North Korea Follows Up H-Bomb Claims with Invention of ‘Hangover-Free’ Alcohol

Media in North Korea are reporting that a national company has invented a liquor that “causes no hangover,” the latest claim of scientific achievement following the military’s claim of having successfully detonated a hydrogen bomb earlier this month.

“Koryo Liquor, which is made of six-year-old Kaesong Koryo insam [ginseng], known as being highest in medicinal effect, and the scorched rice, is highly appreciated by experts and lovers as it is suave and causes no hangover,” an article in The Pyongyang Times this week reads. It notes that the company struggled to control the bitterness of the taste while not adding too much sugar so as to cause hangovers. Finally, they concocted a liquor from glutinous rice, which is “first boiled and the boiled rice is scorched when it begins to steam. In the process of boiling, the nutritive substances of the rice settle down to the bottom and the starch breaks up to become glucose at a high temperature.”

The article also claims the liquor has health benefits: “The scorched glutinous rice contains essential amino acids, inorganic substances and vitamins and helps quicken lipolysis.”

“The product exudes national flavour also in the shape of bottle and packaging,” it claims.

NK News, which tracks propaganda coming out of Pyongyang, notes that the government’s media outlets have been promoting the possibility of revealing this liquor as early as August 19, when the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the official state outlet, claimed the Kaesong Koryo liquor company had partnered with a local university to improve their product.

CNN notes that such alleged North Korean scientific achievements are not uncommon and often too good to be true. Last year, for example, North Korea claimed its scientists had developed a vaccine that cured AIDS, cancer, and Ebola, among other diseases.

North Korea also claimed in early January that it had detonated a hydrogen bomb successfully, calling it “just a measure of self-defense” against the United States’ “imperialism.” Nuclear scientists around the world widely agreed that, while the impact registered on the Richter scale, proving the government had indeed detonated a bomb, the impact was too small to have been that of a hydrogen bomb. Most suggested the weapon in question was likely a combination fusion/fission weapon of significantly less power.

Nonetheless, the government continued to use the detonation to threaten the United States.

Last week, a KCNA article reported:

The scientists and technicians of the DPRK are in high spirit to detonate H-bombs of hundreds of Kt and Mt level capable of wiping out the whole territory of the U.S. all at once as it persistently moves to stifle the DPRK, cradle of life and happiness of its people, if only there are no geographical restrictions and provided the territory is vast.