North Korea remains the most isolated country on earth, with its people effectively cut off from the outside world -- or so the world has been told. But there is reason to believe this is no longer the case. My research suggests millions of North Koreans listen to or hear about foreign radio broadcasts. There is evidence the numbers are growing. This is all the more amazing given that North Korean authorities distribute only radios with fixed dials, assiduously jam foreign broadcasts, and send citizens caught listening to foreign radio to the country's notorious gulags for as long as 10 years.

　　朝鲜依旧是地球上最孤立的国家，朝鲜的国民实际上被与世隔绝了──或者说据外界所知是这样。不过，有理由相信不再是这样的局面了。我进行的研究显示，有数百万朝鲜人收听或从别人那里听到外国电台广播的消息。有证据表明，这个数字还在上升。鉴于朝鲜当局只发放设定了固定频率的收音机，不遗余力地屏蔽外国广播，并且把被发现收听外国电台的朝鲜人关进臭名昭彰的劳改营最长可达10年之久，朝鲜人收听外国电台就更值得惊叹了。

　　North Koreans willing to tamper with their government radios or buy a $3 radio smuggled in from China have a wide range of choices. Over a dozen radio stations from the United States, South Korea and Japan currently broadcast to North Korea. Voice of America (VOA), one of the most popular stations, has been broadcasting to the North since 1942, while the equally popular Radio Free Asia (RFA) began its Korean service soon after its establishment by Congress in 1997. VOA focuses on news of the U.S. and the world, while RFA concentrates on North Korea and life for the nearly 20,000 defectors in the South.

　　有些朝鲜人乐意改装政府发放的收音机，或花三美元买部从中国走私过来的收音机。这些人有很多种选择。有10多家美国、韩国和日本电台目前都有对朝鲜的广播。最受欢迎的电台之一“美国之音”(VOA)从1942年以来一直有对朝鲜的广播，而同样受欢迎的“自由亚洲电台”(RFA)在1997年由美国国会成立之后不久就开始了对朝鲜的广播服务。“美国之音”主要专注于美国和世界新闻，而“自由亚洲电台”则关注朝鲜和逃往韩国的近两万名朝鲜人的生活状况。

　　North Korean defectors themselves have also created three stations in recent years, led by Free North Korea Radio (FNK Radio). These stations employ stringers in North Korea who communicate by cell phone or smuggle out interviews through China. As a result, information is flowing in and out of the North more rapidly than ever. For example, when authorities undertook major economic reforms in 2002, it was months before the rest of the world knew. In contrast, when the regime launched a disastrous currency reform in November, FNK Radio filed a report within hours.

　　逃离朝鲜的人近几年也创建了三个电台，最大的一家是“自由朝鲜电台”(FNK Radio)。这些电台雇佣朝鲜的兼职记者，他们用手机与外界通讯，或经中国把采访内容偷运出朝鲜。结果是，信息比以往任何时候都更快地从朝鲜流进流出。举例来讲，2002年朝鲜当局进行重大经济改革时，世界其他地方在好几个月之后才知道消息。相比之下，去年11月朝鲜政府推出灾难性的货币改革时，“自由朝鲜电台”在几个小时内就发了一篇报导。

　　It's impossible to count how many North Koreans listen to these stations, but there is anecdotal evidence the numbers are significant. For starters, on dozens of occasions, authorities in Pyongyang have used their own media to attack foreign broadcasters. The North reserves the insult 'reptile' exclusively for foreign broadcasters. Last month, the regime likened defector broadcasters to 'human trash.' Ironically, this diatribe also contained the first official mention that the botched currency revaluation had taken place. Foreign broadcasters not only struck a nerve, but also forced the regime to discuss developments it would prefer to ignore. If the broadcasts were not being listened to, the regime would ignore them instead of lavishing free publicity.

　　要想知道有多少朝鲜人收听外国电台广播是不可能的，不过有零散的事例证明人数很庞大。首先，平壤当局有数十次利用自己的媒体来攻击外国广播电台。朝鲜仍把具有侮辱性的“爬行动物”一词专门用在外国广播电台身上。上个月，政府把创建广播电台的逃离者比作“人类垃圾”。具有讽刺意味的是，政府的谩骂中也首次提及进行了拙劣的货币改革。外国广播电台不仅给了朝鲜政府以精神上的打击，还迫使政府讨论它宁愿忽视的改革进展情况。假如广播没人收听，政府会对其不闻不问，而不是为它们做大量的免费宣传。

　　Meanwhile, broadcasters to North Korea frequently receive heartbreaking messages of thanks from North Koreans in China. One listener on RFA's Web site described RFA as 'our one ray of hope.' Over the past several years, South Korean researchers have quietly interviewed thousands of North Korean defectors, refugees, and visitors to China about their listening habits. One unpublished survey conducted last summer of North Koreans in China found that over 20% had regularly listened to the banned broadcasts, and almost all of them had shared the information with family members and friends. Several earlier studies confirm these findings.

