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North Korea in 2026: Frequently asked questions

North Korea is a nuclear-armed state under the leadership of Kim Jong-un and has expanded its military cooperation with Russia since 2024. Relations with South Korea remain at a historic low, while in late 2026 US President Donald Trump said he wanted to conduct direct talks with North Korea, as he had in his first term. North Korea doesn’t appear to be ready to move forward with any talks soon and continues to conduct frequent ballistic missile tests.

This briefing looks at frequently asked questions on the durability of North Korea’s leadership, the possibility of increasing its military support to Russia, its ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programmes, its relationship with South Korea, the United States, Japan, and China, as well as UK policy to the country.

How stable is Kim Jong-un’s regime?

Kim Jong-un’s regime appears stable, but it faces internal challenges and sustained economic weaknesses. Most analysts judge that North Korea's nuclear weapons programme and support from China make the regime likely to survive these challenges in the short to medium term.

Kim Jong-un came to power as Supreme Leader in 2011, part of the third generation of the Kim family that has ruled the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK, North Korea) since its founding in 1948.

Kim Jong-un quickly consolidated his power, removing senior leaders through forced retirements and demotions as well as the executions of his uncle Jang Song-thaek in 2013 and Defence Minister Hyon Yong-chol in 2015. Kim also rebalanced the power dynamic between the ruling Worker’s Party of Korea (WPK) and the military, giving the WPK greater authority including by replacing senior military leaders.

North Korea is believed to have suffered significantly during the Covid-19 pandemic, despite official statements at the beginning of the pandemic that it had “zero” cases of the virus. Pyongyang’s admission of the virus’s impact in May 2022, and Kim Jong-un’s statement that his government’s response had been “immature” and it was causing “great turmoil”, suggest that the regime could no longer deny the scale of the problem.

The regime used the pandemic as an opportunity to further restrict dissent. North Korea closed its borders with China and Russia (from January 2020 until August 2023), making it harder for defectors to leave and for goods and information to enter. The Asia-focused Diplomat magazine said that “officially framed as an epidemic control measure, the closure is now understood to have served as an opportunity to reorganize and intensify the system of population control”.

Along with North Korea’s continued suppression of internal dissent, its relationship with China is believed by some analysts to ensure Kim Jong-un will remain in power. Andrei Lankov, a professor at Seoul’s Kookmin University, says Beijing has a strong interest in maintaining stability in North Korea while strategic competition with the United States continues. He believes that a serious domestic crisis in North Korea “would be treated in Beijing not as a humanitarian problem, but as a direct challenge to China’s national security”. In such “an extreme scenario” Professor Lankov says, “even direct Chinese military intervention, aimed at suppressing such internal crises, cannot be ruled out”. Combined with increased Russian support, and the United States and South Korea stepping back from confrontation with North Korea (see below) he suggests that over the next few decades change in North Korea’s political system is unlikely.

Other analysts suggest there are longer term weaknesses in North Korea that threaten Kim Jong-un’s leadership. Chung Min Lee, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment’s Asia Programme, says in a 2024 article that while Kim Jong-un has secured his leadership and “the chances of a military coup are slim”, North Korea “is still hollowing out and the Kim dynasty is in decline”. He points to a “deepening economic malaise in North Korea”, “the breakdown of loyalty” not just among the people but also within party elites, as well as uncertainties about who will succeed Kim Jong-un.

In a 2025 analysis, Bruce Bennett, Professor of Policy Analysis at the RAND School of Public Policy, also highlighted weaknesses in the North Korean economy, Kim Jong-un’s “risky choice” to send troops to Russia (see below), as well as the fact that “outside information keeps leaking into the North, some of which demonstrates that living conditions in South Korea continue to be far superior to the conditions in the North”. Professor Bennett mentions North Korea’s “brutal efforts to prevent the influx of outside information”.

Evidence of these efforts were published in an April 2026 report by the Transitional Justice Working Group, a Seoul-based human rights organisation. It found that since the pandemic (looking at the period January 2020 to end of 2024) “grounds for execution have been shifting away from ordinary violent crime and toward outside information, South Korean culture, religion, and political dissent”.

