North Korean Defector Writes Book About Kim Family’s European Shopping Trips

This looks like it may be interesting read though the information provided by the defector is a bit dated:

A North Korean colonel who spent two decades going on European shopping sprees for his country’s rulers said Thursday the late dictator Kim Il Sung lived in luxury while many people struggled to survive in his impoverished communist nation.

Kim Jong Ryul, who spent 16 years under cover in Austria, also described how the “great leader” and his son and successor Kim Jong Il spent millions pampering and protecting themselves with Western goods — everything from luxury cars, carpets and exotic foods, to monitors that can detect heartbeats of people hiding behind walls and gold-plated handguns.

The colonel’s account — told in a new book by Austrian journalists Ingrid Steiner-Gashi and Dardan Gashi — shows the deep divide between the lifestyles of the North Korean leadership and their citizens, who sometimes must subsist eating tree bark, knowing they will be sent to labor camps if they criticize the government.  [MSNBC]