　　与此同时，对朝鲜的广播电台常常收到在华朝鲜人令人心碎的感谢信。一位听众在“自由亚洲电台”的网站上把该电台称为“我们的一线希望”。过去几年来，韩国研究人员就收听习惯悄悄采访了数千名逃离朝鲜的人、朝鲜难民和到中国访问的朝鲜人。去年夏天对在华朝鲜人进行的一次未公布的调查发现，有20%以上的人定期收听被禁广播，其中几乎所有人都和家人及朋友分享了听到的信息。早些时候的好几项研究证实了这些发现。

　　The key determinant of a station's popularity seems to be how well its reports jibe with the grim facts which North Koreans see in their everyday lives. South Korea's 'Global Korean Network' has been declining in popularity since it ceased to focus on North Korea and adopted a decidedly soft approach in 1998 after South Korean voters elected a president favoring accommodation with the North.

　　决定一家电台受欢迎程度的关键因素看来是报导是否符合朝鲜人日常生活中所看到的悲惨现实。1998年韩国选民选出了一位倾向于与朝鲜妥协的总统后，韩国的Global Korean Network电台就不再专注于朝鲜，而是采取明显软化的手段，之后它的受欢迎程度一直在下滑。

　　While we must be careful not to draw too many conclusions from samples that are far from random, it is not unreasonable to surmise that there are more than a million surreptitious listeners in a population of 24 million. The North Korean regime is not only losing its monopoly on the control of information; outside broadcasts are also undermining loyalty to the regime. Defectors cite foreign radio-listening as one of the leading motivations to defect.

　　尽管我们必须提防不要从这些远非随机的例子中得出太多结论，却有理由猜测：在人口2,400万的朝鲜，有100多万个秘密的听众。朝鲜政府不仅在逐渐失去对信息控制的垄断，外部广播也在破坏人们对政权的忠诚。逃离朝鲜的人把收听外国电台作为逃离朝鲜的主要动因之一。

　　That opens the possibility that radio could play the same role in prying open North Korea that it did in Eastern Europe. Lech Walesa, Poland's first democratically elected president, insists, 'Without Western broadcasting, totalitarian regimes would have survived much longer.' At the height of the Cold War, one-quarter of the Russian public was listening to jammed and banned broadcasts by the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Liberty and Radio Free Europe. The radios (FL/RFE) knew this based on interviews at that time with over 50,000 Russian travelers and emigres. Recently opened Soviet archives confirm these survey results.

　　这就带来了一种可能：电台可以在打探朝鲜消息方面扮演和在东欧同样的角色。波兰首位民主选举的总统瓦文萨(Lech Walesa)坚持认为，如果没有西方广播，极权政府会存在更长时间。在冷战最激烈的时期，有四分之一的俄罗斯人收听被屏蔽或被禁的“美国之音”、“自由电台”(Radio Liberty)/“自由欧洲电台”(Radio Free Europe)的广播。“自由电台”/“自由欧洲电台”是根据当时对五万多名俄罗斯游客和移民的采访得到这一数据的。最近公开的苏联档案证实了这些调查结果。

　　We can do much more to improve broadcasting to North Korea. VOA and RFA only broadcast five hours a day, and the defector stations limp along on shoestring budgets due to widespread public indifference in South Korea. President Obama's human-rights envoy for North Korea, Robert King, has pledged to expand funding for Korean broadcasting. Pyongyang claims that foreign broadcasts are part of the Obama administration's 'hostile policy' toward the North. But North Koreans deserve to hear the truth -- not only about their own country, but also the world at large.

　　我们可以做更多的事来改善对朝鲜的广播。“美国之音”和“自由亚洲电台”每天只播音五小时，逃离朝鲜的人创建的电台因韩国公众普遍的冷漠而预算紧张、运营艰难。美国总统奥巴马的朝鲜**特使金(Robert King)承诺要扩大对朝鲜广播的资金。平壤方面宣称，外国广播是奥巴马政府对朝鲜“敌对政策”的一部分。不过朝鲜人有权知道事实──不只是关于他们自己国家的，还有整个世界的事实。

　　The seeds of change are being planted. It may take years for North Koreans to act on the information they are receiving, but that does not mean we should not be doing everything we can to encourage that process.

　　变革的种子正在播下。朝鲜人要把收听到的信息付诸行动可能还要很多年时间，不过这并不意味着我们不应该尽全力推进这个过程。

　　Mr. Beck is the Pantech Research Fellow at Stanford University's Asia Pacific Research Center, and also teaches at American University in Washington and Ewha Womans University in Seoul. This is the third of a series of articles on the state of North Korea.

　　（编者按：本文作者Peter M. Beck是斯坦福大学亚太研究中心Pantech研究员，他还在华盛顿的美国大学和首尔的梨花女子大学(Ewha Womans University)任教。本文为朝鲜现状系列文章中的第三篇。）