While greater access to information may destabilise Kim Jong-un’s leadership, Professor Lankov warns that modern technology such as AI and facial recognition technology may also allow for greater surveillance in North Korea.

What support is North Korea giving Russia?

North Korea has provided arms and military personnel to help Russia sustain its war against Ukraine.

In June 2024 at a summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang, the two countries signed a comprehensive strategic partnership agreement which President Putin said included a mutual defence clause in the case of aggression against either country. In April 2026 during a visit to North Korea, Russian Defence Minister Andrei Belousov told Russian news agencies that the two sides had agreed “to put ⁠military cooperation on a stable, long-term footing and to sign a cooperation plan covering the 2027 to 2031 period later this year”.

North Korea provides military personnel

North Korea provided an estimated 11,000 troops to Russia to help counter Ukraine’s military operation in the Kursk Oblast (region) of Russia which began in August 2024. At first neither Russia nor North Korea confirmed the presence of these soldiers, but in April 2025 North Korean state news agency KCNA, said its forces helped their Russian counterparts “completely liberate” the Kursk Oblast. KCNA said the deployment was in accordance with the two countries 2024 mutual defence agreement.

In March 2026 the UK Government stated that “it is highly likely that DPRK forces sustained more than 6,000 casualties in offensive combat operations against Ukrainian forces in the Russian oblast of Kursk”. It added that “Russia has since publicly announced a further 6,000 deminers and reconstruction workers to be deployed to the Kursk region of Russia”.

North Korea provides arms, in particular munitions

An April 2025 report by the Open Source Centre and Reuters analysed satellite imagery of shipments between North Korea and Russia. The report estimated that 15,000 containers likely containing between 4.2 and 5.8 million munitions, including 122 mm and 152 mm artillery shells and 122 mm rockets, had been transported on four Russian-flagged ships between August 2023 and March 2025. It said that “this supply has become a critical enabler of Russia’s sustained artillery fire in Ukraine”.

A September 2025 report by the German Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FNF), estimates that since 2023 North Korea has delivered arms worth an estimated 5.6 to 9.8 billion US dollars to Russia. These shipments include “millions of artillery shells, mor­tar rounds, and rockets, hundreds of artillery pieces and launchers, [and] short-range ballistic missiles”.

According to an August 2026 Atlantic Council article, since late 2023, North Korea has also supplied Russia with around 150 ballistic missiles. Some doubts over their accuracy have been raised. Reuters reported in July 2024 that Ukrainian authorities suggested that only 2 of 24 North Korean ballistic missiles fired by Russia in that month had been “relatively accurate” in hitting their intended targets.

What is North Korea receiving in return for its military support for Russia?

The Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FNF) says the Russia-North Korea trading relationship has a “distinctly asymmetric character”, and it has “had no visible impact on North Korea’s economy”, because Russia has in return traded goods with far less value.

The foundation says that Russia has in return for North Korean arms and military personnel supplied “food, oil, air-defence systems, and possibly fighter aircraft, with a total value of only 457 million to 1.19 billion US dollars”. The FNF says it has not observed inflows of hard currency into North Korea and that “financial transactions appear largely locked within the Russian bank­ing system”. The FNF says the “strategic payoff” for North Korea is:

[I]n the prospect of technological input, in the opportu­nity to test weapon systems under real battlefield conditions, and in a partial reduction of its international isolation through closer alignment with a perma­nent member of the UN Security Coun­cil.

Similarly, an analysis by the thinktank, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, suggests that in Kim Jong-un has gained President Putin’s “gratitude” as well as a “stronger possibility of receiving advanced fighters, space-related technologies, food, and fuel from Russia”.

A May 2026 report by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) defence thinktank, warned that Russian assistance including missile technology, satellite capabilities and proliferation financing “could enable North Korea to further develop its nuclear arsenal and circumvent international sanctions and monitoring efforts”. In October 2024 then South Korean Defence Minister Kim Yong Hyun, said that in return for its troop deployment to Russia there was a “high possibility” that North Korea “would ask for cutting edge technology transfer”, including technologies relating to tactical nuclear weapons, the advancement of inter-continental ballistic missiles reconnaissance satellite and submarines capable of launching nuclear weapons.

