North Korea’s Economy Is Booming – Even US Media Can’t Ignore It

[00:00:00] Amanda Yee: Is North Korea quietly becoming the world's most shocking economic success story? Decades of international sanctions were meant to strangle it, but now even mainstream media outlets can't ignore that North Korea is not only surviving, but economically thriving. We'll discuss this plus Xi's summit with Kim Jong-un on today's China Report. Welcome to the China Report. Every week we'll be helping you sort through all the propaganda with an independent view of the country we're taught to hate but know so little about. I'm your host, Amanda Yee. These are this week's headlines. Two weeks after the U.S. blacklisted nearly 80 Chinese firms over alleged military ties, including BYD, Alibaba, and Baidu, Beijing has fired back. China's Ministry of Commerce announced Monday new export restrictions on dual-use goods on 10 American companies, including Rare Earths Giants MP Materials and USA Rare Earths. Beijing also simultaneously barred government procurement from nearly 50 U.S. defense contractors, like Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and General Atomics. Beijing's message is clear: Washington's moves won't go unanswered. Experts call the response largely symbolic but strategically pointed, mirroring the U.S. tactic of using export controls as a geopolitical cudgel. With both sides now slapping restrictions on each other's corporate giants, it appears the trade war may be escalating, despite a recent trade truce between Presidents Trump and Xi. China just surpassed the West in building the world's most powerful supercomputer. Not only that, they built it using entirely domestic components, proving that U.S. export controls are no match for its technological ambition. Shenzhen's Lineshine machine has topped the top 500 ranking, achieving 2.2 exaflops per second, beating the top U.S. system, El Capitan, which had held the crown for 18 months. Crucially, this is the first time China has reached the top spot using only homegrown chips, networking gear, and software, including Huawei processors. The feat is a direct counterpunch to Western export restrictions on advanced tech, which were specifically designed to block China from reaching this level. While Chinese chips remain less efficient than U.S. ones, Lineshine compensates by linking more processors together and drawing over 42 megawatts of power, 40% more than its American rival. Experts say Lineshine excels in traditional scientific computing, like drug discovery, climate modeling, and engineering simulation, though it does lag a bit in AI-specific supercomputing, where it ranks fourth globally. China has just overtaken Europe as the global powerhouse of pharmaceutical innovation, and it's not even close. According to Pfizer Chief International Commercial Officer Alexandre de Germay, the country now accounts for 40% of all worldwide oncology clinical trials, while delivering drug development at three times the speed and roughly half the cost of Europe. In 2024, out of 81 innovative medicines launched globally, China produced 28, far surpassing Europe's 18. This marks a seismic shift in an industry long dominated by Western players. Meanwhile, the U.S. is already scrambling. The FDA just launched Operation Trial Blazer to fast-track drug research, potentially shaving six to 12 months off development timelines. The Chinese military has accused Japanese military ships and planes of "repeatedly conducting close-in tracking, surveillance, harassment, and provocations" during the Liaoning carrier group's deployment of more than 40 days in the South China and the Philippine Seas. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV released video footage Monday, showing at least four tenths close-range encounters with Japanese vessels and aircraft. Beijing stated they successfully warned off the Japanese forces. The footage showed Japan's maritime self-defense force patrol planes flying and an MSDF destroyer sailing near Chinese vessels and aircraft. China has not specified exactly when or where the incidents occurred. Japan's defense ministry, meanwhile, said in a statement the same day that MSDF ships and planes had tracked the Liaoning and two accompanying vessels sailing through the Miyako Strait into the East China Sea on Saturday. But they have yet to publicly respond to the allegations of provocation. Ties between the two countries have sunk to their lowest point in decades, following Prime Minister Sanai Takeuchi's remarks in November that Japan could hypothetically intervene militarily in a Taiwan crisis. The West has spent decades trying to freeze North Korea out of the global financial system, but a stunning reality is taking shape on the ground. Recent articles from even corporate media outlets like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal depict a North Korea that isn't just surviving, but economically booming. How has the country managed to survive and even thrive despite U.S. and U.N. sanctions? Is this the beginning of a shift in media perception around North Korea? To discuss this and Xi's recent summit with Kim Jong-un, we welcome back Joo Hyun Park. Joo Hyun is an organizer with Noda Dole for Korean Community Development, as well as the Director of Engagement here at Breakthrough News. Joo Hyun, welcome back to the show. [00:05:30] Speaker 2: Amanda, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me. [00:05:33] Amanda Yee: Well, it's always a pleasure to have you. Before we get started, I just want to point out that if you're watching this on BT Live or on YouTube, you'll be watching a shortened version of this interview. If you want to watch the full interview, become a subscriber. So Joo Hyun, just to jump into it, I was really surprised, as I'm sure you were, to see recent articles in mainstream media outlets like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal tout the economic success of North Korea. Beyond the sensationalist headlines, there's a story here