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Koryolink sponsors Taekwondo championship
This week’s earnings report for Koryolink, North Korea’s only widely available cell phone service, highlighted something I missed back in September: the company was a major sponsor of the 17th Taekwondo World Championships. The event took place in Pyongyang from September 6th to 12th. Koryolink banners were strung around the Taekwando Hall where the international…
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Koryolink surpasses 800,000 3G subscriptions
North Korea’s nationwide 3G cellular network could miss an end-of-year target to have a million subscribers despite two successive quarters of record subscriber growth. Koryolink added 142,000 subscriptions in the third quarter, beating the 131,000 subscriptions added in the previous three months, to end September with 809,000 users. That leaves it 191,000 subscribers short of hitting a…
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Nautilus on DPRK’s digital revolution
The Nautilus Institute contends in a new report that North Korea is on the cusp of digital transformation thanks to the increasing importance of cell phones and computers in the country. The report, which is available online (PDF), is a comprehensive and well-researched history and study of the emerging digital communications business in North Korea and…
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Voice of Korea B11 schedule
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…
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National Program Contest underway in Pyongyang
The annual National Program Contest began on Thursday in Pyongyang, according to North Korean media reports. The event, which typically takes place in late October each year, opened at the city’s Three Revolution Exhibition Hall with speeches led by Ro Tu Chol, vice-premier of the DPRK Cabinet. The contest brings together scientists, programmers and students with…
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B11 schedule for Japan’s broadcasts to North Korea
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…
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Around 40 questioned over “pro-NK” Internet postings
Authorities in South Korea are questioning around 40 people over Internet postings said to be in support of North Korea, according to several local news reports. (Update: The Dong-a-Ilbo reports around 70 are under criminal probe on suspicion of circulating materials praising North Korea online in violation of the National Security Law.) The material was posted…
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Orascom planning 3G Internet service
Orascom Telecom is planning to add Internet service to its 3G cellular offering in North Korea, according to the Choson Exchange blog. Writing in a post on Sunday, Geoffrey K. See, the organization’s executive director and founder, says the service is currently being tested but should be available in the near future. The information on the…
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Seoul eyes harsher crackdown on “pro-NK” websites
South Korean prosecutors are launching a crackdown on websites and users judged to be posting “pro-North Korean” material, according to several local press reports. The action comes as regulators judge the amount of such material available to South Korean citizens has “mushroomed to a risky level,” according to prosecutors quoted by Yonhap News said. North Korea’s…
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RSF reports on media in North Korea
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…
