Rodong Sinmun imports resume after pandemic-era halt
South Korea resumed importing North Korea's ruling Workers' Party newspaper, as the opposition questions whether payments could ultimately reach Pyongyang.
North Korea's official Rodong Sinmun carries images of leader Kim Jong-un at a Beijing military parade with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping on its Sept. 4, 2025, front page. South Korea began importing the paper again in May, and members of the public can now read it without restriction at institutions that hold it.NEWS1
South Korea resumed imports of the Rodong Sinmun, the newspaper of North Korea's ruling Workers' Party, in May, and the opposition says nobody can establish whether the money reaches Pyongyang.
Korea Customs Service data released Wednesday by Rep. Park Sung-hoon of the opposition People Power Party (PPP) shows 644 copies came in over three months for 1.58 million won ($1,140). Ninety-six arrived in May for 230,000 won, 422 in June for 1.04 million won and 126 in July for 310,000 won.
The shipments were the first since imports stopped during Pyongyang's pandemic border closure and stayed halted through the previous Yoon Suk Yeol administration.
Park's criticism rests on two laws his party opposes. One is a change to aviation law passed last September that blocks leaflet launches into the North, which the PPP calls the "Kim Yo-jong order law" after the North Korean leader's sister. The other is a revision to the Network Act, in force since July, that the party calls the "gag law."
"The government blocked the leaflets North Korea dislikes with the 'Kim Yo-jong order law,' and now it wants to throw the doors open so that even elementary school students can read the Rodong Sinmun, the North's propaganda organ," Park said. "It is an absurd North Korea policy that muzzles our own people's freedom of expression with the 'gag law' and hands North Korean propaganda a free pass."
The change covers the print edition only, and access to Rodong Sinmun's website and about 60 other North Korean sites remains blocked under the same Network Act. The Ministry of Unification said in January that about 20 institutions were still buying the paper.
The restart followed a reclassification that took effect Dec. 30, when the government moved Rodong Sinmun out of the "special materials" category, which restricts public access, and into "general materials."
Copies of North Korea's Rodong Sinmun from early 2012, several stamped as restricted "special materials," lie spread across a table on April 7, 2012. The government reclassified the ruling Workers' Party newspaper as "general materials" in December, and imports resumed in May after a pandemic-era halt.JOONGANG ILBO
President Lee Jae Myung pressed for the change at a joint work report from the foreign and unification ministries on Dec. 19.
"What is the reason for stopping people from reading North Korea's Rodong Sinmun? Is it that they will fall for the propaganda and turn into commies?" Lee said. "It would do the opposite and give people a chance to understand what North Korea is really like and decide that this is not the way to go."
The government convened a consultative body of agencies responsible for supervising restricted North Korean materials, including the Unification Ministry and the National Intelligence Service, later that month.
North Korea's Rodong Sinmun gives its entire front page to an editorial mourning former leader Kim Jong-il on the 10th anniversary of his death, on Dec. 17, 2021. South Korea resumed importing the ruling Workers' Party newspaper in May, and members of the public can now read it without restriction at institutions that hold it.NEWS1
Readers previously needed to apply in advance and show identification at institutions holding the paper, under an intelligence service directive on special materials dating to 1970. That limited use largely to North Korea research and news reporting. Anyone can now walk into one of those institutions and read it without restriction, like any other newspaper.
Most imported copies went to public institutions, among them the National Assembly Library, the Unification Ministry's Information Center on North Korea, the Korea Institute for National Unification and Seoul National University's central library. Those institutions contact Asia Journal, a specialist importer of foreign publications, and pay for the copies themselves.
The current volume is a fraction of what it once was. About 30,000 copies a year entered the country between 2016 and 2019, under the Park Geun-hye and Moon Jae-in administrations. Imports restarted only three months ago, however, and pent-up demand could push the numbers higher.
"Imports of Rodong Sinmun could increase under this government," Park said.
"It has not been established whether the final recipient of the payments, which go through an intermediary, is North Korea," he said.
The ministry set out the payment route in January, after claims circulated that the paper was being bought with tax money. The purchase is not a subscription but an import, it said. A licensed South Korean firm brings North Korean material in through a distributor in China, and the money goes to that firm rather than directly to North Korea.
"We do not know where the funds go once the import agent brings Rodong Sinmun in," a Unification Ministry official said.
"Imports stopped because North Korea sealed its borders during the Covid-19 pandemic, and that is unrelated to the direction of government policy," the official said of why shipments restarted under the current government.
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
