Media
North Korean TV currently live streaming
Dec 8th
North Korea’s main television propaganda mouthpiece is currently available over the Internet. The live stream of Korean Central Television appears to be originate from a South Korean web site — something that puts the site operator in potential violation of South Korea’s National Security Law.
Korean Central Television broadcasts nationwide to North Korea and is relayed over the Thaicom 5 satellite to most of Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Its terrestrial signal can also be received in some areas along the country’s northern border with China and Russia, but its signal south of the border is disrupted by South Korean government More >
KCNA to launch Chinese news service
Nov 30th
North Korea’s official news agency and chief propaganda outlet, Korea Central News Agency, will start a Chinese news service this week.
The launch of the service on December 1 comes less than a year after KCNA began distributing news in Japanese and makes 2011 a year of major expansion for KCNA.
KCNA’s output of flattering articles on North Korea’s leadership, political system and progress had been available for years in an, English and Spanish via a website in Tokyo. The Japanese site was run by a group affiliated with the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chosen Soren).
Things started to change in late 2010 More >
Voice of Korea B11 schedule
Oct 29th
North Korea’s international shortwave broadcaster, the Voice of Korea, will use the following schedule for English language broadcasts from October 31, 2011, until late March 2012.
The programs appear to be refreshed during the local Korean day with each programming cycle beginning with the 1000 GMT broadcast.
The news output, which has not been observed to change more than once a day, follows closely the English-language stories from KCNA with minor editing. It’s generally a day behind the news being put out on the domestic service in Korean.
Each program is about 55 minutes long.
B11 schedule for Japan’s broadcasts to North Korea
Oct 25th
The two Japanese broadcasts that target North Korea, Shiokaze and Furusato no kaze, are updating their broadcast schedules to the winter (B11) period that runs from October 30, 2011 to March 25, 2012.
Shortwave radio remains a vitally important way to reach into North Korea because of the total lack of international communications offered to its citizens.
Shiokaze (しおかぜ) is run by a private organization, the “Investigation Commission on Missing Japanese probably related to North Korea” (COMJAN), and it broadcasts from
RSF reports on media in North Korea
Oct 11th
Reporters Without Borders has published a detailed report on the North Korean media landscape. The report is the result of of a fact-finding trip to Seoul in July by an RSF staffer and concludes that North Korea is no longer as sealed off from the outside world as it used to be.
Shortwave radio broadcasts from foreign stations, CDs and DVDs of South Korean TV broadcasts, data smuggled over the Chinese border and USB keys dropped by balloon are all creating cracks in the wall of isolation that has surrounded North Korea for decades, said the report.
It also called on the South Korean More >
Pyongyang is not happy about foreign radio broadcasts
Oct 6th
North Korea’s state-run news agency has hit out against propaganda radio broadcasts targeted at the country.
(This post has been updated. See below)
In a commentary published on Wednesday, the Korean Central News Agency criticized the broadcasts for using “the same frequency band as used by the TV broadcasting in the DPRK and conducting its anti-DPRK radio propaganda with the same radio frequency band as used in the DPRK.”
North Korea is targeted by a handful of overseas radio stations that largely transmit on shortwave frequencies to reach listeners in the country. Some of the stations, including South Korea’s KBS and Seoul-based Open Radio for North Korea, More >
AP expands KRT video deal to high-def
Sep 30th
The Associated Press has signed a deal with North Korean state television that gives it exclusive rights to high-definition video of major news events in the country.
The deal comes as AP and its biggest competitor, Reuters, race to expand their access to North Korea ahead of the 100th anniversary of Kim Il Sung’s birth — an event that is expected to see large scale celebrations and events in Pyongyang around April 15.
The new deal lasts three years and makes London-based APTN (Associated Press Television News) “the only agency to transmit broadcast-quality HD pictures of key news events in North Korea,” More >
‘I’ is for the Internet he bans
Sep 26th
Kim Jong Il made a surprise appearance on the season premiere edition of Fox TV’s “The Simpsons” on Sunday night. And so did “the Internet he banned.”
The episode, which marked the beginning of the 23rd season of the hit animated show, features a former CIA agent called Wayne. Played by Kiefer Sutherland, Wayne becomes a security guard at the nuclear power plant and eventually saves Homer’s life.
It’s right at the end of the show that he reveals he was “in a North Korean prison being forced to write a musical about Kim Jong Il with a car battery hooked up More >
Tuning the FM dial in Pyongyang
Sep 16th
Switch on an FM radio in Pyongyang and there isn’t much to listen to, according to a scan of the FM band by a recent visitor to the country.
Mark Fahey found just two radio stations available, although one was repeated on multiple frequencies.
Pyongyang FM Broadcasting (Pyongyang FM Pangsong) was broadcasting on 105.2 MHz. Mark said the station, “opened each morning with a few minutes of test tone, an interval signal and that the 6AM time signal.”
Here’s a recording Mark provided of the start of broadcasts on August 16. You can hear the station ID as “Pyongyang FM Pangsong imnida” (This More >
Group plans satellite TV to North Korea
Sep 14th
A private South Korean group is planning to raise US$46 million to fund the launch of a satellite TV station aimed at North Korea, according to a report by VOA News.
Unification TV, which could be on the air as early as next year, plans to beam South Korean dramas and other entertainment programs, according to the report. It will be launched by Korean Peninsula Vision and Unification.
The chairman of the operation, Bong Doo-wan, told VOA that broadcasting will be the best way to quickly achieve the ethnic unification that is desired by the South Korean public.
Bong is probably right that More >
