Comment Tweet Share Share Digg

This weekend is a big deal in North Korea – it marks the 65th anniversary of the founding of the Workers Party of Korea, the communist regime established by Kim Il-Sung following Korea’s division in 1945.  They’re having a big parade in Pyongyang and most likely doing some karaoke later in the evening to mark the occasion.  The occasion is also widely being see as the stage for the nation’s next ruler, Kim Jong-Un – son of the current leader – to step into the limelight.

This weekend also marks the first time in recent memory that foreign press have been allowed into the country en masse, and reports from the country say that the journalists – staying at the Koryo Hotel (where the North’s movers and shakers go to party) – are enjoying unfettered internet access.  A correspondent from Al Jazeera was even able to appear live on the station via a Skype video call.

Regular North Koreans are only allowed to view a heavily censored Intranet – apparently put together by the Dear Leader (the adorable nickname for current despot du jour Kim Jong-Il), who selected everything they could possibly need from the public Internet and compiled it all for his citizenry to view – those lucky enough to have access to a computer, anyway.  As such, the North allowing completely open internet access – even if it’s just for foreigners who would have been used to such freedom anyway – is a pretty big deal, and a remarkable relaxation of the regime’s usual iron grip.

North Korea has been increasing its presence online for a few months now.  An official Twitter account was launched earlier in the year (subsequently blocked by the South Koreans in an amusing display of foreign relations), and just recently the North’s first actual website – that of the official state-run news agency – took up residency on one of the 1,024 IP Addresses allocated to the DPRK, where previously it had been run through a Japanese proxy.

Could it be that North Korea’s leader is finally using his self-proclaimed status as an Internet Expert to do some good, or is it all just an empty gesture to appease foreign powers in preparation for the younger Kim’s ascendency?  Time will tell, although we’re guessing full-on internet access is still a very long way away for most North Koreans.