Telecommunications in North Korea - Telephone

Telephone

See also: Telephone numbers in North Korea

Most of these are installed in government offices, collective farms, and state-owned enterprises (SOEs), with only perhaps 10 percent controlled by individuals or households. By 1970 automatic switching facilities were in use in Pyongyang, Sinŭiju, Hamhŭng, and Hyesan. A few public telephone booths were beginning to appear in Pyongyang around 1990. In the mid-1990s, an automated exchange system based on an E-10A system produced by Alcatel joint-venture factories in China was installed in Pyongyang. North Koreans announced in 1997 that automated switching had replaced manual switching in Pyongyang and 70 other locales. North Korean press reported in 2000 that fiber-optic cable had been extended to the port of Nampho and that North Pyong'an Province had been connected with fiber-optic cable.

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