where the articles describe a North Korea that has a booming economy full of skyscrapers, Chinese EVs, smartphones, modern restaurants. You know, both of these articles attribute this success to North Korea's partnership with Russia and supplying Russia with munitions during the Ukraine War, as well as its trade relations with China. But I'm wondering, does trade paint the full picture here? Are these factors enough as you see it to explain this recent economic boom? And, you know, if not, is there something else at play here? [00:06:51] Speaker 2: I think that's exactly the right question to be asking at this time, as we're seeing these outlets that have spent so many decades and so much money really denigrating the DPRK now starting to change their tune a little bit. And the explanation that they're proffering up is to look to the DPRK's international trade ties, particularly its recent increases through Russia and China as the explanation. I think, you know, there's no getting around the fact that trade is incredibly important to any economy, right? There's really no economy in the world that's going to function or develop meaningfully without some level of trade. So I think we need to start there and do and recognize that it is important. However, trade alone also does not create development. You need a political system that can properly harness commercial revenues and then direct those towards development in a strategic manner. There's a lot of countries in the world that have access to far more commercial opportunities than the DPRK has and have had that access for far longer. But if you go to many of these places, especially in the global south, what you'll find is a completely uneven economy. You will see glittering tourist districts and very nice upper class neighborhoods that exist alongside immense poverty. And these outcomes are tied to a profit driven model because trade and commerce happen in order to expand private profit rather than public benefit. And that's the trap that a lot of global south countries end up in, in that they can't actually develop the strategic sectors of the economy or the institutions required to run them. And so they get relegated to things like raw materials, to low end manufacturing, to tourism, and usually in service of monopolies in other countries that end up reaping the majority of the profits instead. And in the DPRK that private incentive simply doesn't exist. So I think instead what we need to look to is actually the political system and the economic foundations. The DPRK's development is different and you can see that in how they are actually utilizing their growing trade to advance national development goals. It's not just happening in pursuit of the profits of particular companies. In 2024, shortly after this expanded trade with Russia began, they initiated the 20 by 10 Rural Development Plan. And the 20 by 10 Rural Development Plan is essentially a plan to transform the rural sectors of the economy. And the way that they're doing that is through massive investments in 20 rural counties and cities each year over the next decade. And so what they've achieved so far is actually pretty remarkable. They've constructed over 113,000 new homes in more than 2000 rural communities. They've built massive modern greenhouse complexes, dozens of new factories and new agricultural ventures. And this is really a targeted and rationally planned approach to rural development that's beginning to bring the country into a new stage of its socialism. And they are doing all of this while at the same time, keep staying true and maintaining their urban development plans, which were in many cases in place even before this boom in trade started to occur around 2022, 2023. There were a lot of photos that were circulated earlier this year of the Hwasong district, which is a new part of the capital of Pyong. 50,000 apartment units have been built in this new district over the past five years. And this was a project that was launched in 2020 or in 2021. And so as a result of, so what we can see from that is actually that the DPRK's investments and its development actually precede the commercial boom that's happened in the last few years. And so looking to trade alone is actually not going to actually explain what is going on in the DPRK because it's actually a much longer and more complicated story of how its political system has issued a profit-driven model of development in favor of a model that at times has been far more difficult because the DPRK, you know, has been ostracized from the global economy for so long and has faced so many difficulties and hurdles, but at the same time also has been able to navigate these very rapid changes in world politics we've seen over the past few years in order to expand external relationships to its benefit based on an internal agenda, based on an agenda that really prioritizes building up the strategic sectors of its economy, its investments in the social wage and an overall quality of life and human benefit. And so I think that's where we get to the understanding that the existing economy will also matter when it comes to the development of any country, right? Any country can have a windfall of trade at any given time, but then if they don't have the proper economic infrastructure to be able to utilize that, then those profits are only going to be very short-term, the long-term benefits will be few. But the difference between the DPRK and many other countries is that for so long it has invested in its own industry and it's also invested in its people in the form of housing, healthcare, education investments. Particularly, there is a very high level of technical expertise in the DPRK that allows them to then take advantage of these kinds of momentary, you know, advantages and benefits that have built up as a result of this recent trade boom. And that's why, you know, just within the span of a few years we're seeing the DPRK producing its own smartphones, undertaking this massive