North Korean premier Kim Jong-un has ordered his forces to "eliminate" pigeons as he believes they are spreading Covid-19. The 37-year-old has fears that birds flying from neighboring China are carriers of the deadly coronavirus and should immediately be stopped from either entering the country and those inside should be shot down.
According to reports, border town residents have been seen opening fire, sparking comparisons with 1970s cartoon baddies Dastardly and Muttley, in an attempt to stop Yankee Doodle Pigeon. Stray cats have also been blamed for spreading the virus and are being killed randomly in North Korea.
Bizarre Move
According to reports, authorities in towns and cities particularly along the border have been seen shooting at birds and searching for cats and owners who refuse to give them up. In fact, the local authorities too are paranoid now and are getting aggressive with family and individuals who are refusing to hand over their pet acts and pigeons.
The move comes after an order was issued to "catch and eliminate pigeons and cats" in North Korea as part of a Kim's wider effort to curb the spread of Covid-19, which he believes is still coming from China and pigeons are the main carriers.
In Hyesan, a family of four was forced into an isolation facility for secretly raising a cat. The family told the authorities that their cat had died. But it was seen near a chain-link fence. Border patrol guards tried to capture the animal, but failed. It was last seen heading for a residential district.
The incident was reported up to the provincial quarantine command. After two days of investigation the owner of the cat was arrested his family was kept in the isolation facility for over 20 days and then released. However, by that time the cat were traced and caught and then killed.
Kim's Weird Thinking
Kim has been taking strange steps as he believes that the coronavirus is being purposefully sent by China into North Korea. Over the past few months, he has taken several measures to cut off all Chinese links with North Korea.
Earlier this month, it was revealed that Kim has reportedly banned the use of Chinese medicine at all major hospitals across the country after the death of an official. The bureaucrat, who was in his 60s and suffering from a heart-related illness, is said to have been popular and very close with Kim Jong-un, who became North Korea's Supreme Leader in 2011 after the death of his father Kim Jong-il.
Interestingly, North Korea claims to have suffered no confirmed cases of Covid-19 during the pandemic. However, it has been busy promoting medicines made domestically as foreign treatments are widely unavailable due to sanctions imposed by the United Nations. Moreover, North Korea also doesn't have faith in medicines produced by foreign countries.
