首所朝韩合办大学的学生

Twenty-three-year-old North Korean student So Myong Jin is taking a business English class at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, or PUST.

In slightly awkward English, So tries to express the appeal of studying in an international environment.

"I learned many foreign cultures and manners, so I can have a relationship with foreigners and native speakers according to familiar natures, and cultures, and manners."

PUST is not only the first university to be co-founded by North and South Korea; but also the first private international university in the whole of North Korea.

Some 260 North Korean students, including 60 post-graduates, are currently studying at PUST.

Nearly 30 foreign academics from a variety of countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia and China, teach courses in telecommunications, life sciences and business at PUST.

All courses are taught in English.

British teacher Judith Mitchell has been at PUST for a year. She says the university has an enormous amount of potential.

"I think it's a very unique environment, with a lot of very highly motivated students, who have a real desire to study, and then bringing them here, to this campus, and allowing them to study together with foreign professors, it creates a very special dynamic, between very top quality students, and an international community, and I think that this university has a lot of potential."

The university's president, Chin-Kyung Kim grew up in South Korea and later moved to the US, where he became a successful businessman.

"I put all my resources, all my energy, all my life, I like to build this university in DPRK."

Kim says, despite the fact that all of the campus buildings have been completed; the school still lacks much of the equipment and facilities required.

"Our university needs terribly the faculties, because we have quite many majors, we need faculties, for an international standard of scholars, and also we need a lot of the laboratory equipment."

Back in 1992, Kim set up an independent university in China's Yan-bian region, an area that borders North Korea.

His energy and perseverance have led to the creation of PUST, but Kim admits that more effort will be required to keep the school running and to help it grow successfully.

For CRI, I'm Su Yi.