Analysis
Latest images: Snow comes to Sohae launch facility
Dec 5th
It’s sadly not possible to get a live look at North Korea’s Sohae launch facility, but we do have the next best thing: a satellite image from earlier today.
The image was taken by a GeoEye satellite at 11:34am local time (0234 GMT) and shows dustings of snow across much of the launch facility. (As usual, click for a larger version of the image.)
Satellite images had previously shown increased activity at the site and suggested a launch was being planned, but it wasn’t until Saturday that North Korea made it official: the county will attempt to launch a Kwangmyongsong 3 satellite More >
Satellite images show changes at Sohae-ri rocket launch facility
Nov 29th
Both of the major private satellite imagery providers, GeoEye and DigitalGlobe, have captured images of the North Korean satellite launch facility in the last month and both images show changes from earlier this year.
Earlier this year, satellite images from the companies were one of the first indications that North Korea was preparing for a rocket launch and now that talk has restarted. It’s in part due to DigitalGlobe’s own analysis of its latest image and an article on 38 North that looks at an image from September.
So, what do the images show is happening at Sohae, also known as Tongchang-ri launch More >
WFP video from Anju, Wonsan
Oct 9th
In my daily monitoring of North Korean news and information I come across a wide range of material, much of it reported and posted by general-interest North Korean blogs like NK News or North Korean Economy Watch.
From time-to-time I come across something that isn’t so widely publicized, usually with a tech-angle that I post on here.
Over the weekend I was catching up on some North Korean reading and came across video released by the World Food Programme of recent conditions in Anju and Wonsan. There isn’t a tech-theme to the video, but it’s unlike much of what comes out of North Korea More >
China modernized North Korea’s TV news
Oct 1st
The sudden refresh of North Korea’s staid state TV evening news appears be thanks to help from China’s state TV broadcaster.
China Central Television, the government-run broadcaster of China, donated 5 million yuan (about US$800,000) of equipment to North Korea’s Korea Central Television to help improve its news broadcasts, according to a Chinese news report.
There are very few details of the deal except for a single Chinese-language report and a piece from the Korea Central News Agency.
Here’s the North Korean report:
Pyongyang, September 26 (KCNA) — The Chinese Central TV donated equipment to the Central Broadcasting Committee of Korea. A donating ceremony took place here More >
How satellite helped open up North Korea’s airspace
Aug 27th
Back in 1998 the International Air Transport Association (IATA) improved its network connection into North Korea by linking the country’s air traffic control system via satellite.
The link, via Asiasat 2, was outlined in a presentation that was sent to me soon after. I hadn’t been able to find it for years, but just located a copy in an old email archive. While old and out-of-date, I thought there might be some interest in presenting some of the information here, and providing a bit of history:
Attempts to open up North Korea’s airspace began gathering pace in the mid nineties. Flying over the More >
DPRK targets South media, but coordinates are wrong
Jun 5th
North Korea issued one of its most direct threats yet on South Korean media outlets on Monday.
[This post has been updated, see below]
The threats, to stage “a merciless sacred war” and to blow up “dens of monstrous crimes” came after South Korean media coverage of the Korean Children’s Union anniversary events that are currently taking place in Pyongyang.
From May 29 the group set in motion Chosun Ilbo, Choongang Ilbo, “A channel” of Dong-A Ilbo, KBS, CBS, MBC, SBS and other media to launch a campaign defaming the above-said celebrations. It went the lengths of resorting to a new campaign of hurting More >
More anti-Lee vitriol, and a song
Apr 25th
The North Korean media spent a second day on Tuesday heaping harsh criticism on South Korean president Lee Myung Bak and issuing threats against him and others.
On Monday, the country’s official media carried a statement attributed to the “Special Operation Action Team of the Supreme Command of the Korean People’s Army” that threatened to “burn down” Lee Myung Bak and the country’s conservative media “within three to four minutes, or shorter than that, by unprecedented means.”
Official news agency KCNA carried a number of cartoons depicting Lee as a rat (the theme repeatedly used in the current propaganda action) being captured and on More >
DPRK issues new threat against Lee, SK media
Apr 23rd
North Korea came out swinging on Monday against the South Korean government, promising to “burn down” Lee Myung Bak and the country’s conservative media “within three to four minutes, or shorter than that, by unprecedented means.”
The threats, which are stronger than the normal anti-Lee rhetoric that comes from the country’s media each day, followed a speech made by the South Korea president on Friday and were broadcast in a special news TV bulletin. It was also carried by state radio.
Here’s a clip from the English-language program of the Voice of Korea.
http://www.northkoreatech.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/120423-vok.mp3The Special Operation Action Team of the Supreme Command of the Korean More >
English transcript of Kim Jong Un’s speech
Apr 18th
Here’s an English translation of the speech delivered by Kim Jong Un on April 15th, 2012, at Kim Il Sung Square in Pyongyang:
[Update: I should have originally mentioned, this is not an official translation. The DPRK has, to my knowledge, published no transcript of the speech.]
Heroic officers of the army, the navy, the air force and the strategic rocket unit of the Korean People’s Army (KPA), and officers of the Korean People’s Internal Security Forces; members of the Worker-Peasant Red Guards and the Young Red Guards; working people of the entire country and citizens of Pyongyang; the people in the South More >
TV presenters have new double-Kim pin
Apr 14th
Sometimes it’s the little things that mark larger changes in North Korean society.
[This post has been updated, see below]
As the nation celebrates the 100th anniversary of the birth of national founder Kim Il Sung this Sunday, April 15, announcers on state television have begun wearing new pins that have two faces on them.
The “Kim pins” are familiar to anyone that closely follows North Korea. Worn on the lapel almost all the time by North Koreans, they typically have the face of Kim Il Sung or Kim Jong Il.
Eagle-eyed North Korean TV monitor Mark Fahey in Australia spotted the change in More >
