North Korea is just avoiding (being subject to) economic sanctions.

If the Security Council takes any punitive action, like economic sanctions, North Korea has said this is tantamount to going to war.

All of North Korea is a jail.

Sanctions make a substantial contribution to power based on privation, and they have never hurt a single despot in the whole history of their use.

Inside, I’m assaulted by the evening propaganda broadcasts coming over the apartment’s hardwired loudspeaker. There’s one in every apartment and factory floor in Pyongyang

I felt like a frog that had just come out of its pit, from which it had contemplated the circle of sky outlined by the rim, and taken it for the whole of the world. I had passed through to the other side of the mirror. (162)