Are there pets in North Korea?

Kim Jong-un has a cat!
How are we going to know! It is the most secretive place on earth where they worship, as a god, an obese, chain smoking shorty with a funny haircut who’s allegedly very ill.
Well, the best place to find out is the front page of the internet, Reddit. At least that is a good starting point.
Relying on visits to the country and first hand sightings they tell us that there are very few cats and dogs in North Korea. The reason put forward is that the citizens of the country are generally so poor that they don’t have the means to feed a pet. They are starving. All the money the country earns goes on new nuclear missiles and feeding the tens of thousands of generals who follow their god-like leader with notepad and pencil recording every word he utters.
Apparently on one tourist tour the guide shouted, ‘Look a dog’ as he pointed one out which happened to be a toy poodle. He explained that he was excited to see the animal because tourists always ask why nobody has a dog. A Western guide on the bus said the poodle belonged to the French Consular’s wife! 🙂 .
One of the those who had visited the capital, Pyongyang, said that there was just one cat at a restaurant. The cat was cute and friendly….and very alone.
Perhaps one reason why there are so few cats and dogs is because they eat them as they are so damned starved.
I expect there to be cat and dog pets in North Korea but far less of them than in America or the West generally. There must be some feral cats and dogs too. There won’t be a ‘feral cat problem’ as is so often discussed in America (in N. Korea they’ve eaten them all). I’d expect cats to be rarer than dogs as dogs are more utilitarian and in their eyes more useful e.g. security. And of course the relationship does not have the best of foundations as eating cats and dogs precludes them being pets. They are livestock instead.