North Korea

KimJongUn · Jan 25, 2015

Western-produced film made in N. Korea avoids 'The Interview' fate, screening approved

Comedy made in North Korea by Westerners to be screened across nation

PUBLISHED : Sunday, 25 January, 2015, 4:44am
UPDATED : Sunday, 25 January, 2015, 4:44am

Lana Lam [email protected]

Co-producer Nick Bonner visits Hong Kong for a screening of the new film. Photo: David Wong

One of the first films to be made in North Korea with Western directors and producers will be screened across the hermit nation this year - and Kim Jong-un doesn't seem to mind.

While no one knows if he has seen Comrade Kim Goes Flying - a light-hearted romantic comedy with a "girl power" theme - the film does not appear to have irked him as another Western-produced movie did last year.

The Interview, starring Seth Rogen and James Franco, was at the centre of a hacking scandal just weeks before it was due to be released in December, prompting the US government to accuse North Korea of masterminding a cyberattack on Sony Pictures, the company behind the movie. Pyongyang denied any involvement in the hacking.

The Interview's fictional plotline saw the US Central Intelligence Agency recruiting a tabloid reporter to assassinate Kim Jong-un, a story that had the real leader in a huff.

But Comrade Kim Goes Flying, an 82-minute movie filmed in Pyongyang, had been making waves in North Korea long before Hollywood got involved.

North Koreans attend the 2012 Pyongyang International Film Festival. Photo: Patrick Wack

The film made history as North Korea's first romantic comedy with Western producers and directors who enjoyed unprecedented freedom in the editing process.

"This was the first time North Korean raw footage had ever been allowed out of the country," said Nick Bonner, one of the co-directors and producers of the film, who was in Hong Kong on Friday for a special screening of the movie at the Asia Society.

Student Daniel Madrid, 34, who went to North Korea last October on an organised tour, was pleasantly surprised by the film. "This movie was much better than The Interview, which was really bad," he said.

Bonner, who runs a tour company in North Korea and has yet to see The Interview, said the controversy over the release of the Sony movie and the allegations of North Korea hacking Sony would not hurt the tourism industry.

"North Korea is a destination that appeals to those wanting to find out more, to see for themselves, and it is not likely to appeal to those who want a beach holiday," he said. "So no matter what the political climate, there are always going to be tourists interested in going."

Bonner said he never met former leader Kim Jong-il, who died in 2011, and he does not know what negotiations took place to allow the latest film to happen, but such decisions appear to remain under the new leader.

"I don't know if [Kim Jong-un] has seen it, but it was the only film to be accepted to be shown in North Korea and it had a screening at the Pyongyang International Film Festival and was screened throughout the country," Bonner said.

His company, Koryo Tours, takes about 2,000 tourists a year to North Korea, where visitors are accompanied by a government-appointed guide.

"Most people come back with more questions than they went in with and find the trip absolutely fascinating," he said. "You may see a one-sided version of North Korea but you certainly see more than sitting at home in Central watching the news."

Currently, all tours have been suspended as the country has closed its borders to foreigners because of the Ebola outbreak.

KimJongUn · Jan 27, 2015

The two women who prop up Kim Jong-un

Date January 27, 2015 - 1:33AM

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, accompanied by his wife Ri Sol-ju, applauds an art performance. Photo: Reuters

One sports a Christian Dior handbag and favours Western clothes. The other carries a notebook and wears dark uniforms. These fashion opposites are the two most influential women in North Korea.

While Kim Jong-un's wife Ri Sol Ju and younger sister Kim Yo-jong are currently allies in sustaining one of the world's most reclusive leaders, their overlapping influence makes them potential rivals in a regime where family ties aren't strong enough to protect against Kim's penchant for purges.

These women of Pyongyang offer insight to an opaque regime that, while struggling to feed its people, is capable of maintaining 1.2 million men under arms and threatening neighbours with nuclear annihilation. Ri commands a growing following among the wives of North Korean elite while Kim Yo-jong now holds a senior position in the ruling Workers' Party and serves as an adviser to her brother.

South Koreans watch a TV news program showing Kim Yo-yong, the younger sister of Kim Jong-un. Photo: AP

"Uneasiness is inevitable in a relationship like this," Kang Myong Do, a son-in-law of North Korea's former Prime Minister, Kang Song San, said by phone. "The wife wouldn't like it if her husband got too close to his sister; the sister wouldn't like it if her brother got too close to his wife."

