“The Sunday Times also quoted an official of the ruling Korean Worker's party as saying: 'In a village in Chongdan county, a man who went mad with hunger boiled his own child, ate his flesh and was arrested.
“United Nations officials visited the area during a state-sponsored trip but local reporters said it is unlikely they were shown the famine-hit areas.
“It has not the first time that reports of cannibalism have come out of the country.
“In May last year, the South Korean state-run Korean Institute for National Unification said that one man was executed after eating part of a colleague and then trying to sell the remains as mutton.
“One man killed and ate a girl and a third report of cannibalism was recorded from 2011.
“Another man was executed in May after murdering 11 people and selling the bodies as pork.
“There were also reports of cannibalism in the country's network of prison camps.
“North Korea was hit by a terrible famine in the 1990s - known as the Arduous March - which killed between 240,000 and 3.5million people.”
