April 21, 2026, by Victor Cha—
Dr. Victor Cha argues it's time to stop pretending the old framework can work and instead build a "cold peace" — a relationship short of normalization that manages the North Korean threat as it actually is... This was published on Foreign Affairs today, read the full piece here. In the early 1990s,…
April 13, 2026, by Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., Victor Cha and Jennifer Jun—
Recent imagery shows the completion of a building at Yongbyon, widely believed to be a new uranium enrichment plant... Overview image showing the Radiochemistry Laboratory and new building at Yongbyon, April 2, 2026. Copyright © CNES 2026, Distribution Airbus DS. Image may not be republished without permission. Please contact imagery@csis.org. Satellite imagery from this month…
March 9, 2026, by Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., Victor Cha and Jennifer Jun—
Satellite imagery shows rapid expansion of Russian UAV and UCAV production infrastructure at the Yelabuga Special Economic Zone, with reports suggesting potential North Korean labor involvement... Download Report PDF The Yelabuga drone factory has been identified in open-source reports as a…
March 3, 2026, by Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., Victor Cha and Jennifer Jun—
Recent imagery shows two types of North Korean UAVs at Panghyon Airbase, observed together for the first time at the location... Saebyeol-4 and Saebyeol-9 UAVs at Panghyon Airbase, February 25, 2026. Copyright © 2026 by Vantor. Image may not be republished without permission. Please contact imagery@csis.org. A February 25, 2026, satellite image shows both a...
February 28, 2026, by Victor Cha—
CSIS Korea Chair is producing…
February 2, 2026, by Jennifer Jun, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative and Victor Cha—
The Atlantic Amsterdam, a Chinese platform that was a point of tension between South Korea and China due to its unilateral placement by Beijing in the Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ), arrived at a commercial shipyard in China last week... View of the Atlantic Amsterdam, the Chinese “central integrated management platform” located in the PMZ in October 2022, relocated to Weihai…
January 28, 2026, by Jennifer Jun, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative and Victor Cha—
CSIS imagery analysis and AIS data collection finds that China has begun relocating the Atlantic Amsterdam from inside the Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ) on January 27. .. View of the Atlantic Amsterdam, the Chinese “central integrated management platform” for its aquaculture cages, in the…
December 15, 2025, by Jennifer Jun, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative and Victor Cha—
China’s deployment of buoys near the Korea-China PMZ signals expanding monitoring and gray zone pressure in the Yellow Sea (West Sea)... Sources: CSIS Beyond Parallel; Republic of Korea Navy Headquarters Report submitted to the South Korean National Assembly, shared with the press Download Report PDF This...
December 12, 2025, by Victor Cha—
What is China building in the area in and around the Korea-China Provisional Measures Zone (PMZ) in the Yellow Sea (West Sea)? Is it really only for fishing, or are there dual-nature capabilities that we should worry about? What do we really know about the 13 buoys, the 2 aquaculture cages (Shen Lan 1 & Shen Lan 2), and the integrated management platform (Atlantic Amsterdam) that China has placed in the area?
December 11, 2025, by Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., Victor Cha and Jennifer Jun—
Satellite imagery shows that North Korea has made significant progress at the port-of-entry site for the much-delayed New Yalu River Bridge.
