AP opens a bureau in North Korea

The Associated Press has opened a news bureau in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang. It is the first major Western news organisation to do so, although agencies such as China’s Xinhua also have a presence there.

The AP president Tom Curley said the bureau would operate under the same standards as other outlets worldwide. AP pointed out that the bureau would have two permanent North Korean reporters and would be supervised by two Seoul-based US journalists who would make regular visits. The news agency first established a presence in Pyongyang in 2006, when it opened a video bureau.

The US and North Korea do not have formal diplomatic ties. But the president of state-run KCNA news agency, Kim Pyong-ho, said the two sides had “been able to find a way to understand one another and to cooperate closely enough to open an AP bureau”.