An analysis by the research organisation RAND states that North Korea’s deepening relationship with Russia gives Kim Jong-un “leverage on China”, allowing him to “extort various forms of aid from China, likely making Kim feel that he is in a powerful position”. The Carnegie Endowment also says deepening its relationship with Russia “enables North Korea to counterbalance, even slightly, North Korea’s overwhelming economic and political dependence on China”; and it notes that both China and Russia are opposed to imposing additional sanctions on North Korea.

Is North Korea going to play a bigger role in the Russia-Ukraine conflict?

In July and August 2026 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that North Korea is preparing to increase its military support to Russia.

In July Mr Zelenskyy said that “Russia wants to receive another 30,000 troops from North Korea” and “since June, preparations have been underway in Russia’s Voronezh region to receive them”. The Reuters news agency said it “could not independently verify that statement”. The Ukrainian President added that “North Korea is also preparing to transfer additional launchers for ballistic missiles to Russia”.

Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesperson, when asked about this claim said “I do not think there is any need to comment. It is not for Zelenskyy to speculate about our plans”.

In August President Zelenskyy once again said Pyongyang would send more troops to Russia, saying “now a decision has been made for 30,000 to 50,000 North Koreans to be deployed on the territory of Russia”, and “It is absolutely clear that North Korea will continue to build its experience in modern warfare, receive licenses from Russia, and receive all kinds of military tools from them”.

Oleksandr Kovalenko, a military and political expert at the Ukrainian Centre for Security Studies, told the German news organisation DW that if further North Korean troops were deployed, he did not expect them to fight in Ukraine, instead they would be used to secure Russia’s border territories. He said: “these forces could free up Russian occupational forces” and “Russia would then be able to deploy around 15,000 troops to battles along front lines in Vovchansk, Kharkiv, Sumy or even Chernihiv”.

What is happening with North Korea’s ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programmes?

North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 2003 (it acceded to the NPT in 1985). However, its official status with respect to the treaty continues to be contested as several countries argue that the correct withdrawal procedures were not followed. In February 2005 North Korea officially declared it had nuclear weapons, and conducted its first nuclear weapons test in October 2006. It has conducted five further nuclear tests, with the most recent in September 2017. North Korea is not recognised by the international community as a nuclear weapons state (a status given by the NPT).

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimated in 2025 that North Korea had around 50 nuclear warheads and enough fissile material to produce up to 90. SIPRI says that it expects North Korea’s nuclear stockpile “to grow in the coming years”. In 2024, the then South Korean Defence Minister Shin Won-sik said the North was in the “final stages” of developing tactical nuclear weapons (shorter range, lower yield nuclear weapons).

North Korea first began testing short-range ballistic missiles in 1984. Since then, Pyongyang has invested heavily in its missile programme, and a 2026 assessment by the Center for Strategic and International Studies said it had “advanced rapidly in long-range missile technology”. One of North Korea’s most recent missile types the Hwasong-18, tested three times in 2023, was assessed by South Korean experts to have a range of 15,000 km, which would have the potential to hit any part of the continental United States.

On 12 September 2026 North Korea’s tested several weapons systems in military drills, including attack drones, tactical cruise missiles, tactical ballistic missiles, ⁠and large-calibre multiple rocket launchers. This was reported to be the thirteenth time North Korea has launched ballistic missiles this year. The International Institute for Strategic Affair’s 2026 Military Balance assessment estimated that North Korea has more than 20 intercontinental (long-range) ballistic missiles, 10 intermediate, 17 medium range and over 300 short-range ballistic missiles.

In April 2026 US Assistant Secretary of War, Robert Kadlec, testified to the US Senate that  “North Korea's nuclear forces are increasingly capable of targeting the US Homeland, and its missile forces can strike South Korea and Japan with nuclear or conventional warheads”.

