North Korea insists it has no need to reform or open up

The world's most closed country, North Korea, has nothing to reform and no need to open up, the ruling party's newspaper reported yesterday.

But in a rare concession, the Worker's Party official Rodong Sinmun newspaper, indirectly admitted something that the rest of the world has been saying for decades: the country's economy is in trouble.

"'Reform' and 'opening', much touted by the imperialists and reactionaries, are not 'a remedy' for the DPRK to weather its economic difficulties or to revitalise its economy," the paper said, referring to the North by its acronym.

The North's centrally-planned economy, which only a few decades ago was stronger than its southern neighbour, has gone downhill after the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991.

But the Stalinist state insists it will not be pressurised into change by the capitalists from Washington.

"The imperialists do not want to change their system but work hard to pressurise others to change their systems as dictated by them," Rodong Sinmun said.

"This is an arbitrary and high-handed practice intolerable in the international community."