The sister would try to oust Ri if the first lady - a "rag-tag commoner" compared to Kim Yo-jong - sought political power beyond the role of burnishing her husband's public image, said Kang, who now teaches North Korean studies at Kyungmin University near Seoul.

Kim Yo-jong chooses to remain in her brother's shadow at public events, while Ri locks arms with Kim-jong Un. In a photo released Jan. 21 by the state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper, Kim Yo-jong hides behind a pole as she watches the back of her brother speaking to people at a shoe factory.

Still, Kim Yo-jong "has a lot of control over who has access to her brother, what they say to him, what documents they hand over - in short, she is a combination gatekeeper and traffic cop," said Michael Madden, editor of the North Korea Leadership Watch blog.

She joined her brother in handing out awards to troops at an air force competition in May and that suggests she commands the party's Organization and Guidance Department, which handles everything from promotions to purges, Cheong Seong Chang, a senior analyst at the Sejong Institute near Seoul, said in an e-mail.

Kim's sister remained out of the public eye until she was spotted on state television at her father's funeral in a black mourning dress. In footage shown less than a year later, she was riding a white horse alongside her aunt, Kim Kyong Hui.

The aunt hasn't been seen in public since her husband Jang Song Thaek, once considered the leader's mentor, was executed by his nephew in December 2013 after accusations of graft and factionalism.

Kim Yo-jong began appearing more in public after the purge, and the official Korean Central News Agency last November referred to her as a deputy director of the party, the first time she had been cited with a formal title.

The purge of Jang may have also strengthened the hand of Ri with the North Korean elite looking to avoid a similar fate. Kim Jong-un last year executed another 50 officials on charges ranging from graft to watching South Korean soap operas, South Korean lawmaker Shin Kyung Min said in October after attending a National Intelligence Service briefing.

There are accounts that the wives of North Korean elite used their ties to Ri to "limit the number of officials removed from office due to the Jang purge," Madden said.

"What we'll need to watch for is whether Ri Sol Ju becomes Queen Bee among the wives or if that role is assumed by Yo-jong," he said in an e-mail. "They are a quiet but politically influential cohort in the North Korean elite."

In public Ri offers a softer side of the Supreme Leader and has been a regular in North Korean propaganda. In 2005, she traveled to South Korea as a teenage cheerleader for North Korean teams at an athletic competition. Seven years later she was revealed as his wife at an appearance with Kim at an amusement park in July 2012.

Still, so little is known about their relationship that it took former NBA star Dennis Rodman to reveal the couple had a child after a trip to Pyongyang in 2013 to play basketball. Rodman told the Guardian newspaper that he held Kim's daughter Ju-ae and that Kim is a "good dad and has a beautiful family".

Citing conversations with people who have been in the room with both women at the same time, Madden said the two appeared friendly to each other as they sat at opposite sides - Ri with her husband and Kim with senior party officials.

Kim was born to the same Korean-Japanese dancer, Ko Yong Hui, as Kim Jong-un. In February 2011 South Korean broadcaster KBS showed what it identified as Kim Yo-jong and her other brother, Kim Jong-chol, enjoying an Eric Clapton concert in Singapore.

Yonhap News said January 2 she married one of party secretary Choe Ryong Hae's sons, citing two people in China it didn't identify and a photo of her wearing a ring. Dong-A Ilbo newspaper rebutted the report days later.

Washington Post

KimJongUn · Jan 27, 2015

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's wife, Ri Sol-ju, and sister Kim Yo-jong seen as potential rivals

One has a following among elite while other holds a senior party position

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 27 January, 2015, 3:27am
UPDATED : Tuesday, 27 January, 2015, 3:27am

Bloomberg in Seoul, South Korea

Kim Jong-un and Ri Sol-ju (left) and Kim Yo-jong. Photos: EPA, SCMP Pictures

One sports a Christian Dior handbag and favours Western clothes. The other carries a notebook and wears dark uniforms. These are the two most influential women in North Korea.

While Kim Jong-un's wife Ri Sol-ju and younger sister Kim Yo-jong are currently allies in sustaining one of the world's most reclusive leaders, their overlapping influence makes them potential rivals in a regime where family ties aren't strong enough to protect against Kim's penchant for purges.

