Ryanggang Province (Ryanggangdo; ko, 량강도, ''Ryanggang-do'', ) is a
province
A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions out ...
in
North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...
. The province is bordered by
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
(
Jilin
Jilin (; Postal romanization, alternately romanized as Kirin or Chilin) is one of the three Provinces of China, provinces of Northeast China. Its capital and largest city is Changchun. Jilin borders North Korea (Rasŏn, North Hamgyong, R ...
) on the north,
North Hamgyong on the east,
South Hamgyong on the south, and
Chagang on the west. Ryanggang was formed in 1954, when it was separated from South Hamgyŏng. The provincial capital is
Hyesan. In
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
n usage, "Ryanggang" is spelled and pronounced as "Yanggang" ( ko, 양강도, ''Yanggang-do'', )
Description
Along the northern border with China runs the
Yalu River and the
Tumen River. In between the rivers, and the source of both, is
Paektu Mountain
Paektu Mountain (), also known as Baekdu Mountain and in China as Changbai Mountain ( zh, s=长白山, t=長白山; Manchu: Golmin Šanggiyan Alin), is an active stratovolcano on the Chinese–North Korean border. At , it is the highest moun ...
, revered by both the Koreans and
Manchurians as the mythic origin of each people. The North Korean government claims that
Kim Jong-il
Kim Jong-il (; ; ; born Yuri Irsenovich Kim;, 16 February 1941 – 17 December 2011) was a North Korean politician who was the second supreme leader of North Korea from 1994 to 2011. He led North Korea from the 1994 death of his father Ki ...
was born there when his parents were at a Communist anti-Japanese resistance camp at the mountain. The North Korean-Chinese border for 20 miles east of the mountain is "dry, remote and mountainous, barely patrolled," making it one of the crossing areas for
refugees from North Korea into China, although most, including refugees from Ryanggang itself, prefer to cross over the
Tumen River.
[ The information cited in this footnote comes from the captions to the large illustrated map published with the newspaper article and available online with it.]
Although all of
North Korea is economically depressed after
Soviet dissolution
The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the So ...
, Ryanggang province, along with neighboring North Hamgyong and South Hamgyong provinces, are the poorest, forming North Korea's "Rust Belt" of industrialized cities with factories now decrepit and failing. The worst hunger of the
1990s famine years occurred in these three provinces, and most refugees into China come from the Rust Belt region.
[
]
Ryanggang explosion
An explosion and mushroom cloud was reportedly detected in Kimhyŏngjik-gun on 9 September 2004, the 56th anniversary of the creation of North Korea. This was reported a few days later on 12 September.
Power supply issues
In recent years, power supply problems have become prevalent in Ryanggang.
Administrative divisions
Ryanggang is divided into 2 cities ( ''si'') and 10 counties ( ''kun''). Each entity is listed below in English, Chosŏn'gŭl
The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, . Hangul may also be written as following South Korea's standard Romanization. ( ) in South Korea and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, is the modern official writing system for the Korean language. The let ...
, and Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
.
References
External links
행정 구역 현황 (''Haengjeong Guyeok Hyeonhwang)''
(in Korean only)
{{Authority control
Provinces of North Korea