Description:

North Korea is boxing far above its weight. How is it possible that one of the poorest countries on earth finances a nuclear weapons program large enough to challenge the USA? The answer: Bureau 39, a legendary organization nestled deep inside the government apparatus. Its aim: to procure foreign exchange by any means possible to provide Kim Jong-un's regime with money. Printing dollars, dealing drugs, smuggling arms, insurance fraud, human trafficking - nothing is too unscrupulous for North Korea's money makers. Film shows a unique access to insiders who reveal the most spectacular cases and breath-taking tricks of how North Korea has been circumventing UN sanctions to finance its nuclear arsenal for decades.

Biography:

Sebastian Weis is a producer and reporter at VICE in Berlin, Germany. He studied literature at the University of Saarland before he made a journalistic training in Berlin. Weis worked for several German broadcasters like ARD, ZDF, Deutsche Welle, and Deutschlandfunk. In 2015 he became a news reporter and producer at VICE and worked in conflict and war zones like Syria, Iraq, and Mali. His VICE documentary on the refugee crisis in Germany, “Room for Rent,” was awarded with the People’s Choice Webby Award 2016 in the category News & Politics: Individual Episode.