Ask me about North Korea

Hello everyone! So, I am coming to you today with another announcement/request. As some of you might have seen, I have recently registered for the annual Podcast Awards competition in the category 'News & Politics'. I would be very grateful, if you could use 2 minutes of your time and support my podcast with your vote as a listener. Your help would mean a lot! You can find the instructions here: https://docs.google...

Today I am discussing one of the most important recent political developments in North Korea. Specifically, I will talk about the revisions to the rules of the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK). They were made public and resurfaced on the professional DPRK watchdog websites only a couple of weeks ago, despite the fact that officially the WPK Congress, which is the highest decision-making body in North Korea, revised those rules in January. So, what do these revisions mean for North Korea?

It was quite a sudden bit of news when Kim Jong-un, speaking at a high-level Party meeting at the end of June of 2021, warned of “grave consequences” as a result of senior officials neglecting the country’s COVID-19 prevention measures. This statement caused a lot of interest and controversy in the international mass-media with North Korea experts divided on what sort of event could have happened...

North Korean animation is not really renowned world-wide, but you might have seen some of its products without even realizing it. Indeed, its quality can be surprisingly good! For example, North Korean animators drew some of the scenes in “The Lion King”, one of Disney’s biggest bestsellers. On the other hand, it is also responsible for producing extremely funny, cringy or violent series too...

Back in the Cold War days, North Korea was one of the key players in the non-aligned movement or the so-called Third World. Pyongyang used to position itself as a leader of the opposition to international imperialism and even tried to project its juche ideology on other countries. However, now the country is largely seen as an international pariah sponging off the remaining economic and political ties it has with the developing nations...

Today’s podcast episode is an interview with an organizer of North Korea tours. Nicolas Platt is a travel guide, who works with the Young Pioneers’ Tours, one of the most renown DPRK tour organizers internationally. The YPT website describes Nic as a “North Korea wunderkind and tour guide par extraordinaire. Whilst he’s not touring you may usually find him at a North Korean restaurant in China, studying Korean or travelling unique parts of the world”.

Quite some time ago I’ve received a couple of suggestions to cover the question of how North Korea earns money illicitly. Since this is a massive topic, it took me a while to figure out what kind of episode I want to make while answering the question. Hence, today, I will try to respond to this question by focusing on the main areas of North Korean criminal activities that earn cash for the regime – ranging from drug trade to counterfeiting...

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, North Korea had a reputation as one of the most if not the most isolated societies on Earth. It was as if North Korea was already living under the conditions of a permanent COVID-19 lockdown. Indeed, it was hard to imagine that the hermit nation could get any more reclusive than it had already been. Yet with COVID-19 raging all over the world, North Korea seems to be rolling down the path of new unprecedented levels of isolationism...

The notorious leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un, has disappeared several times from the public eye in the course of 2020 and 2021, with both experts and media watchers wondering whether the North Korean leader is suffering from some sort of systemic health issue that could potentially be fatal. But what actually happens if Kim Jong-un dies? What will the immediate political ramifications look like? Let’s think about it together.

This episode will not be very analytical, but the topic that I will cover provides some important context for the previous episodes and your understanding of the North Korean socio-economic system and its place in the global trade streams. Today I will talk a bit more about North Korean exports – what the country focuses on in its production and external trade.