital that at first it seems an illusion, a buzzing in the ear perhaps. But no, that really is a power saw, and that pounding really is a hammer at work at a construction site. By the dizzying standards of Asia's exploding mega-cities, the construction here is nothing you could call a real estate boom.

The "Do Not Cross" line here between North and South Korea has a prosaic feel to it: a concrete speed bump. The almost imperceptible hump, sitting between two blue buildings that straddle the 38th parallel, would look at home on a suburban street. Likewise, the swath of grass and concrete of the Joint Security Area resembles a college campus -- uncommonly quiet and devoid of students -- more than a hyper-guarded demilitarized zone. But hyper-guarded it is.

I AM SOARING over North Korea, looking down on a denuded landscape and zooming in to hover over missile batteries, nuclear sites, huge palaces and prison camps. It's a cyber tour, courtesy of Google Earth. I once visited North Korea as a reporter, yet this virtual view is far more revealing than anything I was permitted to see. Has the Hermit Kingdom finally met its match?

Fifty-seven years after the end of the bloody Korean conflict, always unpredictable North Korea on Monday proposed a peace treaty to formally end the hostilities. The communist state suggested that once a treaty was underway, it would return to the stalled six-party talks to end the regime's nuclear ambitions. But first, North Korean officials say, they want international sanctions imposed last year to be lifted immediately. The proposal was met with skepticism from the U.S. and its allies, including South Korea.

North Korea lashed out at the United States and South Korea on Wednesday, warning that it would attack the South if any of its ships were intercepted as part of an American-led initiative to stem the world trade in nuclear weapons. North Korea's state-run news service reiterated Pyongyang's anger over South Korea's decision to join 100 other nations in the so-called Proliferation Security Initiative to blockade any nation suspected of trading nuclear materials. "The U.S.

North Korea has seen it all before: A U.S. administration looking for a foreign policy success in its waning days sets its gaze on Pyongyang in hopes of bolstering the president's legacy. As negotiations aimed at halting North Korea's nuclear program reopen in Beijing today after a nine-month hiatus, a central question is whether the communist regime will play ball with the Bush administration or punt until the next president enters the Oval Office in January. Odds are it will punt.

Ko Jong-mi can still see her mother lying on her deathbed in a shabby North Korean village. "I'm sorry," the old woman said, her voice weak. "I'm the one who brought you to this life. Please, please forgive me." Now 49, Ko long ago forgave her mother for becoming an unwitting victim of North Korea's covert Homecoming Project. Under the slogan "Let's go back to the fatherland!" the campaign persuaded more than 93,000 ethnic Koreans and their families living in Japan to immigrate to North Korea from 1959 to 1984.

Seamen who bravely go down with their ship can attain glory in any nation, but in North Korea, hero status also comes to seafarers who die while trying to preserve images of the Dear Leader. On Friday, the autocratic state offered posthumous awards to crew members who drowned while reportedly attempting to save portraits of leader Kim Jong Il and his late father, Kim Il Sung, as a cargo ship sank in frigid water off the Chinese coast in November. North Korean state news media announced that the captain and chief engineer of the Jisong 5 were proclaimed labor heroes for their valor.

His day begins at 4:30 a.m. The 64-year-old retired math teacher doesn't own a clock or even a watch, but the internal alarm that has kept him alive while so many of his fellow North Koreans have starved to death tells him he had better get out to pick grass if his family is to survive. Soon the streets of his city, Chongjin, will be swarming with others doing the same. Some cook the grass to eat. The teacher feeds it to the rabbits his family sells at the market. At 10 a.m.

When is it time to dump an old friend who insists on behaving badly? The debate is raging in China. North Korea's latest nuclear test raises the question of just how long the bonds forged between old communist allies will endure. The test was conducted barely 50 miles from the Chinese border. The ground rumbled in northeast China, and some schools were evacuated because of fears of an earthquake. "It was quite shocking.

Nearly two months after the seizure here of a charter plane carrying 35 tons of weapons shipped from North Korea, the mystery remains as to where the rockets and other armaments were headed. Iran, Sri Lanka and the United Arab Emirates were reportedly listed on the flight plan; the former Soviet republic of Georgia was cited as the charter company's operations base; and the captain has said that Kiev, Ukraine, was the destination. This week, Iran denied that it was the intended recipient, according to wire reports, arguing that it had no need for the weaponry because it has its own arms industry, which makes rockets, tanks, jet fighters, light submarines and missiles.

