North Korea

Kim Jong-un keeps his word: the moratorium on nuclear tests and ICBM launches was a verbal statement. That never became a legal document, but it continues to be enforced. The same goes for promises to increase military capabilities: the leader’s speech on the subject set a number of ambitious targets. According to the Proceedings of the 8th Congress of the Korean Workers’ Party…

In the fall of 2021, news broke out that, in addition to developing a missile program, the DPRK restarted the Yongbyon reactor, its main nuclear facility, which was not operational from December 2018 to early July 2021. During the February 2019 summit in Hanoi, Kim Jong-un told Donald Trump that he was willing to dismantle the Yongbyon nuclear facility in exchange for the lifting of US sanctions that affect…

On September 11-12, North Korea successfully test-fired a new type of long-range cruise missile. The Korean Central News Agency (KCNADahJTkfw reported that the missiles “traveled for 7,580 seconds along an oval and pattern-8 flight orbits in the air above the territorial land and waters” in North Korea “and hit targets 1,500 km away,” and all design requirements were met. This was the third missile…

The South Korean media periodically publishes stories about how the North represses yet another group of teenagers.  The last such news story the author came across was from Korea Times: A group of Anju Middle School students, while on a Red Youth Guard internship, were spotted singing and dancing to a song by South Korean boy band BTS, “Blood, Sweat…

North Korea’s recent demonstration of an indigenously developed cruise missile has provided another opportunity for the United States to perform its own demonstration, one of its inexhaustible hypocrisy upon the global stage. It is also another opportunity to examine the real reason the US continues to maintain nearly 30,000 troops…

On August 15, 2021, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a congratulatory telegram to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Korea’s national holiday, Liberation Day. Putin’s telegram stated that Russia honors the memory of soldiers of the Red Army and the Korean patriots who gave their lives in the struggle for the freedom of Korea. The good traditions of friendship strengthened in those…

Amid the pause in DPRK-US relations and Kim Yo-jong’s June statement about Washington’s misguided expectations, there seemed to be no bright spots in inter-Korean relations before the end of the year. But the author was wrong: On July 27, 2021, South and North Korea reopened the communication hotlines that were shut…

There is a lot of writing about North Korean hackers, and every six months or a year the author makes a kind of summary, pointing out how the stories about the Pyongyang trail have become a self-replicating myth, and the expression “Hackers believed to be linked to North Korea” – a proof. Moreover, spring-summer 2021 turned out to be rich in high-profile events in this area…

On June 18, 2021, speaking at the plenum of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea, Kim Jong-un analyzed in detail the political trend of the new US administration’s relations with the DPRK. He explained the relevant strategic and tactical countermeasures and courses of action to maintain relations with the US in the coming days…

On July 1, 2021, the US State Department accused Russia of being “actively complicit” in the forced exploitation of North Korean workers and included it in a list of 11 countries where authorities violate the accepted anti-trafficking norms. It was alleged that in 2020 the Russian Federation issued almost 3,000 new tourist and student visas to North Koreans in 2020…

A little over a year ago, DPRK leader Kim Jong-un was at the top of search engines thanks to rumors of his death. He even skipped an annual visit to the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun on April 15 to mark the 108th anniversary since the birth of Kim Il-sung, which gave rise to rumors of a particular sort. On April 20, 2020, news outlet CNN reported that DPRK leader Kim Jong-un was possibly “in grave danger after undergoing…

In mid-April 2021, not only anti-Pyongyang propaganda, but also the relatively neutral media were seriously concerned about the collapse of the DPRK’s economic system and imminent famine. The formal basis for this was the following statement by Kim Jong-un: “I have decided that all Party organizations, beginning with the Central Committee…