The highest-ranking North Korean diplomat to defect, Thae Young-Ho, praised VOA’s reporting on Korean issues.  He told VOA’s Seoul Correspondent:

“…Voice of America has been playing very important role to bring back the human rights to every citizen of the world, and so far, VOA played a very important role to push the world to better world.” He also said  “…The North Korean regime also pays great attention on the contents of VOA, so I think it is very important that VOA should further strengthen its activity, and also its contents so that, one day, I hope VOA is remembered by North Korean people as … the main player who contributed a lot for the reunification of the Korean peninsula.”