In a three-hour speech broadcast on North Korean TV Sunday, Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un set a five-year plan to revive his country's struggling economy. But the speech included no major policy changes or economic reforms. Kim delivered the speech during the 7th Congress of the Workers Party of Korea, the highest-level political gathering in the isolated, one-party state. More than 3,400 party members are in Pyongyang for the congress that began Friday and continued through the weekend.

Wheels have long been a sign of economic status for both individuals and nations, and on the lightly trafficked streets of Pyongyang, capital of impoverished and isolated North Korea, electric bicycles are the hottest new ride on the road. Almost unseen two years ago, the Chinese-made two-wheelers are a common site this week in the city, which hosts the first congress of the country's ruling Workers' Party in 36 years.

Weddings and funerals have been banned and Pyongyang is in lockdown as preparations for a once-in-a-generation party congress get underway in North Korea. The ruling Worker’s Party of Korea, headed by the country's leader, Kim Jong-un, is due to stage the first gathering of its kind for 36 years on Friday. Free movement in and out of the capital has also been forbidden and there has been an increase in inspections...

North Korea has sentenced a South Korean-born American citizen to 10 years of hard labor for subversion and espionage, a North Korean official told CNN. Prosecutors were seeking a 15-year hard labor sentence for Kim Dong Chul for committing "offenses in a scheme to overthrow the socialist system of the DPRK," according to state-run news agency KCNA.

North Korea test-fired what appeared to be two intermediate range ballistic missiles on Thursday but both failed, a South Korean official said, in a setback for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in the run-up to next week's ruling party congress.

Kim Jong Un orders the firing of missiles on a whim when he gets upset about U.S. policy toward North Korea. But the North Korean leader has no intention of starting a war, a source close to Kim said. Kenji Fujimoto, the former sushi chef to the current leader's father, Kim Jong Il, told Japanese newspaper Mainichi Shimbun that the younger Kim's military decisions are made spontaneously.

Cheese-chomping despot Kim Jong Un held a “Master Chef”-style competition to find North Korea’s top cooks as millions across the nation starve. The Emmental-obsessed dictator gave the show, which was broadcast on state TV, the green light despite an estimated two-thirds of the country’s 27 million people surviving on food rations. The Commie connoisseur developed a love of European cheeses and fine wines when he went to school in Switzerland.

The device reportedly flew for nearly 20 miles and was deployed from a submarine, in clear breach of UN sanctions

Activities at North Korea's Punggye-ri nuclear site are showing Pyongyang is getting ready for its fifth nuclear test, which could happen as early as Saturday. U.S. and South Korea military surveillance captured the movements showing all preparations are complete, local television network SBS reported. Satellite imagery showed a significant number of vehicles along with other equipment were no longer visible on site.

A solid-fuel rocket engine North Korea tested in March was built with technology from Iran, an Israeli analyst said. Tal Inbar, of Israel's Fisher Institute for Air and Space Strategic Studies, said Pyongyang has also made significant progress in developing ballistic missile technology, Voice of America reported Tuesday. Inbar made the statements at a congressional briefing addressing the "ballistic axis," a reference to Iran's and North Korea's space program.

The United States will respond strongly in the case of a further North Korean nuclear test, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday, days after the North's failure to launch what the United States believes was an intermediate-range ballistic missile. North Korea conducted a fourth nuclear test in January and a long-range rocket launch the next month, both in contravention of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

...the previously restricted Pyongyang Metro is surely one of the most mysterious, yet beautiful transit systems on earth, each station uniquely themed in ultra-nationalism, parading North Korea’s revolutionary goals and achievements to impressionable commuters.

A senior North Korean military officer who oversaw spying operations has fled to the South, say South Korean officials, in a rare high level defection.

North Korea said Saturday it had successfully tested an engine designed for an inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM) that would "guarantee" an eventual nuclear strike on the US mainland. It was the latest in a series of claims by Pyongyang of significant breakthroughs in both its nuclear

Thirteen North Koreans working at the same restaurant in a foreign country have defected to South Korea, Seoul officials said Friday. People working in North Korean-operated restaurants overseas have previously defected, but this is the first time multiple workers have escaped from the same restaurant, South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman Jeong Joon Hee told reporters in Seoul. North Korean defections are a bitter point of contention between the rival Koreas.

At least two suspects who attempted to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong Un were arrested, according to unconfirmed reports in the country. The suspects had been reportedly arrested at the China border near the Tumen River as they were preparing a hit on Kim in the city of Hoeryong in North Hamgyong Province, Radio Free Asia reported Thursday.

Nigel Cowie’s front company also allegedly helped regime expand nuclear programme, Panama Papers show

Satellite images suggest "significant activity" is taking place at a North Korean laboratory that could separate plutonium for nuclear weapons. The photos appear on 38 North, a US website that monitors sensitive sites in the country. The website says that during the past five weeks exhaust plumes have been seen two or three times at the radiochemical laboratory complex at Yongbyon.

China says it is restricting trade with North Korea, announcing bans on gold and some coal imports and jet fuel exports, in line with UN sanctions.

Development of the bomb is part of a newly announced £140 billion five-year defence budget that will be used to neutralise the increasing threat from the north. South Korea plans to build a non-lethal 'blackout bomb' that will wipe out North Korea 's electricity grid if war breaks out between the two countries. If successful, the 'soft bomb' will paralyse North Korea's infrastructure.