Radio Free Asia, a US state-funded outlet that largely ceased operations last year amid a Trump administration cost-cutting drive, plans to revive its Korean content as a way to reach reclusive North Korea, a spokesperson said.
“We plan to start producing North Korean digital content later next week,” Rohit Mahajan, RFA’s chief communications officer said, adding that radio programming would follow.
He said the effort would rely on four reporters based in Seoul, the capital of South Korea.
“RFA’s leadership team made the decision to restart the service, based on resources we have on hand ... recognising the critical role of our uncensored reporting at a time when so few trusted sources are available to the North Korean people,” he said.
RFA and sister outlets have been financed with Congressional funds and overseen by the US Agency for Global Media.
Last year President Donald Trump appointed Kari Lake, a former news anchor loyal to him, to head USAGM and she terminated their grants, alleging waste of taxpayer money and anti-Trump bias, forcing mass layoffs.
Trump’s domestic critics called it a strategic blunder in US competition with authoritarian governments including China, and the moves faced legal challenges and push-back in Congress.
A bipartisan spending Bill that still requires approval by Congress and Trump, includes US$643mil (RM2.6bil) for USAGM.
Mahajan said Korea Service broadcasts, for which RFA would finance the transmission costs, would begin later this month with one original radio programme currently planned per week.
He said the restart would be financed by congressional funding allocated for the first quarter of the 2026 fiscal year and additional programming would be added once the fiscal new congressional package was enacted.
Mahajan said the Korean Service would join RFA’s Mandarin and Burmese Services, which have already restarted content production and that RFA also plans to re-start its Uyghur, Tibetan, and Cantonese service into China.
He said that “before the US Agency for Global Media unlawfully terminated our grant,” the Korean Service had close to 50 staffers, about 37 of them in DC and 12 in Seoul. — Reuters
