section_path: Reform and standardisation/North Korea
section_name: North Korea
paragraph_text: North Korea
  
  In the years following its establishment, the North Korean government sought to eliminate the use of hanja in standard writing; by 1949, characters had been almost entirely replaced with hangul in North Korean publications. While mostly unused in writing, hanja remain an important part of North Korean education: a 1971 textbook for university history departments contained 3323 distinct characters, and in the 1990s North Korean school children were still expected to learn 2000 characters. A 2013 textbook appears to integrate the use of hanja in secondary school education. It has been estimated that North Korean students learn around 3000 hanja by the time they graduate university.