"Who Wants to Hire 40 Skilled Kimbap-Making Women?"... A 'Suspicious Ad' Appears Online

One Team of 40 Members, Hourly Wage of 8,200 Won
North Korean Government Poised to Take 75 to 90 Percent of Wages

A Russian labor agency has drawn attention by advertising that it can supply North Korean female workers to restaurants or factories.

Residents wearing summer clothes walking on the street. Chosun Central TV. Yonhap News Agency.

According to NK News, a US-based media outlet specializing in North Korea, on the 12th (local time), a labor agency advertised on the online trading platform Avito that it could provide 40 North Korean female workers to restaurants, factories, and other workplaces in the Moscow region.

According to the advertisement, the agency introduced that the North Korean female workers are skilled at making gimbap and can be employed not only in restaurants but also on production lines, in textile factories, and in agriculture. However, it added the condition that the 40 North Korean female workers must work as a single team and cannot be distributed across multiple workplaces. This appears to be a measure by the North Korean authorities to monitor the movement of workers and keep them confined to a single workplace.

The North Korean women are required to work 26 to 28 days a month, with 11-hour shifts each day. Accordingly, the hourly wage presented by the agency is 480 rubles (approximately 8,200 KRW), meaning the maximum monthly wage for each worker is 147,840 rubles (approximately 2.53 million KRW).

However, it is believed that the actual amount workers receive is much less. Peter Ward, a North Korea economy expert at the Sejong Institute, estimated that intermediaries, officials, and the North Korean government would take 75 to 90 percent of the wages.

Recently, the influx of North Korean workers into Russia has increased, as the country faces a labor shortage. Last month, it was confirmed that many North Korean female workers were employed at a dumpling factory near Moscow, and a large number of North Korean women are reportedly working in textile factories, agricultural facilities, and logistics centers in western Russia as well.

There has also been a rise in advertisements on Russian job sites seeking Korean interpreters to be dispatched to factories and construction sites where North Korean workers are employed.

Last year, Russia issued about 36,000 educational visas to North Korean residents. According to NK News, this seems to be a way to circumvent UN Security Council sanctions banning the employment of North Korean workers by bringing the workers in under student status.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.