construction boom. It's because they had the economic foundations and they had already made the requisite investments in their people to be able to do that on their own without dependence on others. And so I think that when we look to the DPRK and the recent successes that it's seeing, we need to understand that this isn't just a momentary blip. It is not a fluke, so to speak. This is the cumulative result of decades of strategic thinking that the DPRK has taken and really also commitment to principles, right? The DPRK never undertook really major liberalization programs or really any kinds of efforts to kind of backtrack or step away from its socialism. And I think that what we're seeing today is actually the results and [00:12:57] Amanda Yee: the benefits of that in the long term playing out. Well, the economic system I'd like you to talk a little bit more about like later in the interview. But for right now, I want to talk a little bit more about these two articles. Is there a reason for this particular timing now in terms of the release of these articles? Do you think it signals a softening of a stance in terms of media perception around the DPRK, kind of similar to what we've been seeing with China in the last five or six years? [00:13:29] Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I don't necessarily think it's a softening of the media perspective. I actually think what's happening is that the DPRK's advances have matured to the point that they've become undeniable. And so as a result of that, you know, these outlets primarily being news outlets or ostensibly news outlets, they do have to acknowledge that really because it's a matter of credibility at this point. People in the West have a one dimensional view of the DPRK. It's an anachronistic view as well. When you bring up the DPRK, many people imagine horrific conditions of famine, of poverty. And there was a very difficult period in the DPRK's history known as the Arduous March. It occurred after 1995, when there were massive floods in the DPRK that not only wiped out a lot of its agricultural base, but also its electrical grid. At the same time, the DPRK was under sanctions. It was diplomatically isolated because the Soviet Union had fallen and along with the Eastern Bloc. And so it was in a very difficult position, you know, geopolitically. And as a result of that, you know, there were a lot of difficulties that were endured by the people of the DPRK during that period. And that's absolutely undeniable. But the issue is that for the West, and really, honestly, for the wider world, their image of the DPRK is really derived from this moment in time that at this point was 30 years ago, right? An entire generation has passed and, you know, you can't actually have 30 years of famine in any country. That will just result in the erasure of that country, right? But somehow in the West, you know, that kind of illogical proposition is upheld that, you know, the people of this country have been uniformly starving for the last 31 years when it's simply not true, right? The actual story of the DPRK in the last 31 years is much, much more complicated, much more dynamic. And for the majority of the time, the DPRK has actually been undergoing recovery. A lot of the agricultural yields, a lot of the economic outputs began to significantly bounce back after the 90s. But of course, difficulties remained for the DPRK during that time as well. But, you know, if you look at also the timeline of sanctions and when the US began to impose its harsh sanctions on the DPRK, it was really after the first nuclear test in 2006. And then again, in the period between 2013 and 2017, when the DPRK was making both significant military advancements and also significant economic advances as well. Some of the most sweeping sanctions that were imposed on the DPRK happened around 2017. This was the time when the confrontation between the first Trump administration and the DPRK took place when Trump was talking about fire and fury and totally destroying Korea. And, you know, in the years preceding that, the DPRK had achieved a level of external trade and exports that really in many ways were indicating that it was bouncing back very quick in like a very dynamic way from the economic damage that it had suffered in prior years. And so we can read the sanctions and we can also look at how the US has used these as a mechanism to really try to impede and crush the DPRK's development and really to prevent the DPRK from being able to provide for its people, being able to achieve a level of prosperity that is ultimately about being able to maintain a quality of life in the society as well. And so I think that, you know, what's really going on is that there has been a much longer story of DPRK recovery that's been ignored for so many years. And now, you know, that recovery is yielding really important fruit. And so it has become undeniable. And, you know, as a result of that, these major Western outlets, you know, which of course represent the corporate interests of the United States now have to just, you know, come out with their tail between their legs and essentially confess that, you know, the situation, the DPRK is not what people have been told for so long. But if you read these articles carefully, what you'll also see is that this is an attempt to save face. And it's also an attempt at narrative recovery, because particularly for the New York Times article, they don't actually spend much time talking about the economy of the DPRK or the kind of strategy that, you know, resulted in these outcomes. They're really focused on repeating a lot of the same slanders that we are used to hearing about the DPRK system. Um, I think there's a point in the article where they make the suggestion that, uh, Kim Jong-un's personal weight is an indication of inequality in the society, which is, that's, I'm sorry, that's not journalism. That is, that's like schoolyard bullying level of rhetoric. It has no place in an intellectual discussion