Despite announcing in 2018 that it would no longer conduct nuclear tests and shut down its nuclear test site, there is some evidence that North Korea may be preparing for future tests:

• in 2022 the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that North Korea had begun restoring test tunnels it had previously dynamited at its test site (PDF)
• in 2025 the US Defense Intelligence Agency reported that “North Korea has restored its nuclear test site and is now postured to conduct a seventh nuclear test at a time of its choosing” (PDF)
• in April 2026 Rafael Grossi, head of the IAEA, “confirmed reports of a rapid rise in activity at North Korea’s main nuclear complex, Yongbyon”, according to the Guardian. He said that it had made “very serious” advances in its nuclear weapons programme, including the likely construction of a new uranium enrichment facility and increased activity at other nuclear sites.

For more on North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme see Library briefing Nuclear weapons profile: North Korea.  

How tense are relations between North and South Korea?

Relations between North and South Korea are at an historic low. Following the collapse of the US-North Korea talks in 2019, North Korea has had virtually no official contact with Seoul. Since then, North Korea has taken several steps to distance itself from any moves to reconcile with South Korea and to formalise its nuclear weapons arsenal into state decision-making:

• In 2020 North Korea blew up a joint liaison office, built in 2018 near its border with the South to facilitate communication between the two countries.
• In 2022, North Korea passed a nuclear use law, which codified five cases for when nuclear weapons could be used. Three of those cases allow the use of the weapons if certain attacks (including by conventional weapons in two of the cases) on North Korea are “imminent”, allowing for pre-emptive action. The law also states that if “the command and control system over the state nuclear forces is placed in danger owing to an attack by hostile forces, a nuclear strike shall be launched automatically and immediately”. Dr Salma Shaeen of King’s College, London says these changes indicate “a lowering of the nuclear threshold” by North Korea.
• In 2023 North Korea amended its constitution to enshrine its status as a nuclear power, saying the DPRK “develops highly nuclear weapons to ensure” its “rights to existence” and to “deter war”.
• In 2024, Kim Jong-un said that peaceful unification with the south, which was the country’s official policy, was no longer possible, and that the constitution should be changed to designate Seoul as the “principal enemy” of Pyongyang.
• In May 2026, North Korea’s constitution was changed to remove the goal of reunification, as well as defining the country’s borders, and giving Kim Jong-un sole authority over the use of nuclear weapons.

As set out in an article by SPIRI “South Korea’s policy towards the North tends to swing from engagement to confrontation with successive progressive and conservative administrations”. The pendulum is currently swinging towards engagement in Seoul. Since taking office in June 2025, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung of the progressive Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), has sought to improve relations with North Korea through a series of unilateral measures and calls for dialogue:

• In June 2025 the South Korean military announced it was suspending loudspeaker broadcasts near the border targeting North Korea, which it had resumed the year before.
• Also in June the government called for civic groups representing families of South Koreans believed to be abducted by Pyongyang to stop disseminating leaflets over North Korea (these are dropped by balloons).
• In July 2025 it was reported that South Korea’s National Intelligence Service had suspended broadcasting several radio stations and one television station into the DPRK.
• In August 2025 in a speech on Liberation Day (celebrating the end of the Japanese occupation in 1945), President Lee set out three principles for its relationship with North Korea:
  • affirming their respect for North Korea’s current system
  • rejecting unification by absorption of the North by the South
  • asserting they have no intention of committing any hostile acts
• In September 2025, President Lee in an address to the United Nations, said his government would “consistently seek a path to reduce military tensions and restore inter-Korean trust”, and it would seek comprehensive dialogue centred on “Exchange, Normalization, and Denuclearization”, what has been called his “END” initiative.

North Korea has not changed its behaviour to South Korea since these policies were implemented and, as outlined above, it has continued to launch ballistic missiles. In September 2026, South Korea said it was closely monitoring North Korean activity, after reports in the South Korean media that North Korean troops were ​sighted crossing the military demarcation line separating the two countries more ​than 20 times in August (exceeding the total times recorded throughout 2025). North Korean forces are also reported to have resumed fortification work near the border, including laying mines ​and ​constructing fences.

