Introduction
Andrei Nikolaevich Lankov (Russian: Андрей Николаевич Ланьков; born July 26, 1963) is a Russian scholar of Asia and a specialist in Korean studies and Director of Korea Risk Group, the parent company of NK News and NK Pro.
Early life and education
Lankov was born on July 26, 1963, in Leningrad, Soviet Union (modern day Saint Petersburg). He completed his undergraduate and graduate studies at Leningrad State University in 1986 and 1989, respectively. He also attended Pyongyang's Kim Il-sung University in 1985.
Career
Following his graduate studies, Lankov taught Korean history and language at his alma mater, and in 1992 went to South Korea for work; he moved to Australia in 1996 to take up a post at the Australian National University, and moved back to Seoul to teach at Kookmin University in 2004. Lankov has written in Russian (his native language), Korean, and English. He runs a North Korea-themed Livejournal blog in Russian, where he documents aspects of life in North (and South) Korea, together with his musings and links to his publications. He has written a column for the English-language daily The Korea Times for 15 years and also for Bloomberg News and Al Jazeera English.
Lankov has been a regular contributor to NK News and its premium research platform NK Pro since 2012. In May 2017, he became a Director of Korea Risk Group, the parent company of these platforms and committed to writing exclusively for the firm, outside of his academic commitments.
Books
- Lankov, Andrei (October 2003). From Stalin to Kim Il Sung: The Formation of North Korea, 1945–1960. Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0-8135-3117-9.
- — (December 2004). Crisis in North Korea: The Failure of De-Stalinization, 1956. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-2809-7.
- — (2005).КНДР вчера и сегодня: Неформальная история Северной Кореи [The DPRK Yesterday and Today: An Unofficial History of North Korea] (in Russian). Vostok-Zapad. ISBN 5-478-00060-4.
- — (2006). Быть корейцем (Being Korean) (in Russian). Vostok-Zapad. ISBN 5-17-032481-2.
- — (April 2007). North of the DMZ: Essays on Daily Life in North Korea. McFarland and Company. ISBN 0-7864-2839-2.
- — (2008). The Dawn of Modern Korea. EunHaeng NaMu publishing. ISBN 978-89-5660-214-1.
- — (2009). Август, 1956 год. Кризис в Северной Корее (August 1956, A Crisis in North Korea). ROSSPEN. ISBN 978-5-8243-0907-2.
- — (2013). The Real North Korea: Life and Politics in the Failed Stalinist Utopia. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0199964297.