Will the young 'un take over in Pyongyang?

Kim Il-sung Square in Pyongyang was the scene of a major military parade this weekend. It was the first time such an event was filmed for western TV. Probable successor to Kim Jong-il - who else but his son, Kim Jong-un, (the "Young 'un" - ha, ha) - appeared with his dad. It's a big planet with a lot of strange things on it, but North Korea has to be one of the strangest. It's next door neighbour, South Korea, is an economic powerhouse that sailed through the recent global credit crunch with barely a blip. Up north, the vice-like grip of the Kim dynasty has ensured that the country slipped steadily down to the bottom rungs of output per capita. The QSL is from the Korean Central Broadcasting System, received in 1967. In those days the South African apartheid regime was fiercely anti-communist. Despite this, here was a schoolboy in Cape Town receiving QSLs from every communist state there was. And these countries were only too keen to oblige. Fortunately, no security policeman ever came knocking on my door!