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No One Is Quite Sure Why North Korea's Twitter Account Follows A Random Investor From Texas

Jan 10, 2013, 00:54 IST

North Korea's tentative steps into the online world are always a little mysterious — the strange choices in the videos uploaded to YouTube, for example, or the 2013 website redesign that made the country's official news organization look like it was a relic from 2003.

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One perplexing detail of the country's official Twitter account (@uriminzok), is that it currently follows just three accounts — and one of them is for an American investor @JimmyDushku.

TwitterAsawin Suebsaeng of Mother Jones reached out to Dushku, a 25-year-old independently wealthy investor from Austin, Texas, to ask the obvious question — why the hell does North Korea follow you on Twitter?

Dushku doesn't have much of an answer. "People always ask me how it happened, and I honestly can't remember," he told Suebsaeng. "It started sometime back in 2010. I was initially surprised, but I always try to make friends with people from all different locations and backgrounds."

Dushku believes he may have won over the North Korean's when they first joined Twitter, tweeting them a greeting in Korean. He has no other personal links to the country, he claims.

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Being followed by one of the world's strictest dictatorships isn't all good. Dushku tells Suebsaeng that he has had a variety of angry emails, even threats, over the years from people suspicious about his relationship with the country.

On the plus side, he claims to have a standing offer from North Korean officials to visit their country.

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