North Korea approves national budget, major share reserved for defense spending

Asia-Pacific, News January 20, 2023 , by IRIA No Comments

North Korea’s parliament has approved the defense budget for 2023 as the country’s supreme leader Kim Jong Un pushes for an exponential increase in the country’s military power.

According to North Korea’s state-owned media KCNA, the rubber-stamp parliament of North Korea convened a session on January 18, 2023, to approve the budget for the financial year 2023. Despite the country’s deteriorating economic situation, the largest share of the national budget was devoted to defense spending, standing at 15.9%.

The budget would be spent to support the efforts on “further bolstering up the war deterrence both in quality and quantity” and “defending the dignity and security of the country and the people,” KCNA said. State media reports indicated Kim did not attend the Supreme People’s Assembly’s two-day session that ended Wednesday.

Due to the limited statistics that the North Korean administration discloses, KCNA’s report did not mention the exact amount North Korea aims to spend on its military capability. However, according to an estimation by the U.S. State Department, North Korea possibly spent around $4 billion on defense in 2019, which would have amounted to 26% of its estimated gross domestic product. North Korean defense spending to GDP ratio was reported to be one of the highest in the world.

North Korean military activities have grown exponentially since 2019, therefore, it can be assessed that North Korea’s defense spending for 2023 would be much higher than the previously estimated amounts.

Kim Jong Un’s statements during a major political conference around the end of 2022 underscored an intensifying nuclear standoff with the United States and its allies in Asia after he pushed North Korea’s weapons tests to a record pace in 2022.

The North fired more than 70 missiles last year, including multiple ICBM launches, and conducted a series of tests it described as simulated nuclear attacks on South Korean and American targets.

*^{People at a train station in Seoul, South Korea, watching a TV screen showing a news program reporting North Korea’s missile launch on May 25, 2022. (Image Credit: AP/Lee Jin-man)}*

While Kim Jong Un repeatedly focused on enhancing the country’s military capabilities, other North Korean officials have described 2023 as a crucial year for accomplishing economic goals set under a five-year development plan that goes through 2025.

KCNA’s report on the assembly meetings hinted that North Korea was struggling to revive a moribund economy battered by the U.S.-led sanctions over Kim’s nuclear ambitions and COVID-19-related border closures. North Korea’s Finance Minister Ko Jong Bom urged economic workers to strengthen their “ideological resolve” and put broader national interests ahead of the interests of their own units. He said that at least 45% of this year’s budget would be spent on categories related to “developing the economy and improving the people’s standard of living.”