North Korea News Podcast by NK News

Following a barrage of balloon launches across the inter-Korean border, North Korea analyst Daniel Pinkston joins the podcast to discuss why North Korea is sending trash South and how Seoul should respond.  He also talks about how North Korea uses “digital authoritarianism” to control its citizens with technology, as well as the DPRK’s international arms trade and Pyongyang’s move away from reunif...

North Korea bombarded the South with hundreds more waste-carrying balloons over the weekend, leading Seoul to set up loudspeakers along the border and carry out a propaganda broadcast for the first time since 2018. Meanwhile, NK News analysis has found that the DPRK is clearing land inside the demilitarized zone (DMZ) at six different locations, likely in violation of the Korean War Armistice Agre...

When North Korea released a new song praising leader Kim Jong Un in April, the regime was likely not expecting it to go viral around the world.  DPRK historian Peter Moody joins the podcast to discuss Pyongyang’s latest hit, the popularity of North Korean girl bands and how they are influenced by K-pop, representative works that offer insight into what the country was like at the time of their cre...

North Korea has launched around 1,000 balloons toward the South since last week, each carrying around 22 pounds (10 kilograms) of waste, including cigarette butts and manure.  NK News CEO Chad O’Carroll (@chadocl) and Senior Analytic Correspondent Colin Zwirko (@ColinZwirko) sit down in the studio to discuss the DPRK’s unusual launches and its anger at leafleting by ROK activists. They talk about...

North Korea failed this week to place a spy satellite into orbit for the third time in four attempts since last year, after a carrier rocket exploded shortly after a satellite launch on Monday night. NK News correspondent Shreyas Reddy joins the podcast to talk about what went wrong, and why the DPRK opted to use a new engine after achieving success with a different design last November. Then, Amb...

Former South Korean President Moon Jae-in released a lengthy memoir this week focusing on his foreign and defense policies and diplomacy with North Korea. NK News News Trainee Joe Smith shares what Moon revealed in his new book, as well as why two more World Cup qualifiers have been relocated from Pyongyang and North Korea’s display of new portraits of Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin for the first ti...

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol held his first comprehensive press conference in 21 months last week, during which he discussed Seoul’s relationship with Moscow despite Russia’s burgeoning ties with North Korea. NK News Lead Correspondent Jeongmin Kim (@jeongminnkim) joins the podcast to discuss more of what Yoon had to say, as well as a balloon launch aimed at sending anti-regime leaflets an...

In recent weeks, the mandate of the U.N. Panel of Experts tasked with monitoring the implementation of sanctions against North Korea expired. Evidence emerged that the DPRK is phasing out the use of the term “Day of the Sun” to refer to Kim Il Sung’s birthday. The regime released a new song praising Kim Jong Un. And new data from Seoul’s unification ministry showed that defector numbers remain low...

North Korean trade with its top economic partner China rebounded in March to nearly $160 million, in the latest sign of strength in bilateral exchange. NK News Data Correspondent Anton Sokolin joins the podcast to discuss what we can learn from China’s officials trade data, as well as Moscow’s plan to send some 40 zoo animals to Pyongyang. Then, Sojin Lim at the University of Central Lancashire di...

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un led a salvo missile launch to test the country’s “Nuclear Trigger’ system” for the first time this week. NK News Deputy Managing Editor Alannah Hill (@alannahmhill) sits down in the studio to discuss the test, as well as the release of a new song praising the country’s “friendly father” and allegations that DPRK animators may have had a hand in a popular Amazon Prim...

With the end of the U.N. Panel of Experts on North Korea fast approaching, NK News founder Chad O’Carroll (@chadocl) sits down in the studio to discuss the pros and cons of four alternative ways that like-minded countries could continue to monitor enforcement of the DPRK sanctions regime. Then, retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Aaron Trimble joins the podcast to discuss his time negotiatin...

South Koreans head to the polls on April 10 to cast their votes in the general election to choose their next legislators. The NK News team sits down in the studio to discuss what impact, if any, North Korea has played in the campaigns of those vying for a seat in the National Assembly. They also talk about a recent incident involving a South Korean YouTuber called a “puppet” by a waitress at a Nor...

Russia controversially vetoed a resolution to maintain the U.N. Panel of Experts on North Korea last week. NK News correspondent Shreyas Reddy (@shreyas_k_reddy) and news trainee Joe Smith (@nkjoesmith) sit down in the studio to discuss what’s next for the key institution monitoring the DPRK sanctions regime, as well as North Korea’s curious censoring of a British gardening legend’s jeans and its...

