N. Korea sounding out labor export to Mongolia

In this May 6, 2016 file photo, a North Korean worker looks from behind a piece of machinery at the Pyongyang 326 Electric Wire Factory, seen during a press tour, in Pyongyang, North Korea. North Korea remains one of the world’s least developed economies. Stunting due to malnutrition, abject poverty and the lack of economic options surely persist. But no more so than in many other poor nations. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)

North Korea is seeking ways to export its workers to Mongolia as the central Asian country is recruiting foreign laborers to work at its mines, a U.S. broadcaster, monitored here, said Wednesday.

“(As far as I know), the North Korean authorities recently set up ways to make use of its workforce, and keeps trying to make contacts with the Mongolian side,” the Radio Free Asia (RFA) cited a Mongolian construction official as saying over the phone.

As Mongolia is currently recruiting foreign laborers as miners, North Korea workers are likely to aggressively apply, the official said.

The mining work will go on full scale in March next year, he added.

Mongolia began to hire North Korean workers en masse in 2008, and such employment peaked with 5,000 in 2013.

At present, however, the number of North Korean workers working in Mongolia has decreased to some 1,000 due to an economic slump that hit the central Asian nation in 2014.

More than 50,000 North Koreans are believed to be forced to work overseas, mainly in China and Russia, sending substantial amounts of their salaries to the Pyongyang regime. The North reportedly earns more than $200 million per year through labor exports. (Yonhap)