Category: Resistance

Rimjingang has a pretty good reputation, but this would be extraordinary. Even they aren’t sure if the plot is real or fabricated by the authorities, but why would the authorities fabricate something like that? (Hat tip to a reader.)

It’s funny how life moves in oddly circular ways sometimes. I first met Col. David Maxwell more than a decade ago on Okinawa, when I was an Army defense counsel and he was commanding a Special Forces battalion. This unequal juxtaposition of his cred versus mine makes me begin this post feeling sheepish about disagreeing with one of his conclusions here, that the North Korean people are so thoroughly indoctrinated that they would not consider rising against the system. I...

So says the Daily NK of recent events in the northeastern city of Chongjin, a frequent venue for reports of anti-government sentiment: A source in North Hamgyung Province told Daily NK on January 19, “During the mourning period, one official from the provincial NSA, one from the prosecutor’s office and two from the People’s Safety Agency were murdered in Cheongjin. The source added, “There was a note found lying next to the body of the executed NSA official which said...

So now that the Syrian army is invading town after town from Dara’a in the south to its restive border with Turkey, can we call it a civil war yet? Worse things could happen there, and absent this wave of unrest, probably would have. If Syria isn’t likely to become a democracy within the next year, a destabilized Syria is probably the next best thing. If Bashar Asad is preoccupied fighting to survive, he’ll be impeded in his capacity to...

North Korea is to political disgruntlement what tar sands are to energy — enough to supply the whole world for decades, if only someone could figure out a way to harness it: Small pockets of unrest are appearing in North Korea as the repressive regime staggers under international sanctions and the fallout from a botched currency reform, sources say. On Feb. 14, two days before leader Kim Jong-il’s birthday, scores of people in Jongju, Yongchon and Sonchon in North Pyongan...

Open News is reporting that discontent with the “feudal” succession of Kim Jong-Eun is so great that people are even expressing their dissent publicly, with the presumed exceptions of the anjeonbu and bowibu. These agencies are now so concerned about the spread of dissent that they’re adopting an unusual method to reveal the heretics: “After the meeting of party representatives, public sentiment of North Korean citizens is low. The National Security Agency and party institutions have even ordered companies, village...

Radio Free Asia has published more details about those dissident leaflets that showed up in Hoeryong recently. According to sources, the leafleting occurred just 150 meters away from the Hoeryong Historic Pavilion, a site in Osanduk-Dong guarded by security agents, where the statue and birth house of Kim Jong Suk, Kim Il Sung’s first wife, are located. Near Osan Elementary School, School Village has the lowest crime rate in Hoeryong city due to round-the-clock patrols and surveillance by law enforcement,...

It’s the second such report I’ve seen this week, which is pretty extraordinary for North Korea: North Korea’s National Security Agency (NSA) has launched a hunt for the individual or organization responsible for scattering 5,000 won bills scrawled with words criticizing the Kim Jong Il regime in Chongjin, North Hamkyung Province. A source reported on Thursday that around the Kim Il Sung statue in Pohang and parts of Shinan district in the city, large numbers of 5,000 won bills inscribed...