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For two hours every day, Lee Si-young and his colleagues broadcast uncensored foreign news into the authoritarian north koreaIf caught listening to the radio, its listeners could go to jail,
Lee’s Seoul-based Free North Korea Radio Station has attempted to deliver real-time news to North Korea’s 26 million people for two decades. But Lee says he is now sensing a crisis in his work as a major state-funded broadcaster United States of America And South Korea has been quiet this year due to major funding cuts and policy changes.
“Our frustration with the U.S. and South Korean governments over the suspension of radio broadcasts is growing,” said Lee, a defector and head of the small, non-governmental FNK radio station. “We fear they have abandoned North Korean residents.”
Major channels broadcasting in North Korea went silent
In North Korea, all radios and TV sets are tuned to government channels.
But defectors have testified that they modified their radios or used smuggled radios to secretly listen at night to foreign broadcasts that their government did not want them to hear. This includes outsider perspectives on the North’s ruling Kim dynasty, more prosperous and freer Western lifestyles, and success stories about defectors.
But a reputable academic website focused on North Korea, 38 North, assessed last month that such external radio broadcasts toward North Korea had declined by 85% following curtailments imposed by the U.S. and South Korean governments.
The two major US-funded broadcasters – the voice of america and Radio Free Asia – were forced to halt their Korean-language radio broadcasts after US President Donald Trump in March signed an executive order effectively dismantling the agency that oversees media networks or funds them. Trump said the networks have a liberal bias or wasteful spending.
South Korea’s liberal government, led by President Lee Jae-Myung, halted cross-border radio broadcasts in an effort to reduce hostilities with North Korea. His government also shut down frontline loudspeakers that play K-pop songs and world news, and banned activists from flying propaganda leaflets and balloons with USB sticks across the border.
The FNK station is now one of several small civilian or religious organizations that still broadcast radio broadcasts in North Korea. FNK chief Lee said VOA and RFA are much larger than his group, which has only five employees, all North Korean defectors.
He said, “Our hearts are heavy and conflicted over whether we should tell the North Korean people that those suspended broadcasts were only temporarily halted and will definitely be resumed or that we are the only ones among the few who have survived.”
A website and app targets North Koreans living abroad
Despite setbacks in efforts to spread outside news into North Korea, South Korean defector-turned-lawyer Lee Young-hyeon launched a website and a mobile app this month aimed at providing North Koreans an alternative way to receive outside information.
Lee said his Korea Internet Studio would first target thousands of North Koreans living abroad, including workers, students, diplomats and their family members. Many of these North Koreans abroad use mobile phones with global Internet access, which citizens in the North do not have.
Lee said his group’s goal is to create practical content that North Koreans abroad can use, such as how students can get better credit in foreign schools, what gifts workers can buy for loved ones at home and what cryptocurrencies are.
Lee said, “We do not expect the public to use our content to start a rebellion and overthrow the North Korean government.” Its purpose, he said, is for North Koreans to learn that “there is a good world where they can enjoy some freedoms and rights.”
Lee said he thinks North Korea will eventually ease its strict restrictions on the Internet in a limited way because that could allow Chinese, Russian, Vietnamese and other foreign companies to open local offices in the North.
However, many observers are skeptical.
Since 2020, North Korea has enacted highly repressive laws to toughen its fight against foreign cultural influences, especially from South Korea. The Reactionary Ideology and Culture Rejection Law reportedly provides for up to 10 years’ imprisonment with hard labor for those who consume, possess or spread foreign films and music, and up to five years’ imprisonment for those who use unauthorized radio and TV channels.
Defectors see influence of foreign broadcasts in North Korea
Some question whether campaigns to provide outside news to North Korea have made any difference. Propaganda balloon launches and loudspeaker broadcasts have also been a major source of tension with North Korea.
In July, South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young called radio and loudspeaker broadcasts a “relic of the Cold War” and expressed hope that their suspension would improve relations with North Korea. In response to questions from The Associated Press, the South Korean Defense Ministry said the suspension of its “Voice of Freedom” radio broadcasts was done to reduce military tensions with North Korea.
South Korean officials say North Korea has also shut down its own border loudspeakers and stopped broadcasting jamming signals targeting South Korean radio broadcasts. But North Korea is still refusing to restart long-stalled talks with South Korea and the US
Before his defection in 2003, Paek Yosep said he was shocked when South Korean radio broadcasts reported on anti-government protests. soulSomething that is unimaginable in North Korea. Paek said that when he served as a soldier in a frontline unit, he enjoyed listening to music playing from South Korean loudspeakers across the border.
Kim Ki-sung on the FNK station said that the South Korean radio broadcasts he had listened to for a decade before fleeing North Korea in 1999 influenced his defection. He said he learned that South Korea was so rich that it could give loans to the Soviet Union and had so many cars that it caused traffic jams.
Kim said, “I’m not sure how badly the drugs are addictive but I think those broadcasts were as well.” “Many people ask us whether we have confirmed that people in North Korea are actually listening to our programs. But I believe we should continue to do so, even if only one person listens to our broadcast.”