Remco Breuker: How North Korea built illicit networks that outlasted sanctions
Update: 2025-10-23
Description
This week, historian Remco Breuker explores how Pyongyang has built illicit networks that operate far beyond its borders to oversee labor exports, arrange business deals and traffic arms.
He reflects on the collapse of the U.N. Panel of Experts that once tracked sanctions violations, warning that the world has lost a vital mechanism for understanding and constraining North Korea’s overseas operations.
He also argues for rebuilding expertise on the country’s financial and labor networks to regain leverage, while questioning the effectiveness and ethics of existing sanctions.
Remco Breuker is a historian who works on medieval Korean and Northeast Asian history and on contemporary North Korean affairs. Since 2014, he has been working on making the voices of elite exiles from the DPRK heard in academic debates. He is the author of a number of books about North Korea, most recently “De Wereld volgens Noord-Korea” (“The World According to North Korea”).
About the podcast: The North Korea News Podcast is a weekly podcast hosted by Jacco Zwetsloot exclusively for NK News, covering all things DPRK — from news to extended interviews with leading experts and analysts in the field, along with insight from our very own journalists.
NK News subscribers can listen to this and other exclusive episodes from their preferred podcast player by accessing the private podcast feed. For more detailed instructions, please see the step-by-step guide at nknews.org/private-feed.
He reflects on the collapse of the U.N. Panel of Experts that once tracked sanctions violations, warning that the world has lost a vital mechanism for understanding and constraining North Korea’s overseas operations.
He also argues for rebuilding expertise on the country’s financial and labor networks to regain leverage, while questioning the effectiveness and ethics of existing sanctions.
Remco Breuker is a historian who works on medieval Korean and Northeast Asian history and on contemporary North Korean affairs. Since 2014, he has been working on making the voices of elite exiles from the DPRK heard in academic debates. He is the author of a number of books about North Korea, most recently “De Wereld volgens Noord-Korea” (“The World According to North Korea”).
About the podcast: The North Korea News Podcast is a weekly podcast hosted by Jacco Zwetsloot exclusively for NK News, covering all things DPRK — from news to extended interviews with leading experts and analysts in the field, along with insight from our very own journalists.
NK News subscribers can listen to this and other exclusive episodes from their preferred podcast player by accessing the private podcast feed. For more detailed instructions, please see the step-by-step guide at nknews.org/private-feed.
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