In the midst of all the media coverage of North Korea, it may seem that there would be little more room for a clash between the press and the Democratic People’s Republic. Yet it was recently revealed that three BBC reporters joined a group of 10 students from the London School of Economics without the government’s permission. John Sweeney and two colleagues, while working on the Panorama documentary North Korea Uncovered (on BBC World News the weekend of April 20), joined the group from the LSE’s Grimshaw Club (part of the International Relations Department), thereby gaining entrance into the nation notoriously closed to foreign press.
But as The Guardian reports:
the LSE disputed whether the students gave their informed consent, claiming they had been deliberately misled by the BBC, and challenged the corporation’s risk assessment. “It is LSE’s view that the students were not given enough information to enable informed consent, yet were given enough to put them in serious danger if the subterfuge had been uncovered prior to their departure from North Korea,” the university said in an email sent to all staff and students on Saturday.
The BBC, however, plans to keep the program on the air—so let’s get ready to watch some ethically questionable footage!
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