about, you know, world economies and, you know, politics. And so I think we can see that, you know, actually in many ways, the media coverage of the DPRK remains deeply unserious, right? They are just now in a position where they have to say the things that [00:18:32] Amanda Yee: are no longer undeniable. Mm-hmm. Well, I imagine that the success of, uh, the DPRK has prompted it to expand its economic ties. Uh, as such, uh, there was, uh, a summit between China's President Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-un earlier this month. Um, they held a two-day summit in Pyongyang, and this was Xi's first visit to North Korea in seven years, I believe, and it, like, marked the 65th anniversary of the signing of their mutual defense treaty. Um, and North Korea is the only country in the world that China has this mutual, uh, pact with. So, the two leaders during their summit, they declared a new historical stage of cooperation, and they vowed to expand their ties across technology, across politics, across trade. Um, but I think in terms of, uh, concrete outputs, uh, there was, it didn't seem like there was anything much that came out of it, or at least that's what the media is saying. So, you know, I'm interested to see, you know, I'm interested in your take on this summit. Um, you know, why weren't there any specific binding policies that came out of it? Um, was it largely symbolic, as the U.S. media is portraying it as? [00:19:55] Speaker 2: I don't think it was largely symbolic. I think this is one step in a broader process of strategic realignment that's taking place between China and the DPRK. I think the clearest indication that we saw of that was during Kim Jong-un's visit to Beijing last year, uh, for the 80th anniversary of victory in World War II. Uh, we saw that Kim Jong-un was given pride of place, uh, next to Vladimir Putin, next to, you know, China's Xi Jinping. Feel however you want about these leaders. These are very, very important political actors on the world stage. And the fact that, you know, the, the placement of, you know, where these individuals are in the photo shoots actually does matter pretty significantly, right? Because it gives us an indication of, you know, how China sees its interests as well. And, you know, I think, um, what we need to understand additionally is that when there are these meetings, uh, between particularly countries like China and the DPRK, which share a socialist model, uh, which share socialist politics, their orientation is not going to necessarily be towards making flashy declarations or statements, uh, from the get-go. That's something that happens a lot in, you know, modern world politics because of how, uh, press-driven a lot of things are, right? And because of the need for leaders in different parts of the world to, uh, really demonstrate to media that they are making, uh, you know, demonstrable progress, uh, on certain issues. But then when it comes to China and the DPRK, that's not really going to be their concern, right? Um, these meetings that are taking place, um, I think we can assume are really high level deliberations around the future strategy of the two countries when it comes to their shared regional concerns. And that's actually a very important development when you consider the longer arc of the China DPRK relationship, because they are historically very close and, you know, they do have a, uh, structural kind of unity that is unique for, uh, really any other country when it, particularly when it comes to China's relationships, uh, because it doesn't have a defense pact with anyone else. Um, but at the same time, especially since the nineties, there have been major contradictions between them. Um, and I would say that, you know, the most important source of that has been the difference in their, uh, respective economies, orientations toward the work towards the world market, which has resulted in political disputes over time. In the nineties, China stopped its discounted trade policy towards the DPRK. They also stopped offering interest-free loans and they normalized relations with South Korea. This was part of a broader reorientation that was taking place in China's foreign policy after reform and opening up. They realized that they needed to play more by the rules of the international liberal order in order to make their development strategy work. And, you know, I think one of the most pointed, uh, areas of disagreement in the last couple of decades was, uh, really China's acquiescence to UN security council sanctions against the DPRK for its nuclear program. They only really started to use their seat to block these sanctions in the last few years. And, you know, to me, what that's emblematic of really is the difference in the, that, uh, the different places that these countries occupy in the world system, China's reform made it a manufacturing and technological pillar of the world economy. That's the leverage that it now has to stand up to the U S the DPRK was not interested in a similar route of liberalization or market socialism. And they also faced much harsher obstacles to their development. So they had to take the military route to build that leverage. And so what's happening now is a couple of things, you know, China's development strategy has brought it to a new phase. We're going to afford to be bolder. And at the same time, U S decline has been giving further impetus to U S aggression in East Asia for the last decade. We have the freedom of navigation patrols in the Taiwan street. We have military exercises taking place in the South China sea. We have massive war drills being undertaken on the Korean peninsula as well. In 2025, the U S military conducted war exercises for 274 days of the year to China. These are not disparate problem areas because the U S doesn't see it that way either. The U S military doctrine is to view the Pacific as a single battlefield where they leverage every single flashpoint that's available to them, including Korea to exert pressure and