Sending Out Signals to Long-Isolated North Koreans (hail Free North Korea Radio)

WP ^ | 12/30/07 | Francine Uenuma

[TigerLikesRooster]

Sending Out Signals to Long-Isolated North Koreans

Defectors Who Once Worked for Government of Kim Jong Il Now Broadcast From South of the DMZ

By Francine Uenuma

washingtonpost.com Staff Writer

Sunday, December 30, 2007; A27

SEOUL -- Trained as a military propagandist in North Korea, Kim Seong Min has turned his skills against the government that once forced his allegiance. From a small radio studio in Seoul, he and a handful of other North Korean defectors deliver daily broadcasts to people who remain behind in the isolated communist state run by Kim Jong Il.

"To give food provisions, if the Kim Jong Il regime still exists, is merely prolonging their lives in a state of slavery," said Kim, founder and director of the station known as FNK, for Free North Korea Radio. "But broadcasts . . . give an opportunity to change their own future, and provide food for the spirit."

The North's estimated 23 million people have little accurate information about the outside world. Listening to foreign news sources is illegal, part of a government effort to block infiltration of subversive ideas. But as more North Koreans buy low-cost radios brought in from China, violating that ban has become easier.

[TigerLikesRooster]

Ping!

[SevenofNine]

That so coollll Tiger

[PLMerite]

Radio Free Kimchee !!

[RichInOC]

“You bleaking my barrs, peopre. You bleaking my barrs....”

[jokar]

Thanks Tiger.

Good luck to these poor devils.

[John Jorsett]

The Norks have radios? I thought they barely had dirt ...

[RWB Patriot]

Think the guys who trained him will get executed since they can’t punish him?

[VOA]

Too bad there was no mention of the project to spirit radios into
North Korea via balloon.

Maybe 5-6 years ago The Los Angeles Times (amazingly) ran an article
about a West German (human rights activist?) and a South Korean guy
that would fill ballons with helium, add a string tied to a small radio...
and then release them during opportune winds to land in a (relatively)
random pattern in North Korea.

I suspect the only reason the article ran was due to the large
South Korean population in the “Mid-Wilshire” area of Los Angeles.
(despite the Leninist/Marxist leaning of The Los Angeles Times)

[VOA]

Think the guys who trained him will get executed since they can’t punish him?

Don't know about that.
But if his parents or any children are still in North Korea,
they probably caught hell after his escape.
(IIRC, the North Korean have a "three-generation" approach to
punishing dissidents and their families.)

[AF_Blue]

Unfortunately, North Korea has installed jamming equipment along the border, affecting radio, television, and cell phone signals going either way. Pointed out to me during a recent visit to the JSA.

[nw_arizona_granny]

Thank you for the ping.

I am glad someone is attempting to reach them and suspect that many are, if we knew all the attempts being made.

[gaijin]

West German (human rights activist?) and a South Korean guy that would fill ballons with helium, add a string tied to a small radio... and then release them during opportune winds

Remember it clearly, yes. Don't ask me but the SOUTH Korean government stopped it! YEP!

My understanding is that looking at the East German experience, the ROKs (lib gov't flunkies) are in fact scared of the HUUUUGE costs that re-unification would actually bring and wish for it NOT to occur.

I'm not a ROK expert, however. I'm mostly a Japan guy.

You prolly want Tiger-Likes-Rooster for that --he's the total expert.

I've seen lots of interviews with the German doctor guy you're talking about --originally he got some kind of medal up there before he fell out of favor with the DPRK's.

[VOA]

My understanding is that looking at the East German experience,
the ROKs (lib gov't flunkies) are in fact scared of the HUUUUGE costs
that re-unification would actually bring and wish for it NOT to occur.

Interesting. And perhaps the most rational explanation of the
South Korean policies I've heard.

For awhile I thought South Korea was going soft and might almost
go hard-Socialist in sympathy with North Korea.

If anything, what you say makes me think the South Korean
wonks have done a business analysis and decided to eliminate
(or at least delay) a huge business liability!
Pragmatic maybe; noble, maybe not.

[reagan_fanatic]

The Soviets did a lot of jamming too back during the cold war, but we managed to get broadcasts through from time to time.

I suspect the same will happen in Korea.