After Japan’s surrender at the conclusion of World War II, the Korean peninsula was partitioned into two occupation zones, divided at the 38th parallel. The USSR controlled the north, with the U.S. taking charge of the south. In 1948, the division was made permanent with the establishment of the separate regimes of North and South Korea. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) was established on May 1, 1948, with Kim Il Sung as president.

Hoping to unify the Koreas under a single Communist government, the North launched a surprise invasion of South Korea on June 25, 1950. In the following days, the UN Security Council condemned the attack and demanded an immediate withdrawal.

President Harry S. Truman ordered U.S. air and naval units into action to enforce the UN order. The British government followed suit, and soon a UN multinational command was set up to aid the South Koreans.

The North Korean invaders swiftly seized Seoul and surrounded the allied forces in the peninsula’s southeast corner near Pusan. In a desperate bid to reverse the military situation, UN Commander Gen. Douglas MacArthur ordered an amphibious landing at Inchon on Sept. 15 and routed the North Korean army. MacArthur’s forces pushed north across the 38th parallel, approaching the Yalu River.

Prompted by this successful counteroffensive, Communist China entered the war, forcing the UN troops into a headlong retreat. Seoul was lost again, and then regained. Ultimately, the war stabilized near the 38th parallel but dragged on for two years while negotiations took place. An armistice was agreed to on July 27, 1953.

Kim Il Sung’s death on July 8, 1994, introduced a period of uncertainty, as his son, Kim Jong Il, assumed the leadership mantle. Negotiations over the country’s suspected possession of atomic weapons dragged on, but an agreement was reached in June 1995 that included a provision for providing the North with a South Korean nuclear reactor.

The nuclear standoffs that characterized the mid-1990s were overshadowed when famine struck the nation’s 24 million inhabitants in 1998 and 1999. Two years of floods had been followed by severe droughts in 1997 and 1998, causing devastating crop failures. Because of a lack of fuel and machinery parts, and weather conditions that encouraged parasites, only 10% of North Korea’s rice fields could be worked. The staggering food crisis necessitated foreign aid. In the fall of 1999, the severe famine, which claimed an estimated 2 million to 3 million lives, had begun to wane. Malnutrition and hunger, however, continued to plague North Korea into the mid-2000s. Thousands have attempted to flee to China or South Korea, and only few have evaded capture. Those who do not escape face torture or execution.

North Korea, one of the world’s most secretive societies, has been accused of egregious human-rights violations, including summary executions, torture, inhumane conditions in prison camps, which hold up to 200,000 prisoners, and denial of freedom of expression and movement. Access to the country is strictly limited and North Korea’s domestic media is tightly controlled, making it difficult to substantiate the accusations. Some nongovernmental organizations, however, such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have spoken to North Korean refugees who have experienced such persecution.

In Sept. 1998, North Korea launched a test missile over Japan, claiming it was simply a scientific satellite, raising suspicions regarding North Korea’s nuclear intentions. In 1999, North Korea agreed to allow the United States to conduct ongoing inspections of a suspected nuclear development site, Kumchangri. In exchange, the U.S. would increase food aid and initiate a program for bringing potato production to the country.