North Korean state TV spotlighted the small city of Huichon on Tuesday, touting recent construction of new housing blocks, schools, and factories as part of similar developments found in other towns nationwide. 

The segment appeared to contrast with a report in the ruling party daily last week, which detailed numerous “problems” in the city’s ability to provide for its residents.

But the largest ongoing construction project in Huichon continues to be kept under wraps, failing to be mentioned in the recent reporting as progress on the ground appears to have slowed down, satellite imagery shows.

In a program apparently filmed in recent weeks called “The New Look of a Proud Town (전변의 새 모습 자랑하는 고장 – 자강도 희천시),” aired July 14 on Korean Central Television (KCTV), viewers were given a tour of the mountainous Huichon in Jagang Province.

City officials led construction on hundreds of new buildings for over 1300 families across seven districts, the narrator said, as improvements at two foodstuffs factories, a greenhouse farm, fish farm, and a tree nursery were also praised.

New apartment blocks in central and southern districts were also shown off, while newly-built groups of single-story homes in the east were featured in connection to a new “organic compound fertilizer factory” under the Huichon Silk Mill.

An article published in the Rodong Sinmun on July 9, however, focused on the failings of city officials, describing their efforts to engage in self-criticism to put its management back on track.

Officials were said to have recently reviewed “whether foodstuffs were not appropriately supplied thus causing discomfort among the residents, whether daily necessities were correctly supplied according to household size, and whether water was properly supplied to apartments.”

“There were certainly not a small number of problems to solve,” it continued.

The article added that a great deal of work was done for the people in the last period, but that officials “took turns admitting blame for failing to work as faithful servants of the people.”

“They came to feel they need to do better guaranteeing the lives of the people after considering facts such as that they could not properly solve problems” in some local neighborhoods, it said.

The full program which aired on July 14 | Video: KCTV

Progress on mystery projects

But still missing from both Tuesday’s TV program and the Rodong article, as well as other state media reporting, is official information on the largest ongoing construction project in Huichon. 

Located in the Chongha district in the northeast, the project began in July 2019 with the demolition of a sprawling factory and dozens of homes in the surrounding area, according to daily medium-resolution satellite imagery provided by Planet Labs.

An area covering roughly 3 km² has since last October been transformed into two distinct areas, with one appearing by late 2019 to be a new factory consisting of around a dozen large buildings in place of what is believed to be the Chilsong Electric Appliance Factory (칠성전기공장), visited by Kim Jong Il in March 2010.

Timelapse of construction on the site (located at 40°12’09.35″ N 126°16’58.16″ E) from July 2019 to July 2020 | Images: Planet Labs

What are likely schools, a stadium, and other public buildings began to show up in the adjacent undeveloped area in late March this year.

Most of an additional 3 km² in the surrounding area was cleared of over a hundred small homes by last October as well, while development began this May on another large patch of land across the river.

None of the new buildings in these sections appeared finished by July 15 in the medium-resolution imagery.

The project’s omission from such comprehensive programs and reports may be linked to sensitivity over its purpose, though plenty of other large construction projects are also routinely completed without fanfare in state media.

Meanwhile, across town, another new development has appeared since last month directly behind the UN-sanctioned Huichon Ryonha General Machinery Plant (희천련하기계종합공장), alternately referred to as the Huichon General Machine Tool Factory (희천공작기계종합공장).

The company was designated by the UN Security Council in 2013, and, according to a 2015 UN sanctions panel report, is suspected of providing computer numerically controlled (CNC) machine tools to factories that produce components of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. 

The new construction of four or five small buildings appears directly next to the factory’s largest warehouse at the western edge of the city. But as they lie just outside the outer perimeter, it is unclear whether the new buildings are indeed part of the machine tool factory.

Edited by Oliver Hotham