By Michael van Poppel
Seoul, Mar 18 (THAINDIAN NEWS) — A North Korean official was executed last week for the country’s failed currency reform that further devastated its national economy, which is already facing massive inflation and food shortages.

South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency, which usually has reliable government sources and often breaks North Korean stories first, said Pak Nam-gi was executed last week. Its sources, which the report did not identity, said Pak Nam-gi was charged with conspiracy to “infiltrate the ranks of revolutionaries to destroy the national economy.”

There was no immediate official confirmation from North Korea’s secretive government, which strictly controls all media reports in the country.

Pak Nam-gi was the former Planning and Finance Department chief of the ruling Worker’s Party of Korea (KWP). The party, headed by Supreme Leader Kim Jong-il, is often described as the last old-style Stalinist party in the world. It has been the ruling party since 1949.

Yonhap said Pak Nam-gi was sacked from his position in January and was executed at a shooting range in Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital.

Over the recent months, North Korea’s national economy has worsened further. In December, the country revalued the Won (its currency) at an equivalent of lopping off two zeros. It also faces massive food shortages and implemented new laws to tighten state control of the financial markets. It has also banned the use, and even the possession, of foreign currencies.

North Korea is known to have executed an unknown number of political prisoners and opponents of the regime, including military officers suspected of espionage or plotting against Kim Jong II.

In April 2004, reports say, the Korean government enacted a law that allowed the execution for serious “anti-state” crimes. those include participating in a coup aimed at overthrowing the government, acts of terrorism for an anti-state purpose and treason.

Further, North Korea’s ‘relationship’ with South Korea remains extremely unstable since the Korean War. Regularly, North Korean and South Korean forces are involved in conflicts - which some fear may result in an outburst and cause the continuation of the war.