North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has directed Workers' Party officials to modernise the country's ideological and propaganda operations, calling for updated tools and methods that meet what he described as "the expectations of the times." The directive came at the close of a four-day workshop in Pyongyang for party information-sector officials, where participants were also instructed to more aggressively use digital and technological means to block the spread of foreign cultural influences inside the country. The move signals Pyongyang's intensifying efforts to reinforce ideological control at home, particularly as it seeks to mobilise public support behind decisions taken at the Ninth Congress of the Workers' Party of Korea (the ruling party's highest decision-making gathering).