prevent the region as a whole from asserting greater independence. And so that requires China to look to its neighbors, to build up closer ties with countries like the DPRK that it shares a special level of partnership with. And so I think that, you know, when we look to these types of meetings and their significance, we really need to understand that, uh, what's happening behind the scenes is in some ways more important than what they're willing to say publicly. Um, but I think that, you know, the fact that they are both talking about the need to maintain regional peace, the need to prevent hegemonic powers from really bullying everyone else indicates that they recognize that there is a shared threat and a shared interest in working together to act against those. Um, but it's not only about, you know, U S military aggression that they're necessarily combating either. Uh, one major area of speculation is whether or not China and the DPRK talked about, uh, economic, joint economic development along the Tumen river. Uh, the Tumen river is, uh, flows along the border between China, uh, sorry, Russia and the DPRK. It's also accessible from China and flows directly into what Koreans call the East sea, but is internationally recognized as the sea of Japan. Um, the reason this area is significant is that is because if China and the DPRK are able to establish a commercial portage and transport along this river route, what they can do is actually take a lot of the products that are produced in China's Northeast. And rather than having to export them through the Bay of Bohai and then circumnavigate the Korean peninsula and then pass through various streets along the Japanese archipelago, they can just, uh, bring them directly to the main body of the Pacific. And then those products can both be exported around the Pacific and actually will very likely, uh, within a few years, uh, exported along Russian waterways through the Arctic in order to reach markets in Europe. So, uh, what that could do, and you know, this would take many years to materialize, uh, but what it could do is actually reorient, uh, the flows of both global trade and geopolitics in the region to great benefit to both China and the DPRK. Um, and so I think that, you know, what we need to understand is that, uh, the discussions taking place are both about the near-term interests and the long-term interests that these countries share. Um, and you know, they're not going to necessarily announce plans or initiatives until it's time to do so. And, you know, all the details are worked out, um, because they're not under the same kind of pressure that you find in a lot of capitalist countries where our politicians constantly have to play the media in order to, you know, retain any level of popularity and legitimacy among, uh, their base. Thanks so much for joining us on the China Report [00:26:44] Amanda Yee: again. Um, you know, maybe to close out, can you tell people where to find you if they're interested in, uh, reading more of your work? Um, and maybe you can also take a minute to talk about what [00:26:56] Speaker 2: Noda Dole is working on right now too. Yeah, absolutely. So I think, you know, first off, um, if you want to read more about, uh, the work that I'm doing, um, the best place you can go is BreakthroughNews.org. Um, we'll have an article, um, that I've authored about the Trump-SHI summit coming up very soon. So, you know, you can keep an eye out for that and just read in more detail, uh, what we've discussed in this interview. Uh, when it comes to Norutul, um, I would really recommend following us on social media. That's N-O-D-U-T-D-O-L. Um, we are, you know, engaged in our US side of Korea campaign, which has been going on for a couple of years now. Um, this is really seeking to, uh, build, you know, education and knowledge about the wholesale situation in Korea, not just what's happening internally in the DPRK, but really particularly what's going on in terms of US military exercises in Korea, um, historical and present cases of, uh, US military violence and injustice. Uh, one issue that Norutul is especially focused on right now, uh, is the efforts by former women in the US military camp towns who were subjected to a state sponsored system of, uh, prostitution, um, to seek justice and redress both from the South Korean government and the US military. There is a lawsuit that is being undertaken currently, um, that is charging the US military with violating their rights. Um, and so we've been conducting a number of different popular education events across the country. Uh, we just had one recently in San Francisco. Um, actually this weekend on, uh, June 27th, there will be one in New York and Ridgewood Queens, um, would highly recommend attending that. Um, and then in a couple of weeks, you know, there will be one in Los Angeles as well. And so, you know, we'll be continuing to provide educational opportunities around, you know, what's going on in the Korean peninsula more generally. Um, we provide a lot of social spaces, uh, for not only Korean people, but really for anyone with an interest in anti-imperialism and international solidarity to come together and, you know, start to like build some of those communal ties that are really essential to higher level organizing as well. Um, and then of course, if you're part of an organization, you can visit usoutofkorea.org, learn more about our campaign, endorse, participate in our days of action. Uh, we really want, you know, as many people as possible to be engaging with these issues because as we see it, internationalism, national liberation, these aren't just issues for any particular, uh, group, but they're really questions of our common future and our collective liberation. [00:29:21] Amanda Yee: So we want everyone involved. Absolutely. All right. Thank you, Juhian. So that's our show. Don't forget to like, share and subscribe. Um, please also support us by, by becoming a member at breakthroughnews.org and we'll see you next time.