North Korea continues to process cargo through a border disinfection facility established during the pandemic despite taking steps to ease COVID-19 controls, according to NK Pro analysis. NK News senior analytic correspondent Colin Zwirko joins the podcast to talk about why the DPRK leadership may be using the center to search for politically sensitive goods, as well as leader Kim Jong Un’s appear...

The U.S. and South Korea wrapped up large-scale springtime military drills last week, but not without a response from the DPRK. NK News Managing Editor Bryan Betts (@BryanBetts21) sits down to discuss North Korea’s recent rocket salvo, as well as why state propaganda is keen to show leader Kim Jong Un is not just focused on the military. Then, scholar Sheena Chestnut Greitens joins the podcast to...

The U.S. and South Korea launched large-scale springtime military exercises to practice “neutralizing” North Korean nuclear threats this month. Pyongyang has called the Freedom Shield exercises between the allies “frantic war drills,” warning that Washington and Seoul will pay a “dear price.”  The NK News team sits down in the studio to discuss the annual exercises and Pyongyang's response, as wel...

North Korea marked the fifth anniversary of leader Kim Jong Un’s trip to Vietnam by highlighting relations between Pyongyang and Hanoi, while making no mention of Kim’s failed summit with former U.S. President Donald Trump during the same visit. NK News news trainee Joe Smith (@nkjoesmith) discusses the snub, the DPRK’s failure to pay its contribution to the U.N. budget and more.  Then, Frode Maur...

A German delegation traveled to North Korea this week to inspect the condition of the country’s embassy in Pyongyang, in what appears to be the first visit by European staff in some four years.  NK News Seoul Correspondent Ifang Bremer (@IfangBremer) discusses what this could mean for a broader DPRK border reopening and the return of international aid agencies, as well as the five-year anniversary...

Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korea’s leader, raised the possibility of engagement between Pyongyang and Tokyo last week but caveated that this is her “personal” view. NK News Lead Correspondent Jeongmin Kim (@jeongminnkim) dissects Kim Yo Jong’s statement, as well as a proposal from South Korea’s unification ministry to take DNA samples from suspected North Koreans who wash up dead...

The first group of tourists to visit North Korea since before the COVID-19 pandemic returned home to Russia this week after a 4-day trip to Pyongyang and the Masikryong Ski Resort. NK News Data Correspondent Anton Sokolin discusses plans for more groups of Russian nationals to visit the DPRK next month, the experiences of one man who spent time at a North Korean summer camp on two separate occasio...

South Korea and Russia have gone back and forth in recent days after Moscow took issue with President Yoon Suk-yeol’s description of North Korea at a defense meeting. The NK News team discusses the war of words between the two sides, along with a planned trip by Russian nationals set for this week, in what could be the return of tourists to the DPRK.  The team also talks about North Korean leader...

Some three weeks ago, longtime North Korea watchers Robert Carlin and Siegfried Hecker set off alarm bells from Washington to Seoul when they asserted that “like his grandfather in 1950, Kim Jong Un has made a strategic decision to go to war.” Their warnings in an article for the website 38 North have received widespread coverage in both ROK and U.S. media, and prompted even South Koreans accustom...

North Korea appears to have demolished a large monument in Pyongyang symbolizing hope for reunification with South Korea, following orders from Kim Jong Un to “erase” symbols that celebrate inter-Korean reconciliation and the goal of reunification. NK News Senior Analytic Correspondent Colin Zwirko discusses some of the fallout from Kim’s instructions, as well as North Korean foreign minister Choe...

North Korean propaganda websites targeting South Korea suddenly started to disappear from the internet last week, after leader Kim Jong Un declared in late December that Korean unification is now “impossible.” Some radio broadcasts into the ROK have also stopped, while the DPRK announced on Tuesday that it is shutting down several organizations dealing with inter-Korean matters. NK News Correspond...

North Korea fired more than 200 rounds of artillery shells near the inter-Korean border on Friday, according to the South Korean military, leading the ROK to conduct artillery drills in response and triggering evacuation alerts for three border islands. More artillery fire followed over the weekend, with Pyongyang claiming that it “deceived” Seoul with a fake shelling operation. NK News Correspond...