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April 6, 2017

When North Korean agitprop backfires: A film about a peasant uprising is sowing dangerous ideas

What passes for a feel-good story in one of the world’s bleakest corners? Evidence that the seeds of class warfare are sprouting within a state that has fooled so many gullible leftists into believing that it’s a paradise of socialism. The Daily NK reports that an old agitprop film is inspiring exactly the kind of revolutionary consciousness that Kim Jong-un sees in his cognac-sodden nightmares. The film, “Im Kkoek Jung,” reminds North Koreans that their society has become the very thing the state’s propaganda...

Categories Class Warfare/Famine & Food Aid/Inside NK/Propaganda/Resistance/Subversion
October 19, 2015

Stage Five Watch

Over the last year, this site has carefully tracked reports about the popularity or (more often) the unpopularity of Kim Jong-Un. Throughout the summer and fall of this year, numerous reports have suggested the existence of discontent — however latent, unfocused, spontaneous, and unorganized —  among North Korea’s youth, within the elites, and even inside the military. Three recent reports have added to this evidence. A North Korean defector said Pyongyang’s Workers’ Party is “imploding” due to Kim Jong Un’s inconsistent...

Categories Inside NK/Kim Jong Un/Resistance
December 15, 2014

Tokyo Shimbun: Another deadly collapse in Pyongyang

Oh, and wait till you hear where: Last October, a collapse accident at a construction site for a new National Defense Commission Building, saw 80 people lose their lives, according to a Tokyo Shimbun report from today. The paper, citing information obtained by a South Korean government official through a source in North Korea, reported the victims were mostly laborers and soldiers affiliated with the military. It added that in order to prevent the accident scene from appearing in satellite...

Categories AP Watch/Inside NK
October 31, 2014

North Koreans buying solar panels to generate electricity.

This trends is being driven by the falling price of Chinese solar panels, and no doubt, by growing demand as well. Solar panels have become among the assets considered essential for life in North Korea by allowing households to connect them to rechargeable batteries which can power lights and household appliances, according to a local source. “Now, it doesn’t matter whether we get power from the state. With these solar panels, we can use electricity,” The South Pyongan Province-based source...

Categories Inside NK
October 10, 2014

The Asahi Shimbun looks at corruption in North Korea …

from the perspective of a former truck driver and chauffeur, tarnished by bad songbun. Along the way, the man relates a story of an act of symbolic resistance: Q: Is it true that you witnessed the defamation of a bronze statue of Kim Il Sung, the founder of North Korea? A: At Taeochon (near Hyesan in Ryanggang province), someone had thrown rabbit feces at the bronze statue of Kim Il Sung. I believe it occurred on Feb. 11, five days before...

Categories Inside NK/Resistance
October 2, 2014

Kim Jong Un has abandoned that plan to build 100,000 homes in Pyongyang …

according to The Daily NK’s sources, one of whom expressed the same reaction I had: “Perhaps he’s worried there will be another collapse and has pulled out of it.” In a few cases, “people with money,” presumably people who got rich through their state connections or positions, have taken over to complete the projects. I wonder how that will affect the safety of the construction methods.

Categories Inside NK
May 22, 2014

N. Korea Perestroika Watch: Man executed for calling China

The Daily NK provides us some updates on Kim Jong Un’s ongoing crackdown on unauthorized contact with the outside world, via sources in North Hamgyeong Province, in the far northeast: The North Korean authorities recently added five extra clauses to Article 60 of the country’s criminal code, which pertains to attempts to overthrow the state. The additional clauses codify harsh punishments for acts including illicit communication with the outside world, which could in principle now incur the death penalty. [….] The...

Categories Border Control/Inside NK/NK Economics
May 18, 2014

If a building falls in Pyongyang and AP doesn’t hear it, why the fuck is it even there?

This weekend, we hear news of a terrible tragedy in Pyongyang, the collapse of a 23-story apartment building in the central Phyongchon District. The building was still under construction, but apparently, North Koreans move into apartment buildings before the construction is completed. Sources in South Korea’s Unification Ministry told Reuters that hundreds may have died, and KCNA’s expression of “profound consolation and apology … to bereaved families” seems to corroborate that there were many dead. KCNA says the accident “claimed casualties,” but doesn’t...

