Face-Palm, Shudder
This week there was a roundup of thirteen people for weapons trafficking in Spain. They would buy weapons that were no longer in working order on the internet from other countries. (It's legal because the weapons cannot be fired and therefore do not need a license. They are treated as collectors' items.) The problem is that once on Spanish soil, they would take them apart and tweak them to be able to fire (it's more difficult that it sounds). Then they would be sold. That part was illegal.
Among the people arrested was Alejandro Cao de Benós from Tarragona. The only reason he was mentioned is because he is the volunteer "ambassador" of North Korea. When he first popped up on the news, a Spaniard dressed in North Korean military uniform, attesting to the people's glories of North Korea, most took him as a joke. Others thought it only right that the only Western person who voluntarily embraced the shuttered society of a country that revolved around the personal cult of its leader, be a Spaniard. We never were one for picking winners.
Cao de Benós was born in Tarragona forty-two years ago. When he was fifteen he became an ardent communist. For some reason he preferred North Korea. Perhaps Cuba was too warm and informal, the U.S.S.R. no longer in service, and China too capitalist. But, whatever the reason, there he ended up. He has since become an honorary member of the Korean military, of the Worker's Party, and also an honorary journalist (that kind of says everything about journalism in that country). Though he also has North Korean citizenship, and is the only Westerner that can come and go at will, he lives most of the year in Tarragona (and that says something about daily life in North Korea). He also takes tourist groups on carefully regulated jaunts in North Korea. I heard on the news that he charges several thousand euros per person. That has raised eyebrows.
Most people in law enforcement consider him a fraud. Personally, I find him uncomfortably recent. I found his blog in Spanish. One of the entries describes how freedom does not really exist in the West unless you have money. And how thieves are "protected" by the laws and never punished. His rant reminded me of old magazines and books published in the heydey of Franco. They had the same argument, the same ideas, the same need of vengeance against miscreants. And the same defense of the lowly worker.
I hope that trafficking ring is small and hasn't had much time to convert junk pieces into deadly weapons.
Among the people arrested was Alejandro Cao de Benós from Tarragona. The only reason he was mentioned is because he is the volunteer "ambassador" of North Korea. When he first popped up on the news, a Spaniard dressed in North Korean military uniform, attesting to the people's glories of North Korea, most took him as a joke. Others thought it only right that the only Western person who voluntarily embraced the shuttered society of a country that revolved around the personal cult of its leader, be a Spaniard. We never were one for picking winners.
Cao de Benós was born in Tarragona forty-two years ago. When he was fifteen he became an ardent communist. For some reason he preferred North Korea. Perhaps Cuba was too warm and informal, the U.S.S.R. no longer in service, and China too capitalist. But, whatever the reason, there he ended up. He has since become an honorary member of the Korean military, of the Worker's Party, and also an honorary journalist (that kind of says everything about journalism in that country). Though he also has North Korean citizenship, and is the only Westerner that can come and go at will, he lives most of the year in Tarragona (and that says something about daily life in North Korea). He also takes tourist groups on carefully regulated jaunts in North Korea. I heard on the news that he charges several thousand euros per person. That has raised eyebrows.
Most people in law enforcement consider him a fraud. Personally, I find him uncomfortably recent. I found his blog in Spanish. One of the entries describes how freedom does not really exist in the West unless you have money. And how thieves are "protected" by the laws and never punished. His rant reminded me of old magazines and books published in the heydey of Franco. They had the same argument, the same ideas, the same need of vengeance against miscreants. And the same defense of the lowly worker.
I hope that trafficking ring is small and hasn't had much time to convert junk pieces into deadly weapons.
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