A recent move by North Korean officials to rejigger the nation's economic system has introduced a new level of misery to everyday life. In the last month, the price of rice rose tenfold at private markets, and residents often had to wait in line for hours in subzero temperatures to buy food. Humanitarian aid workers have been unable to travel to large portions of the country because many hotels no longer accept foreign currency and the exchange rate bounces around wildly.

For years, Kim Young Soon said, she struggled with a cruel uncertainty: She didn't know the crime that landed her in Yodok prison, the notorious penal colony in secretive North Korea. One day in 1970,North Korean secret police agents came for Kim and her family: her parents, husband, three sons and daughter. They were taken to the gulag whose mere name stirs terror among many North Koreans. Life under the regime took its toll on Kim's family. Her parents died of hunger at Yodok, she said.

Seamen who bravely go down with their ship can attain glory in any nation, but in North Korea, hero status also comes to seafarers who die while trying to preserve images of the Dear Leader. On Friday, the autocratic state offered posthumous awards to crew members who drowned while reportedly attempting to save portraits of leader Kim Jong Il and his late father, Kim Il Sung, as a cargo ship sank in frigid water off the Chinese coast in November. North Korean state news media announced that the captain and chief engineer of the Jisong 5 were proclaimed labor heroes for their valor.

Ko Jong-mi can still see her mother lying on her deathbed in a shabby North Korean village. "I'm sorry," the old woman said, her voice weak. "I'm the one who brought you to this life. Please, please forgive me." Now 49, Ko long ago forgave her mother for becoming an unwitting victim of North Korea's covert Homecoming Project. Under the slogan "Let's go back to the fatherland!" the campaign persuaded more than 93,000 ethnic Koreans and their families living in Japan to immigrate to North Korea from 1959 to 1984.

Fifty-seven years after the end of the bloody Korean conflict, always unpredictable North Korea on Monday proposed a peace treaty to formally end the hostilities. The communist state suggested that once a treaty was underway, it would return to the stalled six-party talks to end the regime's nuclear ambitions. But first, North Korean officials say, they want international sanctions imposed last year to be lifted immediately. The proposal was met with skepticism from the U.S. and its allies, including South Korea.

He rarely leaves his secure confines in Pyongyang, but Asian news reports cite signs that reclusive North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il is preparing for a trip to Beijing. Kim, who is believed to have traveled to China four times since 2000, two of them in the month of January, could be ready to announce his nation's return to the six-party nuclear disarmament talks, some analysts say. North Korea's desperate economy, weakened by international sanctions after Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests last year, could force Kim back to the bargaining table in the hopes of extracting food and financial aid. Kim's previous trips abroad have signaled new business ventures or a renewed push for nuclear talks.

He rarely leaves his secure confines in Pyongyang, but Asian news reports cite signs that reclusive North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il is preparing for a trip to Beijing. Kim, who is believed to have traveled to China four times since 2000, two of them in the month of January, could be ready to announce his nation's return to the six-party nuclear disarmament talks, some analysts say. North Korea's desperate economy, weakened by international sanctions after Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests last year, could force Kim back to the bargaining table in the hopes of extracting food and financial aid. Kim's previous trips abroad have signaled new business ventures or a renewed push for nuclear talks.

As she rubs the stump where her left ankle used to be, Park Choon-young recalls her life in this town that she calls a cursed place, a no man's land where the very ground is fraught with peril. Countless land mines planted here, she says, have wreaked an incredible personal toll: The petite 84-year-old widow lost two sons and a grandson to explosions after they accidentally detonated mines while walking in the dense woods outside town. About four decades ago, Park also stepped on a mine in a farm field.

The recent seizure of a transport plane carrying North Korean-made weapons for sale was more than just an embarrassment for Pyongyang. It represents another significant loss the financially struggling regime can ill afford, analysts here say. An anemic North Korean economy has continued a perilous tailspin in recent months triggered by international sanctions imposed on the combative nuclear-armed state. The United Nations-imposed restrictions have led to several risky measures that experts suggest may be warning signs of worsening economic woes.