A team of American relief experts back from a three-month monitoring trip to North Korea said international aid is making the difference between hunger and starvation in the country.
They also said they saw no sign that food shipments from the United States, China and other countries had been diverted to the military and no indication of discontent among the population because of food short-ages."They have faith they will overcome "because they've done it before," Michael Frank, a Catholic Relief Services official who led the five-person team to 10 of the country's 12 provinces, said Thursday.
Besides Catholic Relief Services, the consortium of nongovernment agencies involved included Mercy Corps International, Amigos Internacionales, CARE and World Vision. The group monitored distribution of 60,500 tons of cereals from the U.S. Agency for International Development.
North Korea sought international help after floods late last year severely reduced its harvest of cereals, mainly rice. This year's harvest improved, but Frank said North Korea would still need food aid in 1998.
"In spite of the challenges of restricted access, language and cultural barriers, the team came away with the strong conviction that there is an enormous need" for additional food shipments, Frank said.
He said the team saw high levels of malnutrition and talked with people who took extreme measures to survive, such as picking up grains of rice in a field after completion of harvesting.
Dr. John LaNoue of Amigos Internacio-nales said the monitors experienced some difficulties in obtaining answers to their 100-question survey because the communist state is secretive with statistics.
He said North Koreans also were trained from childhood to be suspicious of Americans "and their image of us is a one-eyed person behind a rifle sight in the DMZ with barbed wire."
Frank said the team hopes to return to North Korea next March and develop a program to feed children in schools.
He said aid groups from Britain, Germany, Ireland and other countries were operating relief programs in North Korea, which formerly was closed to foreigners.