Barthélémy Courmont is a Professor at the Université Catholique de Lille, where he is Director of Master’s degrees in history and international relations, the Director of Research at IRIS, where he is responsible for the Asia Pacific department, and Editor-in-Chief of Asia Focus. He previously worked as a Professor of Political Science at Hallym University (South Korea), Visiting Professor at UQAM and Editor-in-Chief of Monde chinois, nouvelle Asie.

He has written a number of books on Eastern Asia and the Korean peninsula, including L’énigme nord-coréenne (The North Korean Enigma), Louvain, Presses universitaires de Louvain, 2015, and has contributed to the Petit Futé’s travel guide on North Korea, published in April 2019.