The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on June 20, 2024, that “A treaty on comprehensive strategic partnership between the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Russian Federation has been signed” and “Comrade Kim Jong Un signed the treaty together with Comrade Putin.” / Photo: Rodong Sinmun, News1 North Korea held week-long ideological lectures for officials in June 2026 to mark the second anniversary of its comprehensive strategic partnership treaty with Russia, framing the alliance as an unbreakable achievement of Kim Jong Un’s leadership while working to contain growing unease over the deaths of North Korean soldiers deployed to fight in Russia’s war against Ukraine. A source in South Hwanghae province told Daily NK recently that Haeju city launched the lectures on June 19 following instructions issued by higher party organs on June 18. The lectures, directed at official study groups, carried the theme that the North Korea–Russia alliance...

Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Workers’ Party of Korea, reported on October 14, 2025, that workers at Ipsok Farm in Mundok county had moved into new homes. (Photo: Rodong Sinmun-News1) North Koreans are increasingly refusing to serve as neighborhood watch unit leaders in 2026, and the trend has now reached Pyongyang, where filling the role had previously been less difficult than in the provinces. A source in Pyongyang told Daily NK on Wednesday that in one neighborhood in Pyonchon district, an aging neighborhood watch unit leader needs to be replaced but no one will volunteer. “There are people who meet the qualifications, but not a single one of them is willing to do it,” the source said. “They just keep going in circles.” North Korea’s neighborhood watch units are the country’s most basic unit of state-organized social control. Each unit covers a small cluster of households, and its...

A North Korean surveillance post photographed near the border with China. A poster describes methods of making reports, including a phone number for a neighborhood police station. (Courtesy of Kang Dong-wan, a professor at Dong-a University) North Korean authorities in North Pyongan province have sharply intensified phone surveillance in 2026, intercepting both landline and mobile calls to crack down on traders conducting business across provincial boundaries, a Daily NK source in the region reported on Wednesday. The crackdown has prompted a growing number of people to avoid phone calls altogether, communicate only in person, or use coded language when calls are unavoidable. “The National Intelligence Agency‘s wiretapping has gotten so bad in cities and counties across North Pyongan province that people are trying not to make calls at all,” the source said. “For sensitive matters, they meet in person, and if they absolutely have to call, they speak in code.”...

Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Workers’ Party of Korea, reported on June 9 that Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife, Peng Liyuan, had arrived at Pyongyang International Airport the day before, on June 8. The newspaper said President of the State Affairs Commission Kim Jong Un and his wife, Ri Sol Ju, greeted them at the airport, and that the two sides shared what it called “an emotional reunion.” (Photo: Rodong Sinmun-News1) When Chinese President Xi Jinping visited North Korea on June 8 and 9, 2026, for a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the pageantry on display — welcome ceremonies, state banquets, elaborate artistic performances — appeared carefully staged to send a message of Sino–North Korean solidarity to South Korea, the United States, and Japan. But a close comparison of how each country’s state media covered the visit tells a more complicated story, one...

FILE PHOTO: Taken on on the Chinese side of the Yalu River, this photo shows apartments being built in Sinuiju’s Ponbu District. (Daily NK) North Korean authorities intensified a crackdown on unlicensed home lodging operations near the border in 2026, threatening expulsion for repeat offenders and pushing travelers toward state-run guesthouses as officials tighten their grip on internal movement. A source in North Pyongan province told Daily NK on Tuesday that repeated directives have been issued through neighborhood watch units across multiple districts in Sinuiju, including the Nammin neighborhood, warning that unauthorized lodging and unlicensed commercial accommodation will be met with serious consequences. Neighborhood watch units are the lowest-level administrative cells in North Korea’s surveillance system, responsible for monitoring the day-to-day activities of residents. “The message being sent is that getting caught hosting an outsider without reporting it won’t end with a simple reprimand,” the source said. This month alone,...