It was confirmed that a significant amount of information on North Korea contained in Korean Wikipedia are biased contents, citing exactly what the North Korea regime insists.
According to materials of a debate held by the Young Intellectual Forum ‘story K’, in the Korean Wikipedia there are 72 North Korea related documents – but 18 are wrong; 21 hold inaccurate, uncertain, and groundless information; necessary and essential information is missing in 22 documents; 15 are biased, distorted and misunderstood.
On the 19th Story K held a debate, “Current Situation of Korean Wikipedia and the Direction for Improvement: Is it intellect or anti-intellect?”
In addition to that, 22 out of 72 documents are source less and the other 25 are newspapers’ articles and internet media.
In the Korean Wikipedia there is no explanation of North Korea’s nuclear issues, even though North Korea has been sanctioned by UN Security Council because of two times of nuclear tests.
In terms of Agreed Framework between DPRK and US in 1994, it explains a “special contract of nuclear development between North Korea and the U.S.”
Information on Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il is also according to North Korea’s insistence. “Kim Jong Il, at age 12, organized a ‘study group to put together a brief biography of General Kim Il Sung’ on February 10, 1953. In May 1956, regarding the first five year plan, he criticized cadres of Workers’ Party who were accustomed with doctrinarism and todayism.”
“Kim Il Sung pursued the expansion of armaments, and the development of nuclear weapons and missiles, after being stimulated by Park Chung Hee’s nuclear development.”
“Kim Jong Il pursued reform and opening policies after witnessing the collapse of the USSR and Eastern European Bloc.”
According to the materials, these Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il related documents on Korean Wikipedia look just like their biographies.
With respect to the northern limit line (NLL), Korean Wikipedia described that, “North Korea abided by the line until 1990s,” but Story K has corrected it to “Since 1973 North Korea has been invading the NLL.”
The explanation of Status of Forces Agreement also has problems: it drops the fact that SOFA was amended partially in April, 2001, but only describes, “Despite a partial amendment in 1991, it is still an unfair agreement.”
Newspapers, Korean Wikipedia quotes, are also biased: in the case of the Cheonan attack, there are 139 segments of articles, from left leaning newspapers such as Hankyoreh, Kyunghyang Shinmun, Voice of People, while 59 pieces are based on conservative newspapers like Chosun Ilbo, Donga Ilbo and Joongang Ilbo.