What has President Trump said about US military exercises with South Korea?

On 17 August 2026 US President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that based on his “very good relationship with Kim Jong-un” he was “not happy with the fact that the United States has, long ago, agreed to participate in Joint Military Exercises with South Korea”. He said that not only were these exercises “costly” with “much of these costs paid for by the United States of America” but also sent a signal “that is totally inappropriate and hostile, to a Country that, as long as Donald J. Trump has been President, has been unthreatening and respectful”. As the exercises were “too late to cancel” Mr Trump said he had instructed the Department of Defense to “substantially reduce”, the exercises. He also referenced that he had asked the President of South Korea to join the US in the “denuclearization” of Iran, and they had declined.

South Korea’s military confirmed that the Ulchi Freedom Shield joint military exercise which began on 17 August, the same day as President Trump’s announcement, would end on 21 August, six days earlier than planned, at the request of the United States.

The US and South Korea have strong defence ties. A 1953 mutual defence treaty commits both countries to defend each other against an armed attack, and the US has stationed significant numbers of troops in the country. There are approximately 28,500 US soldiers based there at present. South Korea contributes towards the cost of the US deployment (around $1.9 billon US dollars in 2026). In both his first and second terms President Trump has called for South Korea to pay more to the United States in return for its military support.

Will there be new US-North Korea talks?

In 2018 and 2019 President Trump held talks with Kim Jong-un, the first US President to conduct direct face to face talks with their North Korean counterpart. The talks were ultimately unsuccessful, with Mr Trump reportedly refusing to agree to Kim Jong-un’s proposal to freeze his country’s nuclear programme in return for sanctions relief. The US President was also said to have offered to significantly curtail US-South Korea military exercises or reduce the number of US troops stationed in South Korea in return for a North Korean nuclear freeze.

Following President Trump’s announcement that the US was shortening joint military exercises with South Korea, analysts speculated that the move was made to persuade Kim Jong-un to enter into fresh talks with Washington.

The Wall Street Journal reported on 18 August 2026 that Mr Trump was pushing officials to try and set up a face-to-face meeting with Kim Jong-un as early as the autumn this year. The following day President Trump told reporters he planned to meet with the Supreme Leader later in 2026. Asked whether Mr Kim had responded to his request for a meeting Mr Trump said: “Yeah, he has”.

However, Kim Yo-jong, Kim Jong-un’s sister and a senior party official, released a statement through the state media saying that while the relationship between President Trump and her brother “is still excellent,” her brother is “not aware” of any communication with his US counterpart. Ms Kim said that the “US hostile policy towards [North Korea] has remained unchanged” and downplayed the significance of the curtailment of the US-South Korea military exercises. She said that if the US “calculates that it can propagate its recent measure as the one of so-called good faith, they will not get desired answer”.

A spokesperson for the US State Department said that “the United States remains open to ⁠dialogue with North Korea without preconditions”, and that “The president and Kim Jong-un will meet again at the appropriate time”.

Analysts have suggested that North Korea is unlikely to rush into new talks. Victor ​Cha, head of the Korea program at the ​Center for Strategic and International Studies think⁠tank, believes that North Korea would be unlikely to respond immediately, saying “I think they're going to bide their time and wait a little bit”.

Andrew Yeo at the Brookings Institution, another thinktank, suggested that a meeting would be in Kim Jong-un’s interest, telling Reuters that “some say ​that there's no reason why ⁠Kim Jong-un would want to meet Trump because he has Russia and China now in his pocket. But on the flip side, I feel like he has nothing to lose by meeting Trump because he has Russia and China in his pocket”. He said the talks also gave the North Korean leader reputation and status, so it was “just a ⁠matter of ​[…] when's the most optimal timing”.

