Suddenly, Ri Sol Ju’s Fashion is the AP’s Blind Spot

What Blaine Harden calls North Korea’s extreme makeover has suffered a severe setback:

North Korea’s young first lady has been pictured sporting what appears to be a Christian Dior handbag, in stark contrast to widespread shortages elsewhere in the impoverished nation.

Ri Sol-Ju, the wife of leader Kim Jong-Un, was pictured accompanying him on a “field guidance trip” to an army unit.

It was unclear whether the bag was genuine or an imitation. South Korea’s JoongAng Ilbo newspaper said Wednesday it would cost 1.8 million won ($1,594) in Seoul. [AFP]

Time‘s Erica Ho sharpens the point nicely:

In a move reminiscent of Marie Antoinette, Ri Sol Ju, wife of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, was spotted sporting a luxury Christian Dior purse on Tuesday. The bag, identified as a Lady Dior Clutch, retails for about $1,600 in South Korea, which is roughly the equivalent of an average North Korean worker’s annual salary.

The extravagances of Kim and his recently unveiled wife have come under intense scrutiny as North Korea continues to suffer from chronic food shortages. It’s a long-standing crisis only worsened by floods in June and July that destroyed many North Korean farms and is expected to have a significant effect on food supplies in the tightly closed-off country.

Ouch.  Even the N.Y. Times‘s Choe Sang-Hun, who had recently compared Ri to Kate Middleton, sounds a little like Perez Hilton:

The South Korean news media also noted the apparent “belly fat” — or is it a baby bump? — that Ms. Ri has developed. The South Korean spy agency believes that Ms. Ri and Mr. Kim already have a child.

Ms. Ri has drawn international attention since she began accompanying her husband in public early last month. Her expensive-looking designer suits stand out among the North Korean elites, who typically wear olive-colored military uniforms and drab Mao suits. Some outside analysts even consider her appearance as a sign of potential change in leadership and even lifestyle that Mr. Kim could bring about as a youthful leader who studied in Europe as a teenager. (Recent visitors to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, reported seeing miniskirts, high heels, Nike hats and Hello Kitty cellphone accessories.)

But Ms. Ri’s fashionable style magnifies how disconnected the ruling Kim family remains from the public.

A famine in the 1990s killed numerous North Koreans and drove many others to flee to China and South Korea. The regime still cannot feed its own people and needs outside aid. But the Kim family has lived in style.

I have to suspect that Harden’s criticism in Foreign Policy, and the inevitable comparisons to Asma Al-Assad, must have stung.  By the way, can we all agree to stop using that nauseating “baby bump” cliche, or to leave that to TMZ, please?  See also the N.Y. Daily News, NBC News, and the Daily Telegraph, which provides this photo (credited to AFP and Getty images, although the image on the right is clearly from KCNA):

Any guesses as to which news agency didn’t notice the Dior handbag?  Just for fun, let’s make this multiple choice:

(a) The one that’s actually based closest to the story.
(b) The one that’s angling for an interview with Kim Jong Un.
(c) The one that has the closest business relationship with KCNA, which took the photo that started this whole fuss.
(d) The one whose Pyongyang staff, having been shut out of access to any real news, had been behaving like fashion paparazzi until today.
(e) All of the above.

None is so blind as she who will not see.  Meanwhile, the AP is providing glowing coverage of Kim Jong Un’s visit to China:

Kim Jong Un the marshal became Kim Jong Un the statesman as he met with Chinese political dignitaries in meetings that marked his first official foray into foreign affairs since becoming North Korea’s leader.

Kim told Wang Jiarui, head of the Communist Party’s international affairs office, that his government is focused on building the economy, and then invited the Chinese delegation to a banquet Thursday, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported. The Korean Central News Agency reported the meeting without details on their discussions.

The occasion was Kim’s diplomatic debut as leader of North Korea, seven months after he took power following the December death of his father, longtime leader Kim Jong Il.

Kim Jong Un, who is believed to be 29, has been swift in moving to build loyalty among North Korea’s 24 million people and to establish control over key institutions such as the military and the ruling Workers’ Party.

He also has been quick to show his rule will differ in style from that of his father, who kept his personal life out of the state media, rarely traveled abroad and met only selectively with foreign dignitaries.

After gaining the new title of marshal and shuffling the military leadership last month, Kim Jong Un made the surprise introduction of his wife, Ri Sol Ju. Kim also has emphasized raising the standard of living as a main goal of his leadership, an objective laid out for him by his father.

“Developing the economy and improving livelihoods so that the (North) Korean people lead happy and civilized lives is the goal the Workers’ Party is struggling towards,” Xinhua reported Kim as telling Wang.

Lee’s piece is uniformly uncritical of Kim and the North Korean regime.  It mentions the hunger of North Koreans affected by recent flooding, but except for a vague token clause buried in the middle of the story, glosses over the endemic hunger that has coexisted with its dictators’ luxury since 1993.  Lee’s fine eye for superficial detail also missed the car that Kim Jong Un rode in, or his private train, or the hotel where the North Korean delegation stayed.  The least excusable omission, however, was Lee’s failure to mention one key element of the the relationship between China and North Korea — their apparently successful joint efforts at rounding up refugees and sending them to gulags and firing squads.  That means that the vast majority of North Koreans will continue to suffer far from the cameras of the Associated Press.