Story highlights
North Korean propaganda video pulled off YouTube website
Game maker Activision says video used scenes from Call of Duty game
Video appeared as experts say North Korea nuclear test imminent
Walt Disney Company denounced North Korea's use of Mickey Mouse in 2012
A bizarre three-and-a-half minute North Korean propaganda video – depicting a city resembling New York but with its skyscrapers on fire – was pulled from YouTube this week after videogame maker Activision said those scenes were lifted from its top-selling game “Call of Duty.”
Clicking on the now-defunct YouTube link brings up the message: “This video has been removed by the user. Sorry about that.” But the video can still be found elsewhere on the internet.
The anti-U.S. video also employs an instrumental version of “We Are the World,” written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, while a sleeping North Korean man apparently dreams himself aboard a North Korean space shuttle launched into orbit around the Earth.
Just after the video’s two-minute mark, a city covered by a large American flag is seen apparently being bombarded by a missile attack.
The Korean-language caption that scrolls across the screen says, “Black smoke was billowing somewhere in America. Maybe the group of Satan, who has been habitually conducting an invasion war, are burning in the fire they set themselves.”
The release of this video, the latest in a series of regular propaganda videos, comes as experts and officials widely believe North Korea is on the verge of its third nuclear test, following trials in 2006 and 2009.
The country’s use of copyrighted material is not new. In 2012, Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh and a cast of Disney characters appeared at a Pyongyang theater for newly-ascended North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
The Walt Disney Company denounced the use of its characters and said in a statement, “This was not licensed or authorized by The Walt Disney Company,” according to the Associated Press.