Not all analysts agree the barriers to talks are so low. Rachel Minyoung Lee, senior fellow for the Stimson Center’s Korea Programme told Al Jazeera that North Korea does not trust the US, and since its joint military strikes on Iran with Israel in February, Pyongyang has consistently portrayed Washington as an “untrustworthy actor and a disturber of the international order”. She also said that Kim Jong-un had made clear earlier this year that for the US and North Korea to have friendly ties, Washington would first have to recognise North Korea’s “constitutional status” — a reference to its nuclear-armed status. “Even for President Trump, who is eager to engage Kim Jong-un again, recognising North Korea’s nuclear status seems like a very tall order,” Minyoung Lee said.

There have been different theories put forward as to why President Trump wants to hold talks with North Korea. Al Jazeera suggested that the US President could be using his efforts to improve relations with Kim Jong-un to “exercise[e] leverage vis-a-vis South Korea”. Victor ​Cha said President Trump was clearly interested in meeting with Kim Jong-un again, but that he also appeared to be trying to shift focus from the US’s struggles in the war with Iran.

Reuters reported that “South ​Korea has been privately receptive to Trump's strategy [of talks with the North], although officials in Seoul still have doubts about reducing joint military exercises with the United States”.

How have regional powers China and Japan reacted to recent developments in North Korea?

China has, for a long time, been an ally of North Korea. Relations with Japan, meanwhile, historically have been tense and remain so.

China’s reaction

China has largely been supportive of the Kim Jong-un’s leadership, and while its desire for stability on the Korean Peninsula means it previously tried to constrain Kim’s nuclear ambitions, it now sees North Korea’s nuclear status as a useful tool to constrain the US’s role in the region.

China and North Korea’s relationship goes back to the Korean War (1950 to 1953), with Beijing supporting Pyongyang. The two countries signed a mutual defence agreement (PDF) in 1961 (it was renewed for 20 years in 2001, and again in 2021). North Korea is the only country China has such an agreement with.

Despite these bonds, when North Korea conducted its first nuclear weapons test in 2006 China criticised the action, forcing an apology from then Supreme Leader Kim Jong-il, and supported and implemented UN sanctions against Pyongyang. Before and after the nuclear test, China was part of six-party talks attempting to end North Korea’s nuclear programme (along with North Korea, South Korea, Japan, Russia and the US).

Today, however, the Australia-based foreign policy thinktank the Lowy Institute says Beijing “has abandoned its long-standing posture as a reluctant mediator of the Korean Peninsula’s nuclear crisis”. Rather it is now “actively leveraging Pyongyang’s nuclear status as a durable buffer against Washington”. Han Ki-bom, a former deputy director of South Korea's National Intelligence Service, has said that “China seems to be trying to revive and upgrade a relationship that many observers had considered largely symbolic”, after a September 2026 visit by President Xi Jinping of China to Pyongyang. He also said that part of China’s motives for improving relations are its concerns about North Korea's close military cooperation with Russia, as well suggesting “Beijing increasingly views North Korea as a strategic partner in addressing broader international and regional challenges”.

While China has become more supportive of North Korea in the last several years, its interests in stability on the Korean peninsula remain. Beijing fears significant economic hardship in North Korea or a regime collapse could result in significant migration to China and would see any potential conflict on the peninsula as undermining its security interests.

China has not officially commented on President Trump’s proposal for fresh US-North Korea talks. However the South China Morning Post reported in September 2026 that “Beijing was stepping up to play an ‘active’ and ‘constructive’ role in reviving US-North Korea diplomacy”.

Japan’s reaction

Since 2022, Japan has significantly increased its defence investment and updated its security policies. This shift is in response to what Japan sees as a deteriorating security environment in the Indo-Pacific region, with threats posed by China, Russia and North Korea.

Japan’s 2022 National Security Strategy (PDF) states that “North Korea’s military activities pose an even more grave and imminent threat to Japan's national security than ever before”. Japan relies on its close security relationship with the United States to help counter the threat of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programme.

In terms of its own military capabilities, Japan has ballistic missile interceptors that are deployed on its eight Aegis destroyers (warships). A plan to deploy land-based interceptors to provide an uninterrupted missile defence system over the long term was developed in 2017 but suspended in 2020. By deciding in 2022 to acquire longer-range missiles for counter-strikes, Japan is increasing its deterrence against North Korea through the threat of military retaliation (“punitive deterrence”).

