Xenophobia, the last refuge of a despot: North Korea is aggressively asserting greater control over domestic and international communications, apparently out of fear the United States could launch a preemptive military strike on the country, two sources with close connections to North Korea have suggested. Starting in April, the sources said Pyongyang blocked 90 percent of its international phone lines to hinder leaks of information to the outside world. Before April, the North operated 970 international phone lines, but the...