Briton Reveals Details of North Korean Communist Propaganda Cult in London

TOPSHOT - North Korean soldiers attend a mass rally to celebrate the North's declaration o
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Kurt Zindulka

A British man has revealed details from the inside of a communist propaganda outfit run by the North Korean government in London.

Alex Meads, a former teenage member of the Korean Friendship Association (KFA), described the cultish atmosphere inside the organisation run out of the North Korean embassy in London.

“No criticisms of North Korea and its ideology were allowed. They are promoting an ideology that is totally contrary to our democratic values. It’s a very dangerous and controlling ideology,” he told The Times.

“It’s quite obsessional. You have to use expressions like ‘the Fearless General of Mount Paektu who is like a tiger to his enemies’, and that kind of thing,” he added.

Meads joined the organisation at the age of 14, after seeing an advertisement for a KFA meeting in a communist newspaper. He said that the group originally felt “like a family”; however, he soon came to feel that he was being indoctrinated by Dermot Hudson, a former British civil servant who led the group.

Mr Meads, now 23, claims that he became disillusioned with the group during a trip to North Korea last year after he began questioning the communist country’s system.

“I said, ‘How come, in a socialist society, the leadership is passed from father to son?’ Dermot couldn’t answer,” he said.

In a lengthy statement on its Facebook page, the Korean Friendship Association said that Mr Meads was expelled because some in the group viewed him as a “fascist or right-wing infiltrator” and went on to accuse The Times of being a “mouthpiece for MI6 and the CIA”.

“The fact that UK KFA has again been attacked in the media shows that we are the true defenders of People’s Korea and is [sic] independence. There is no doubt that this vile attack on UK KFA has been ordered by anti-DPRK hostile forces who want to demonise those who dare to speak up for People’s Korea, for Juche [the official state ideology of North Korea] and independence!” the statement concluded.

In 2014, the group’s leader, Dermot Hudson, told Vice that he hoped the United Kingdom would adopt North Korean policies such as: “Free housing, cheap food and low-cost public transport. It only costs one pence to use the Pyongyang metro, compared with a £2.20 minimum for the tube. Also, free nursery education and free higher education.”

In May, it was reported that North Korea has cut rations for its people to their lowest level ever after having one of the worst harvests in a decade.

According to an assessment from the  Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Food Programme, 40 per cent of the people in North Korea, some 10.1 million people, are suffering from severe food shortages in the communist “Hermit Kingdom”.

Follow Kurt on Twitter at @KurtZindulka

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