Anthony Kuhn
Anthony Kuhn is NPR's correspondent based in Seoul, South Korea, reporting on the Korean Peninsula, Japan, and the great diversity of Asia's countries and cultures. Before moving to Seoul in 2018, he traveled to the region to cover major stories including the North Korean nuclear crisis and the Fukushima earthquake and nuclear disaster.
Kuhn previously served two five-year stints in Beijing, China, for NPR, during which he covered major stories such as the Beijing Olympics, geopolitical jousting in the South China Sea, and the lives of Tibetans, Uighurs, and other minorities in China's borderlands.
He took a particular interest in China's rich traditional culture and its impact on the current day. He has recorded the sonic calling cards of itinerant merchants in Beijing's back alleys, and the descendants of court musicians of the Tang Dynasty. He has profiled petitioners and rights lawyers struggling for justice, and educational reformers striving to change the way Chinese think.
From 2010-2013, Kuhn was NPR's Southeast Asia correspondent, based in Jakarta, Indonesia. Among other stories, he explored Borneo and Sumatra, and witnessed the fight to preserve the biodiversity of the world's oldest forests. He also followed Myanmar's democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, as she rose from political prisoner to head of state.
Kuhn served as NPR's correspondent in London from 2004-2005, covering stories including the London subway bombings and the marriage of the Prince of Wales to the Duchess of Cornwall.
Besides his major postings, Kuhn's journalistic horizons have been expanded by various short-term assignments. These produced stories including wartime black humor in Iraq, musical diplomacy by the New York Philharmonic in Pyongyang, North Korea, a kerfuffle over the plumbing in Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Pakistani artists' struggle with religious extremism in Lahore, and the Syrian civil war's spillover into neighboring Lebanon.
Prior to joining NPR, Kuhn wrote for the Far Eastern Economic Review and freelanced for various news outlets, including the Los Angeles Times and Newsweek. He majored in French literature as an undergraduate at Washington University in St. Louis, and later did graduate work at the Johns Hopkins University-Nanjing University Center for Chinese and American studies in Nanjing.
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In a victory for LGBTQ rights, South Korea's supreme court ruled that transgender people have the right to change their legal sex status, regardless of whether they have underage children.
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NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with correspondent Anthony Kuhn and then Victor Cha, the Center for Strategic and International Studies Senior Adviser, about the latest in North Korea.
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President Biden talks to China's President Xi Jinping at the G20 meeting in Bali while the two countries' tensions are high. Disagreements includes status of Taiwan, trade and Russia's war in Ukraine.
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South Korea's official entry at the Oscars this year is a murder-mystery-romance blend. Like 2019's Parasite, it shows how Korean directors are making their mark across the spectrum of film genres.
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How residents in the Itaewon area in Seoul, South Korea are feeling right now, and how Halloween's tragic crowd surge might affect the "party mecca of South Korea."
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Tensions between North and South Korea are increasing with both sides firing missiles into disputed maritime areas for the first time since the Korean peninsula was divided more than 70 years ago.
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South Koreans are mourning 154 people who died in a Halloween stampede in Seoul. There has been criticism of the police, who admitted they failed to predict the risks of big crowds.
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More than 150 people have died and more than 130 are injured due to a crowd surge at South Korea's capital. More details are coming from witnesses of the chaos at the scene.
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More than 150 people were killed after a crowd pushed forward in a narrow alley during Halloween celebrations in Seoul. Many of the dead are teenagers.
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A corruption scandal has ensnared a powerful former Tokyo Olympics organizer, and the corporate sponsors accused of bribing him. It's a dark footnote to a controversial games held amid a pandemic.