Kim Jong-Un's Power Grab Invites Swirl of Rumors
Is the ouster of North Korea's military leader a sign of more purges to come?
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New details of the Justice Department's investigation of a leak to a Fox News reporter demonstrate the scale of the inquiry: phone records, access badge information for the media, a CD of phone recordings. All to investigate a leak of incorrect information.
Is the ouster of North Korea's military leader a sign of more purges to come?
After firing the guy who was running North Korea's military on Monday, Korean State television is reporting that rather than interview a whole new slate of candidates to replace the departed general, Kin Jong-un found a perfectly suitable replacement: himself.
In today's tour of state-sponsored propaganda: A Chinese propagandist hits the mark, North Korea misidentifies its own foreign minister and press freedoms dwindle in Egypt.
It's not just international dictator gossip that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and his mystery lady seem more and more like a married couple. Analysts are scrutinizing the public appearances for signs for how the young Kim's emerging leadership style will veer away from his father's.
A summary of the best reads found behind the paywall of The New York Times.
North Korea's highest-ranking military officer has been officially relieved from all his duties due to an unnamed illness, but many observers of the new regime doubt the official story.
We've been busy gossiping about Kim Jong-Un's new lady friend, who may or may not still have a husband and child, but we've also quietly wondering how Disney would respond to Kim using, like, all of their characters for a stage show. The answer: they're thrilled.
It seems that South Korean intelligence sources have figured out who exactly that mystery woman showing up with Kim Jong-Un at all his important events. Her name is apparently Hyon Song-wol, but North Koreans know her as the illustrious front woman of the Bonchonbo Electronic Music Band.
If North Korea had a Page Six, they'd be all over the news that Kim Jong Un has been spotted twice now with an unidentified lady friend by his side. South Korean media—and maybe a few would be Mrs. Kim Jong Un's—are desperate for an answer: Is she his wife or sister?
Among Kim Jong Un's priorities as North Korean leader are establish the nation as an intercontinental nuclear threat and organize a stage show featuring his favorite unauthorized Disney characters. He's succeeding in at least one.
In today's tour of state-sponsored propaganda: Egyptian TV goes xenophobic, multinational corporations get in bed with North Korea and Cuba shares its reading list. We begin in Egypt.
Last week, North Korea threatened South Korean media companies for comparing Kim Jong Un to Hitler, and on Saturday, a massive cyber attack disabled two Seoul-based newspapers, so it's natural to suspect Pyongyang was involved.
It's been a rough week for the communication staffs of the North Korean military and the U.S. military. Today, a U.S. official was replaced after mentioning a covert operation in North Korea and last night North Korea issued a military threat that is mathematically impossible.
U.S. military officials are scrambling to dismiss a report that U.S. Special Forces have been parachuting into North Korea to gather intelligence about the regime's underground tunnels.
After North Korea's epic failure of a rocket launch last month, it's hard to get too concerned about the report that it appears to be upgrading its launchpad to handle even bigger rockets than the Unha.
In today's tour of state-sponsored propaganda, Kim Jong Un is published outside of North Korea, China's media meets Sacha Baron Cohen, and a US ambassador causes trouble for the Beijing Daily.
China does not approve of North Korea carrying out nuclear tests, but unlike in the past when the North's economic ally has warned of heightening international tensions, this time China says its worried about damage to its own environment.
A fascinating report from the Associated Press introduces us to some of the individuals within the tightly choreographed crowds North Korea trots out to celebrate its national solidarity.
When she isn't the subject of an odd "kiss" story with blind Chinese dissidents, Hillary Clinton actually has a real job to do and it means laying down the law for Chinese officials about North Korea, Iran and Syria--which is what she did today in Beijing.
Juan Williams on Condoleezza Rice, Bill Keller on North Korea, Shikha Dalmia on big government conservatives, Paul Krugman on youth unemployment, George Will on LBJ.
Following the North Korean military's vow to defeat the U.S. with "powerful modern weapons," U.S. analysts have discovered that the country's missiles are actually fakes.
Last week, when Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said "we're within an inch of war almost every day" he was talking about the narrow strip of land that divides North and South Korea. Turns out, that swath of ground is actually a merry little tourist trap.
