Tokyo, January 20, 1996


Dear Sir:

        I have just received this clipping from your paper and that is why
I am urgently writing you now and trust you will publish this letter or
check with me if you choose to run an abbreviated version:

...

        I was quoted, but not fully, giving readers the opposite meaning,
in the article you shortened from The Washington  Post on your front page
(December 21), "Seoul, Jittery, Sees a Menace in North" by Kevin Sullivan.
I  launched an Internet campaign to help the 500,000 flood victims in North
Korea threatened by famine (http://shrine.cyber.ad.jp/mrosin/flood).
  I visited three of the damaged areas in November and donated relief goods
directly to the victims. I am continuing my campaign focused on donating
rice, this time,  to the same people now facing famine, on my next trip in
February.

        Your deletion, however,  of an essential paragraph of the quote
which appeared in the original article in the Washington Post  has given
the impression that I disputed the accurate reports of the The
International Red Cross and the World Food Program experts  which describe
the serious food shortage and imminent famine there. My own views confirm
this in the complete quote.

        Potential donors to my campaign, particularly in Europe, where the
Trib  is widely circulated, who have seen my appeal on the Internet have
written me that they see no need to contribute since I myself was quoted in
your paper as saying  the people are well fed. This is not the case. In the
complete quote I added many of the villages I visited only had a very short
supply of rice left and by now could be without food.

        I trust, both in the interest of accuracy, and  to prevent the
starving population from not receiving aid from  people who may have been
misled,  that you publish the complete text of my quote below:

>               At least one report out of Pyongyang paints a much less
>     bleak picture of the food supply than a report released this week by
>     the United Nations. While the serious damage inflicted by last
>     summer's floods is indisputable, one person who recently toured the
>     worst-hit areas said they are recovering quickly.
>             "I did not see any hunger or malnutrition when I was there,"
>     said Bernard Krisher, an American who lives in Tokyo and spent two
>     weeks in North Korea in late November delivering $25,000 worth of
>     relief supplies he raised through an appeal on the Internet.
>              Krisher said that in the worst-hit areas, including Sinuiju
>     on the Chinese border, people still had food, electricity and
>     heating fuel and were in good spirits. He said most people who had
>     been living in schools or other temporary shelters since the floods
>     have moved back into their rebuilt homes. Nearly all the homes he
>     saw had a single overhead light bulb and a black-and-white
>     television set, he said.
>             The daily ration of rice had been cut since the floods from
>     36 ounces to about 17 ounces, about two big cupped handfuls, he
>     said. While that is a small allotment, it is only slightly less than
>     the 18 ounces that the United Nations considers the minimum daily
>     adult requirement.
>             Although Krisher said he saw nothing immediately dire, he
>     added that food stocks are limited. In some places, he said, there
>     was only enough rice in warehouses to last a month. Without
>     continued foreign aid, the situation could become much more
>     desperate, he said.


        The final two paragraphs (which you omitted) is key to what I told
Mr. Sullivan and he faithfully quoted it in his story which appeared in the
Washington and other U.S. newspapers. Your copy editor,  however, chose to
cut this essential portion  and thus distorted my observation. I hope you
will run the entire quote in order to set the situation right.

        I welcome further donations from the public to increase the amount
of rice I plan to order by February 15  to be shipped to Nampo port,
consigned to me,  where I will fetch it and truck it directly to villages
for personal distribution which the North Korean government has already
approved, as in November. This assures that no food brought in by me will
be diverted to other purposes. One metric ton of rice costs $250 which will
feed 75 persons for one month.

Sincerely yours,

Bernard Krisher