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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As people around the world live longer, many nations are having to find new ways to care for their aging populations. In China, a new law requires adult offspring to visit and look after their elderly parents. China's one-child policy complicates the issue further, and some dismiss the law as another attempt to legislate morality by a government that is riddled with corruption. -
The Chinese government is one of the most aggressive when it comes to censoring the Internet and restricting social media. A 16-year-old boy recently became the first person arrested under a new law that bars the spreading of rumors. -
A court found former top Chinese official Bo Xilai guilty of corruption after one of the highest-profile political trials of recent years. Media coverage of the earlier court hearings transfixed audiences with details of murder, a love triangle, and lavish official life styles. -
Each summer, the rice farmers of Narita, Japan, gather to pray for bountiful harvests with dancing, music and elaborate festival carts. This year, some farmers feel their way of life is under threat from a major trade agreement. -
Dumplings are a huge part of Chinese culinary tradition, and restaurants there cater to the nation's obsession with a dazzlingly array of dumpling shapes and fillings, including green frogs stuffed with bullfrog meat and a flock of birds filled with roasted Beijing duck. -
Who the heck are all of these 20-somethings and how in the world are they able to drive all these Ferraris and Maseratis? It's the first thing that struck NPR's Anthony Kuhn upon his return to Beijing after a few years away. It's also clear the city's distinctive dialect and foods are growing scarcer. -
The Myanmar opposition leader is being criticized for cooperating with the former military rulers who kept her under house arrest for nearly two decades. But supporters say she is trying to show she has what it takes to lead the nation. -
Environmentalists are focusing on big corporations to prevent the destruction of rain forests cut down for paper products. With help from some unlikely characters, they've scored a success against one of the world's largest paper companies. -
When tightly controlled societies open up, long-suppressed sectarian tensions can flare. That's been happening in Myanmar. And the twist is that Buddhist monks, widely viewed as pacifists, are part of this rising Buddhist nationalism. -
British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace warned well over a century ago about the risks to diverse forms of life in places like Indonesia. His words are more compelling today than when he wrote them.