Diplomatic initiatives between Japan and North Korea appear unlikely at present. The two countries have only ever held two sets of leadership talks, and the last were in 2004. The most significant issue preventing talks is that of the abduction of Japanese citizens by North Korea. In the 1970s and 1980s North Korean agents abducted a large number of Japanese citizens from Japan, and Japan responded by imposing one of the world’s strictest sanctions regimes. North Korea released five abductees in 2002, and has since said the abductions issue has been resolved, but Japan believes many of its citizens remain in North Korea and public anger against Pyongyang remains significant.

For more on recent developments in Japan’s defence spending and security policies see Library briefing Japan’s strengthening military posture and new security policies (July 2026).

What is UK policy towards North Korea?

The UK imposes a broad range of sanctions on North Korea due to its nuclear programme. The UK’s recent defence and security reviews warn of the threat of North Korea’s missile programmes and its growing links with China, Russia and Iran. The UK Government says diplomacy and negotiations are the best way to secure peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.

UK imposes broad range of sanctions on North Korea

In response to North Korea’s 2006 testing of a nuclear weapon, the United Nations imposed a broad range of sanctions on North Korea, which the UK implements. The UK has also implemented additional sanctions (travel bans and asset freezes) on certain North Korean officials and entities.

The UK sanctions regime on North Korea includes wide-ranging financial sanctions that apply to its credit and financial institutions; export bans on goods including arms, dual-use items, and many other goods including machinery, helicopters and ships, certain metals, minerals and ores, oil and aviation fuel, and luxury goods. Transport sanctions are imposed also, banning the entry of North Korean aircraft or ships into UK airspace or ports, as well as the buying or acquiring of North Korean aircraft or ships.

UK strategic defence and national security strategies warn of North Korean threat

The UK’s Strategic Defence Review (SDR) and National Security Strategy (NSS), both published in 2025, warned of the threat posed by North Korea. The SDR said that North Korea “will likely pursue further nuclear modernisation to guarantee regime survival and coerce its neighbours”, and that both it and Iran are “developing missile programmes with growing reach, and they continue to pose a direct threat to the UK in cyberspace”.

The SDR stated that “the growing links between Russia, China, Iran, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea complicate calculations of deterrence and escalation management across regions”. Similarly, the NSS warned of the “willingness of [the UK’s] adversaries and competitors to work more closely together”, giving the example of Noth Korea “not only threaten[ing] its neighbours in Asia through ballistic missile testing; it has sent thousands of troops to support Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine, directly confronting those seeking to preserve European security”.

UK calls for dialogue between North and South Korea and criticises North Korea’s human rights record

In November 2025, then Foreign Office Minister Seema Malhotra said that “Diplomacy and negotiations are the best way to secure peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula. The Republic of Korea [South Korea] is a valued partner with whom we routinely discuss these important issues”, when asked what the government was doing to encourage dialogue between North and South Korea.

Asked in December 2025 what action the UK Government was taking on nuclear proliferation and to “contain” the situation in North Korea, Defence Minister Lord Coaker responded that the country’s withdrawal from the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 2003 “is something that the UK and the international community dispute and do not accept”. He called upon North Korea’s “influential neighbours” to put pressure on the country “to adhere to its responsibilities that it accepted when it joined the NPT in the first place”.

In September 2025, the UK released a statement at the UN Human Rights Council calling on North Korea “to engage meaningfully with the international community, to take credible steps to improve its human rights record and to grant all UN human rights mechanisms access into the country”. In October 2025 Ms Malhotra said the government had raised their concerns over human rights with North Korea’s London embassy, and “regularly discuss with key international partners how to address the DPRK's human rights record, including on freedom of religion or belief”.

The UK’s embassy in North Korea is currently closed. It has been closed since May 2020 due to entry and exit restrictions put in place by the North Korean government in response to the covid-19 pandemic. However, the UK does have an ambassador to North Korea, who is based in London.