Featured Image Credit: Reddit/u/XiaoHao2
Man flies drone into North Korea from China to capture incredible footage but everyone’s saying the same thing
The eerie pictures claim to show life in the secretive nation.
Published Mar 27, 2024, 17:44:23 GMTLast updated Mar 27, 2024, 17:44:21 GMT
A man claims to have taken photos from inside North Korea after flying a drone into the country – and everyone’s saying the same thing.
For anyone who skipped out on international relations back in school, North Korea is notoriously a secretive nation.
So much so, getting in and out of the country can prove to be more than a little difficult.
But one person decided they wanted to get a look into the nation.
A Reddit user claimed that while he was in China, he decided to send his drone on quite the adventure.
He said that he flew his drone over the border and took several pictures, some of which he shared on the social media platform. The post has since gone viral with over 130,000 upvotes.
XiaoHao2/Reddit
Reddit/u/XiaoHao2
The images show the portraits of North Korean founder Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il decorating the outside of a building.
While it is not clear what time the images were taken, the streets are very much devoid of motorists and pedestrians. Some images even show people on the ground pointing out the drone. Other images simply show the skyline of a city in the country.
“Am I tripping or is there no street drainage at all? Definitely no traffic lights. Looks like a concrete model of a city,” one user wrote.
“It’s interesting how the uncanny valley exists for inanimate things as well. This is close enough to being an actual city that it’s disturbing,” another added.
XiaoHao2/Reddit
Reddit/u/XiaoHao2
“Yesss but barely any cars or people. No trash anywhere. It’s so bizarre to look at it,” a third wrote.
Despite being impressed by the photos, many users have all remarked the same thing – that the person could find themselves in serious trouble, and probably shouldn’t have done it.
Others were surprised at how easily the Reddit user was able to get images of the country and then on the internet.
“Guy singlehandedly invaded N. Korea,” joked one user.
“If this random dude with a drone from a store can this easily spy on North Korea, imagine the intel the US has,” a person added.
“US intelligence are probably like ‘wait s***, we spent hundreds of millions on spy satellites and could have just used a f****** $500 drone?'”
“That seems like a dangerous game,” another warned.
“Causing an international incident as a goof,” another also warned.
However, others remarked due to the civil relationship between China and North Korea, even if they had successfully shot down the drone, not much more would have occurred beyond confiscation.
“That seems like a dangerous game,” wrote another, as a third questioned: “Are you alive?”
XiaoHao2 has since confirmed that he’s okay, telling those concerned: “I am still alive and free…”
While the streets of North Korea look notably empty in the Redditor’s photos, recent snaps of the country showed more signs of life.
Photographer Pedro Pardo managed to take some images that portray life on the other side of the Chinese and North Korean border in recent weeks.
Padro was able to get access to a remote part of North Korea’s border with China in the latter’s Jilin province to take the snaps, which date between February 26 and March 1 of this year.
The snaps were taken shortly before Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a damning report about North Korea. It was titled ‘A Sense of Terror, Stronger than a Bullet: The Closing of North Korea 2018–2023’.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
Part of the summary of the report, which was published on March 7, read: “North Korea is one of the most repressive countries in the world. Ruled by third-generation hereditary totalitarian leader Kim Jong Un, the North Korean government for decades has controlled its population with violence and fear, using arbitrary detention, torture, executions after unfair trials, enforced disappearance, and other serious violations of human rights, to obtain unquestioned obedience.”
Since King Jong-un took power of the country in 2011, North Korea’s annual trade values in terms of exports have drastically decreased from almost $4 billion a year, as per HRW’s report, to just $248 million a year in 2022.
Featured Image Credit: Reddit/uspn
Rare images show what life is really like inside North Korea
Rare images have shown what life is like in North Korea.
North Korea, run by Kim Jong-un, is a notoriously private country and people are seldom lucky enough to snap images of what it’s like to live there.
North Korea closed its borders in January 2020, but prior to doing so there were already heavy restrictions on photography there.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
Officially known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), those who were once fortunate enough to get into the country before it closed its borders weren’t able to take snaps of anything but public tourist sights.
Anything outside of that was illegal.
But, four years on from Kim Jong-un making the country even more private, photographer Pedro Pardo managed to take some images that portray life on the other side of the Chinese and North Korean border.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
He managed to get access to a remote part of North Korea’s border with China in the latter’s Jilin province to take the snaps, which date between February 26 and March 1 of this year.
One photograph by Pardo is of a government building in Namyang, while another snap was of North Korean soldiers working on the border, as seen from Tumen in China.
Pardo’s photos also included an image of the town of Chunggang, which boasts dozens of identical-looking houses.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
There’s also a large sign up on the hill of the town that translates to ‘My country is the best’.
Elsewhere there was a photo of a watchtower in Hyesan on the border.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, North Korea has been using ‘expanded fences, guard posts, strict enforcement, and new rules, including a standing order for border guards to shoot on sight’, a bleak new report from the Human Rights Watch (HRW) revealed earlier this month.
Released on March 7, the report was titled ‘A Sense of Terror, Stronger than a Bullet: The Closing of North Korea 2018–2023’.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
HRW analyzed satellite images of the country’s borders and found that between 2020 and 2023, North Korea had built a total 482km of new fencing in the areas and enhanced another 260km of primary fencing that had existed before, Independent reports.
As of the images taken in April 2023, there were still some fences being erected.
While North Korea is making it increasingly more difficult to enter or leave the country, it was found that the number of people that escaped from North to South Korea tripled last year, as per The Guardian.
The news outlet reported that almost 200 people managed to flee to the neighboring country.
