North Korea News Podcast by NK News

Representatives from Young Pioneer Tours and Koryo Tours crossed over the Chinese border to the Rason Special Economic Zone last week as part of preparatory efforts to resume full-fledged tours to the DPRK in the near future, marking a first since before the pandemic. Rowan Beard and Greg Vaczi join the podcast shortly upon their […]

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un announced that old and deteriorating neighborhoods of Pyongyang will be redeveloped in the coming years, according to state media this week. NK News Lead Correspondent Shreyas Reddy joins the podcast to discuss Kim’s revelation that major annual residential construction projects in Pyongyang won’t end when the current 50,000-home project […]

On today’s episode, intellectual historian Thomas Stock discusses his paper “Polyphonic Peace: The 1989 World Festival of Youth and Students in Pyongyang,” which explores North Korea’s hosting of the 13th World Festival of Youth and Students. This massive event, which brought together 15,000 young people from over 150 countries, was North Korea’s attempt to counter […]

The leader of South Korea’s main opposition party called for renewed dialogue with North Korea this week, while emphasizing the need to maintain strong military readiness amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula. NK New’ Correspondent Jeongmin Kim joins the podcast to discuss what Lee Jae-myung, the current frontrunner in multiple presidential polls, has to […]

In this episode, we speak with Dan Gudgeon, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Vienna, about how peace narratives shape inter-Korean relations. Drawing from his research on South Korea’s Sunshine Policy era, Dan explains how national identity and “ontological security” influence public and political willingness to engage in peace building. He then discusses whether […]

North Korea issued its first statement directed at U.S. President Donald Trump and his DPRK policy since his inauguration two weeks ago. NK News founder Chad O’Carroll joins the podcast to discuss Pyongyang’s remarks as well as reports that Ukraine killed multiple North Korean officers in a strike on a command post in Russia’s Kursk […]

Researcher Kap Seol, a frequent contributor to the leftist magazine Jacobin, joins the podcast to discuss his recent article about how the deployment of DPRK troops to fight in Ukraine could lead South Korea to respond by escalating its own involvement. The self-described former socialist also talks about the similarities between Kim Il Sung and […]

North Korea launched multiple sea-to-surface strategic cruise missiles on Saturday, with leader Kim Jong Un overseeing the first weapons test since Donald Trump assumed the U.S. presidency. NK News Correspondent Joon Ha Park joins the podcast to discuss the launch, as well as a former ROK spy likening President Yoon Suk-yeol’s alleged order to arrest […]

North Korea-Russia ties have grown by leaps and bounds since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine, while its relationship with China appears to have suffered as a result. This week, expert Lyle Goldstein joins the podcast to share insights into Pyongyang’s strategic partnerships with its neighbors and the complex dynamics that shape its nuclear ambitions. […]

In this episode, NK News Deputy Managing Editor Alannah Hill dives into the latest evidence of North Korea’s military involvement in the war in Ukraine, focusing on recently recovered handwritten notes detailing Kim Jong Un’s message to North Korean soldiers fighting alongside Russian forces. She also talks about how Kyiv’s decision to reveal the identities […]

In this special roundtable episode, NK News journalists evaluate the accuracy of their predictions for 2024 and share what they expect from North Korea in the year to come. The team discusses how the DPRK’s relations with South Korea, China and Russia have evolved and allegations that Seoul sought to provoke Pyongyang last year. They […]

Ukraine released the first testimony from North Korean soldiers captured fighting for Russia in the Kursk region on Saturday, providing the latest evidence of the DPRK’s involvement in the war. NK News Senior Analytic Correspondent Colin Zwirko joins the podcast to discuss the footage and photos of the two soldiers released by the Ukrainian government […]

In this episode, Andrei Lankov returns to the podcast to discuss key developments in and around North Korea over the last year, including the deployment of DPRK weapons and soldiers to aid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He also discusses the impact of Pyongyang’s increasing alignment with Moscow, the current state of China-DPRK ties and why […]

North Korea launched into the new year with its first test of a ballistic missile in months, firing an upgraded version of its solid-fuel hypersonic intermediate-range ballistic missile on Monday. NK News Lead Correspondent Shreyas Reddy joins the podcast to discuss what new about the missile and the timing of the launch. He also reviews […]

Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture is located in northeast China, just across the border from North Korea, and while few outsiders may know about it, the region is home to a sizable population of ethnic Koreans whose story is wrapped up with the decades-long division of the peninsula. In this episode, Chinese YouTuber Jingwu Fang joins […]

The world has long since moved on from the closures and restrictions of the pandemic, but five years since the first COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, the patchy return of diplomatic missions and foreign aid organizations to Pyongyang shows that North Korea is still far from restoring the pre-2020 status quo. This week, NK News founder […]

In this special year-end episode, the NK News podcast revisits the most compelling North Korea stories of the year, as told by the reporters who covered them. NK News journalists discuss everything from the DPRK’s Olympic glory and inter-Korean border construction to South Korea’s late-night martial law, while sharing firsthand experiences reporting their favorite features […]

The Ukrainian military claims it seized fake identification documents of North Korean soldiers killed in action in Kursk, the latest evidence that DPRK troops disguised as Russian soldiers are supporting Moscow’s war effort. NK News Deputy Managing Editor Alannah Hill joins the podcast to discuss the latest news about DPRK troops in the region, as […]

This week, Hanna Song of the Database Center for North Korean Human Rights (NKDB) returns to the podcast to discuss the NGO’s latest white paper documenting a huge surge in regime crackdowns on outside information, as well as how NKDB’s researchers gather credible data. She shares her perspective on the controversy over the all-male speaker […]

In recent days, Kyiv has reported that a “significant number” of North Korean soldiers have participated in assaults on Ukrainian forces, allegedly suffering heavy losses as Russia uses them in more prominent combat roles. Data Correspondent Anton Sokolin joins the podcast to discuss what we know about Pyongyang’s military cooperation with Moscow and what to […]