Cities - Villages and Towns in North Korea (5)

Kijong-dong, known in North Korea as Peace Village, is a small city visible from South Korea's border checkpoints. It features high-rises, low-slung buildings, and surrounding agricultural fields. However, South Korean and multinational troops refer to it as Propaganda Village, believing it to be a façade manned by the North Korean military. Some buildings have painted windows, and others are mere shells with no interior floors or walls. At night, lights shine brightly in the upper windows but dim closer to the ground. Loudspeakers blare music across the countryside, and a towering flagpole rises above the village. North Korea created Kijong-dong to persuade South Koreans to defect by presenting it as an attractive place to live.

Kijong-dong is reportedly a Potemkin village located in P'yŏnghwa-ri, Panmun-guyok, Kaesong Special City, North Korea, within the northern half of the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). Known in North Korea as Peace Village, it is widely referred to as 'Propaganda Village' by South Korean and Western media. Kijong-dong is one of two villages allowed to remain in the 4 km wide DMZ established under the 1953 Korean War armistice, the other being the South Korean village of Daeseong-dong. The North Korean government claims that Kijong-dong houses a 200-family collective farm with amenities such as a child care center, schools, and a hospital. However, South Korea asserts that the village is uninhabited and was built in the 1950s for propaganda purposes to encourage South Korean defection and to accommodate DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) soldiers stationed near the border. The village features brightly painted, multi-story buildings and apartments, apparently wired for electricity, oriented to display their bright blue roofs and white sides prominently from the South. Close inspection reveals these buildings to be mere concrete shells lacking windows or interior rooms, with lights turned on and off at set times and sidewalks swept by caretakers to maintain an illusion of activity. Surrounded by cultivated fields visible from the DMZ, Kijong-dong is equipped with massive loudspeakers that deliver DPRK propaganda broadcasts directed at the South. Initially, these broadcasts praised North Korea and encouraged defection. As South Korea's economy grew in the 1960s and 1970s, the broadcasts shifted to anti-Western speeches, agitprop operas, and patriotic music for up to 20 hours a day. From 2004 to 2016, both Koreas agreed to stop their loudspeaker broadcasts, but they resumed in 2016 after increased tensions following a North Korean nuclear test. On April 23, 2018, North and South Korea officially canceled their border propaganda broadcasts.

Hoeryŏng is a city in North Hamgyong Province, North Korea. It is located opposite Jilin Province, China, with the Tumen River in between. Sanhe (三合鎮), in Longjing City, is the closest Chinese town across the river. Hoeryŏng is the birthplace of Kim Il-Sung's first wife and Kim Jong Il's mother, Kim Jong-Suk. The Hoeryong Revolutionary Site commemorates the birthplace. The Hoeryŏng concentration camp (Kwalliso No. 22) is located 20 kilometres (12 mi) from the city. Hoeryŏng was one of the six posts/garrisons (Chosŏngŭl: 육진) established under the order of Sejong the Great of Joseon Dynasty (1418 - 1450) to safeguard his people from the potentially hostile semi-nomadic Jurchens living north of the Yalu river. In 1952, some territories of Hoeryŏng (then a county), which included myoen of Poŭl and parts of myoens of Yonghung and Pyŏksŏng, were incorporated into the then newly created Yusŏn county. After the 1974 incorporation of Yusŏn county, the Yusŏn region became a up and was renamed as Yusŏn worker's region. In early May 2007, the newly appointed Prime Minister Kim Yong-il visited Hoeryŏng. At the time, the Prime Minister brought with him on his train one carriage worth of glass (made in South Korea) and 3 carriages worth of cement. After delivering the goods to the People's Committee of Hoeryŏng he ordered that the city of Hoeryŏng be decorated and adorned as much as a city where Mother Kim Jong Suk's birthplace should be.

Kanggye (강계시) is the provincial capital of Chagang, North Korea and has a population of 251,971. Because of its strategic importance, derived from its topography, it has been of military interest from the time of the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910). During the Korean War, after being driven from Pyongyang, Kim Il Sung and his government temporarily moved the capital to Kanggye after first moving temporarily to Sinuiju. The city was firebombed in November 1950 on American general Douglas MacArthur's orders after the Chinese People's Volunteer Army turned the course of the war; at least 65% of the city was destroyed. The following month Kim presided over a plenum of the cabinet at Kanggye, where he assigned blame for what he claimed were military failures during the losing phase of the war. Workers' Party general secretary Kim Jong-il toured facilities at Kanggye and the surrounding area in January 1998 amid the North Korean famine. Impressed by the people's success in building minor power stations and improving factories despite hardships, he urged other provinces to emulate the 'Kanggye spirit'. Kanggye gets its name, 'river junction,' from the Changja River, which flows through the city, and two tributaries. Kanggye has a mining industry producing copper, zinc ore, coal and graphite.

Sinŭiju (Sinŭiju-si, 신의주시; known before 1925 in English as Yeng Byen City) is a city in North Korea which faces Dandong, Liaoning, China across the international border of the Yalu River. It is the capital of North P'yŏngan province. Part of the city is included in the Sinŭiju Special Administrative Region, which was established in 2002 to experiment with introducing a market economy. Inŭiju is bordered by the Amnok River, and by P'ihyŏn and Ryongch'ŏn counties. The city's altitude is 1 metre (4 feet) above sea level. There are several islands at the mouth of the Amnok River - Wihwa-do, Rim-do, Ryuch'o-do and Tongryuch'o-do. In the course of the Korean War, after being driven from P'yŏngyang, Kim Il Sung and his government temporarily moved its capital to Sinŭiju - although as UNC forces approached, the government again moved - this time to Kanggye. Also, the city sustained heavy damage from aerial bombardment as part of the United States Air Force's strategic bombing of North Korea; 95 percent of the city was destroyed. However, the city has since been rebuilt. In 2018, a master plan for the redevelopment of the city was unveiled and shown to Kim Jong-un, which would have featured many high rise buildings and parks, centered around the road leading to the statues of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il. Ultimately, this plan has yet to be fulfilled. The area has recycling plants which recycle a wide range of material, including products that are banned for recycling in China. A substantial portion of North Korea's international trade, both legal and illegal, passes through Sinuiju and Dandong, across the Yalu River.