NORTH KOREA: North Korea, one of the most isolated countries in the world, has taken a major step towards opening up by allowing the development of its first high-speed Internet link.
The reclusive state has agreed to the building of a fibre-optic link via a cable to China to allow the establishment of an online lottery.
For a country where people have no access to foreign television, radio, newspapers or books, the move is a significant step forward.
The new lottery game, DPRKoreaLotto.com, will start operating next week using the Internet line which was completed by the North Korean Ministry of Communications last month.
Previously, there was no known high-speed Internet access in North Korea.
Most offices, including foreign embassies, can e-mail only by dialling into service overseas on painfully slow telephone lines.
Ordinary North Korean citizens are not allowed Internet access.
The online lottery company will be the country's first Internet joint venture, with a a South Korean company, Hoonnet Co.
The company president, Mr Kim Beom-hoon, approached the South and North Korean governments with his ground-breaking idea 18 months ago.
Mr Kim said yesterday his only interest is to woo online gamblers around the world to DPRKoreaLotto.com.
He said the big draw was that players could win 100 per cent prize money, as North Korea does not charge any tax from the lottery.
"Most capitalist countries have special laws on Lotto.Their Lotto takes money from the poor people, and then the money is used by the government."
The online lottery will offer a jackpot of $11,980 in a variety of different games, and the site will also provide Internet payment and e-commerce facilities selling North Korean products such as mineral water online.
Mr Kim said that gamblers can claim their winnings in any country in the world.
One of the lotteries offers gamblers the chance to win a free trip to North Korea to watch the Arirang celebrations starting next month, including a mass gymnastics display by 100,000 performers.
Mr Kim's company invested some $1.16 million in the project, including $200,000 for use of the fibre-optic link, which is connected with a China Telecom cable to Beijing and Shanghai.
When he first put the idea to the South Korean government, it said it was impossible as it was not allowed to use the Internet in the North.
But after a year and some 20 meetings with North Korean officials in Beijing, Mr Kim was granted approval to set up the joint venture to become the only commercial user of Pyongyang's new high-speed Internet link.
However, last week South Korea's Unification Ministry said it would block the lottery website and punish any South Koreans taking part in the lottery.
The Ministry did not say how it would block the web link.
Although South Korea is trying to improve relations with North Korea, it retains an anti-communist National Security Law which forbids contacting North Koreans or their organisations.
Telecommunications, rail and postal links have been severed for decades between the two Koreas, who remain technically at war after the bloody Korean conflict of 1950-53.
Mr Kim declined to say if government offices in Pyongyang were hooked up to the Internet via the same cable.