Categories AP Watch/Inside NK/Media Criticism
January 14, 2014

N. Korea’s new “reign of terror” stirs fear, flushes out dissent

Rimjingang, the guerrilla news service that brought us the footage we’ll see in Frontline: Secret State of North Korea, has published a spate of reports that give credence to Park Geun-Hye’s prediction that a “reign of terror” would follow the purge of Jang Song-Thaek. The reports clearly rely heavily on third-hand rumor, so I wouldn’t necessarily consider them so much for the truth of the matters asserted as for what they say about the mood on the street. But amid...

Categories Inside NK/Regime Change/Resistance
December 3, 2013

N. Korean security forces shooting each others’ officers, and Jang Song Thaek reportedly removed

Three weeks ago, the Joongang Ilbo reported that North Korea had publicly executed 80 people in seven provincial cities for such “crimes” as Bible possession and watching porn. Norkromancers took note at the time that the Daily NK, with its formidable network of informants inside North Korea, had abstained from corroborating the reports. A new Daily NK report, however, belatedly (sort of) corroborates them now, and the venue for the reported executions has a significance unto itself: A number of...

Categories Human Rights/Inside NK
July 3, 2013

#NIGHTOUT with Daily NK: Support Free Media in North Korea

Joshua’s still away, but this is a first attempt at getting back to posting at least occasionally here. — Dan Bielefeld Even infrequent readers of One Free Korea will recognize the important role the Daily NK plays in deepening and broadening our understanding of North Korea. For those of you in Seoul, I hope you can come out Friday night in Itaewon for their first “Nightout.” For everyone else, why not send them a few bucks with an online donation....

Categories Inside NK/Media Criticism
July 2, 2012

No Pyongyang Spring

You may not believe that Kim Jong Un learned to drive at age three, but he has managed to perform one miracle — making North Koreans long for the libertine halcyon era of Kim Jong Il: The ‘Dear Leader’ Kim Jong Il’s sudden death in December of last year brought a tighter grip across the border.  Going even further, Kim Jong Un ordered a “guilt by association” system, which is a collective execution system which aims to terminate the entire...

Categories Human Rights/Inside NK/Refugees
January 13, 2012

Why they weep

This video ostensibly depicts North Koreans hysterically mourning a monster who terrorized, starved, and murdered millions of his subjects. This particular clip has accumulated more than seven million YouTube views. Videos like it have produced reels of bemused speculation in America. The near-universal reaction found this in roughly equal parts disturbing and amusing. I’m certain that I have, at times, found amusement in some aspects of North Korea that were, on closer examination, much more horrid than they were funny....

Categories Inside NK
July 16, 2011

Some Fascinating-if-True Reports from North Korea

Everyone knows that North Korea does a lot of things that we can’t explain without resorting to mostly groundless speculation about its internal power politics. This goes beyond cultural differences. I don’t know any South Koreans who can explain things like the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong incidents, which imposed real (if insufficient) financial and diplomatic costs on the regime. In our conversations, not even Kim Kwang Jin claimed to understand for certain why Kim Jong Il does things that appear to...

Categories Inside NK/Kim Jong Il/Kremlinology
January 26, 2011

North Korea Suffers Record Cold Amid Coal Shortage

In a worrisome new sign of catastrophic climate change, a record cold winter in North Korea suggests that the mere presence of two Current TV reporters may be enough to invoke The Gore Effect: Citing data from the North’s meteorological research unit, the KCNA reported that between Dec. 24 and Jan. 19, the average daytime high temperature had been minus 4.9 degrees Celsius while the morning low averaged minus 15.6 degrees. Both figures, it said, were 3.2 degrees lower than...

Categories Inside NK
December 28, 2010

The Wreck of the Tribute Train

Several of you have written in or commented on the reports of a train carrying tribute for Kim Jong Eun derailing between Sinuiju and Pyongyang, North Korea, along with speculation that sabotage caused the derailment. Several newspapers in the U.S. and South Korea pick up the story, but they all attribute it to this one, from Open News: A source in the defense department in North Pyongan province reported on the 23rd that, “The defense department was notified of an...

Categories Inside NK/Kim Jong Un