Now that it's been suggested, we can't think of a better rock-n-roll comparison for North Korea.
If ever there was a time for China to reign in its little brother, North Korea, it would be now, as the peninsula edges
"within an inch of war."
Reuters is reporting that North Korea has "almost completed" preparations for a nuclear weapons test and that the planned explosion will come soon.
North Korea state television issued a bizarre, but ominous threat to "soon" launch a "fire of retaliation" against their South Korean neighbors and their "rat-like" president Lee Myung Bak.
Say what you will about North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, the kid knows how to pinch a penny.
In today's tour of propaganda, Kim Jong Un gives a winning smile, Chinese media does damage control, and Anders Breivik sobs after watching his own propaganda film.
James E. McWilliams on sustainable meat, The Guardian on the DMZ in Korea, The New York Times on solar energy, ClimateWire on the Mississippi Delta, and National Geographic on India's rickshaws
Mitt Romney has a few favorite words he uses as a crutch when he can't think of anything actually bad to say about President Obama.
Nobody can quite figure out why North Korea, a country that instinctively lies to its people, admitted to the embarrassing failure of its rocket launch this morning.
After all the bluster and hand-wringing over North Korea's big provocative rocket launch, the missile itself broke apart shortly after liftoff, falling into the Yellow Sea.
An Associated Press story that ran Thursday morning told the tale of a North Korean press bus that took a wrong turn into a part of Pyongyang usually shielded from reporters.
Sometime between now and Monday, Pyongyang will launch its "Unha-3" rocket some time between now and Monday, but it will have cost hundreds of millions of dollars and tons of food to make that happen.
North Korea doesn't have a lot of experience dealing with the press (because it rarely does) so when it gave its most detailed defense of its rocket launch this morning, it didn't go over so well.
North Korean officials tried to ease tensions over its upcoming rocket launch by opening its launch pad on Sunday to the international press. It didn't work.
After weeks of bluster, North Korea is finally going to fire a satellite into polar orbit next week, which raises several questions.
The environmental degradation in North Korean has become so severe, North Korea invited a group of five Americans to Pyongyang last month to talk about restoration and food security.
Amid internet riffs about Kim Jong-il looking at things (Kim Jong-un, too), and listicles such as the Funniest Evil Dictatorship Ever, it's possible to forget the atrocities that make up North Korea's system of oppression, but an Atlantic piece Wednesday provides a chilling reminder.
In the face of Pyongyang's stubborn pursuit of a ballistic missile launch next month, North Korea's neighbors are vowing to blow the rocket out of the sky.
It was supposed to be a two-day summit about keeping nukes away from terrorists, instead North Korea's temper tantrum is spoiling President Obama's plans.
The president glimpses a "time-warped" North Korea through binoculars, then tells them to knock off their "bad behavior."
On the same day North Korea very loudly proclaimed it was going to test a space rocket that many feared was a thinly disguised missile, the country quietly invited United Nations nuclear inspectors to return after three years of expulsion, the agency said Monday.
And things were going so well with North Korea. The secretive, ornery regime in Pyongyang which agreed to stop enriching uranium and stop testing long-range missiles in exchange for food aid from the U.S. is now planning to launch a rocket. For science, though.
It's the most restricted place in the world, and if you want to run a news bureau there, you're going to have to play ball with the powers that be.
U.S. diplomats this morning are trumpeting an agreement they reached with North Korea to end its enrichment of uranium and its frightening, chest-thumping long-range missile tests. Does this signal a friendlier regime under Kim Jong-Un?
With an upcoming election in Russia, the 88th birthday of Robert Mugabe and an Iranian triumph over an Israeli filmmaker, it's been a busy day in propaganda for the world's authoritarian regimes.
Iran's been dominating the news and it shows -- a Gallup poll found that 32 percent of Americans believe that Iran is the greatest threat to the U.S., followed by China, North Korea, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
The North Korean military has warned of "merciless retaliatory strikes" should the South carry out as planned two hours of live-artillery drills.
It is nothing more than a rumor, but China's Twitter equivalent, Weibo, has lit up with posts that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has died in a possible coup.
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