Although they "almost certainly don't know it", Western owners of "shiny new wigs and false eyelashes could owe their look to North Korean slave labour".
By purchasing these products, said The Guardian, Western customers could also be inadvertently helping Pyongyang "skirt the impact of sanctions".
According to Chinese customs data, last year's exports from North Korea to China included 1,680 tonnes of false eyelashes, beards and wigs worth about $167 million.
This haul, which The Guardian said adds up to about "135 double decker buses worth", made up 60% of North Korea's declared exports to China as trade bounced back after Covid lockdowns.
After speaking to 20 people Reuters uncovered a lucrative arrangement in which China-based firms import semi-finished products from North Korea, which are then completed and packaged as Chinese before being exported to markets including the West, Japan and South Korea.
Shoppers in London and Seoul "perusing hairpieces and other accoutrements" will find labels telling them the items were made in China, not North Korea, said The Guardian.
According to a paper by a think tank funded by the South Korean government there are wig and fake eyelash-making departments at labour correction camps, where "mostly female prisoners perform the task without receiving any wages", said The Straits Times.
The two nations insist their trade is legal and claim any suggestion that it violates UN sanctions is "completely without foundation". A spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry said Beijing and Pyongyang "are friendly neighbours" and that "normal co-operation" between the two countries that is "lawful and compliant" should "not be exaggerated". | 
