Tens, if not hundreds of people, are believed to have been killed when a major apartment block collapsed in the capital Pyongyang due to substandard construction. Uncertainty also surrounds whether the building had been recently completed or was still under construction. The significance of this collapse was highlighted only some days afterwards with an official ceremony to commemorate the dead. In North Korea no independent unions are allowed, and reports point to substandard conditions and poor wages, whether in the north on the border with China or in the joint South Korean industrial zone of Kaesong.
Tens, if not hundreds of people, are believed to have been killed when a major apartment block collapsed in the capital Pyongyang due to substandard construction. Uncertainty also surrounds whether the building had been recently completed or was still under construction. The significance of this collapse was highlighted only some days afterwards with an official ceremony to commemorate the dead. In North Korea no independent unions are allowed, and reports point to substandard conditions and poor wages, whether in the north on the border with China or in the joint South Korean industrial zone of Kaesong.
