Trouble at Japan's North Korean schools

It took them 40 years, but apparently North Koreans living in Japan are sending fewer of their children to schools funded by Kim Jong Il.

For decades, the schools indoctrinated the children in the glories of North Korea, the evils of Japanese imperialism and the revolutionary exploits of national founder Kim Il Sung, the "Beloved Father Marshal."

But enrollment has fallen to 12,000 from 40,000 in the 1970s, parents are disenchanted, and the dream of one day returning to Chosen, as Korea is historically known, is dying. So the schools are phasing out the Kim-worship and dipping a toe in the Japanese mainstream.

The change highlights deep changes in an enigmatic minority that has stood by North Korea through the Korean War, the Cold War and the entrenchment of one of the world's most rigid and secretive dictatorships.

Via Marc.