Ri commands a growing following among the wives of North Korean elite while Kim Yo-jong now holds a senior position in the ruling Workers' Party and serves as an adviser to her brother. "Uneasiness is inevitable in a relationship like this," Kang Myong-do, a son-in-law of North Korea's former prime minister, Kang Song-san, said by phone.

"The wife wouldn't like it if her husband got too close to his sister; the sister wouldn't like it if her brother got too close to his wife."

The sister would try to oust Ri if the first lady - a "rag-tag commoner" compared to Kim Yo-jong - sought political power beyond the role of burnishing her husband's public image, said Kang, who now teaches North Korean studies at Kyungmin University near Seoul.

Kim Yo-jong chooses to remain in her brother's shadow at public events, while Ri locks arms with Kim Jong-un. In a photo released on January 21 by the state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper, Kim Yo-jong hides behind a pole as she watches the back of her brother speaking to people at a shoe factory.

Still, Kim Yo-jong "has a lot of control over who has access to her brother, what they say to him, what documents they hand over - in short, she is a combination of gatekeeper and traffic cop," said Michael Madden, who is the editor of the North Korea Leadership Watch blog.

She joined her brother in handing out awards to troops at an air force competition in May and that suggests she commands the party's Organisation and Guidance Department, which handles everything from promotions to purges, Cheong Seong-chang, a senior analyst at the Sejong Institute near Seoul, said in an email.

Kim's sister remained out of the public eye until she was spotted on state television at her father's funeral in a black mourning dress. In footage shown less than a year later, she was riding a white horse alongside her aunt Kim Kyong-hui.

The aunt hasn't been seen in public since her husband, Jang Song-thaek, was executed by his nephew in December 2013 after accusations of graft and factionalism had been levelled.

The purge of Jang may have also strengthened the hand of Ri with the North Korean elite looking to avoid a similar fate. There are accounts that the wives of North Korean elite used their ties to Ri to "limit the number of officials removed from office due to the Jang purge", Madden said.

"What we'll need to watch for is whether Ri Sol-ju becomes Queen Bee among the wives or if that role is assumed by Yo-jong," he said in an email. "They are a quiet but politically influential cohort in the North Korean elite."

KimJongUn · Jan 28, 2015

North Korean defector with cancer avoids jail after Hong Kong court told she stole to pay medical bills

HK resident sentenced for fraud breaks silence over her painful past

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 27 January, 2015, 5:20pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 28 January, 2015, 2:37am

Chris Lau [email protected]

Until the court case, Lau Shaun's true identity was hidden from all except her foster family in Hong Kong. Photo: SCMP

For the first time, a North Korean defector living in obscurity among Hongkongers revealed publicly how 16 of her family were possibly sacrificed after she and her sister fled the totalitarian regime nearly four decades ago.

Lau Shaun, 45, offered insights into her secret identity yesterday following her sentencing to six months in jail, suspended for two years, over her guilty plea to fraud charges. Lau was also fined HK$16,000 by Principal Magistrate Ernest Lin Kam-hung at Kwun Tong Court.

"[It took] 16 lives to save two girls," Lau said.

All had been thrown into a labour camp, where both her parents had died, according to an uncle who fled to the United States. Nothing was known about the rest, she was told. That was the last time Lau, then 15, heard news about her family.

Lau's painful past could have remained under wraps, had she not landed in court for swindling HK$70,000 late last year out of a handbag manufacturer, where she was a manager, to treat stage-three spinal cancer at a time when her husband was out of a job, the court heard last month. Lau admitted to one count of obtaining property by deception and another of forgery.

She had since returned the money and was physically and mentally too weak to serve a custodial sentence, her lawyer Eric Lo Chi-ming said in mitigation yesterday. A report on Lau suggested she felt "foolish" for issuing bogus purchase orders and falsely claiming expenses over business trips, Lo said.

Of her health and family circumstances, Lau said: "The situation has got a lot better."

Earlier, the court heard Lau was born in North Korea and fled the hermit state with her sister when she was six, leaving the rest of their family behind.

She revealed more details yesterday outside court.

One morning 39 years ago, Lau said, her parents woke the siblings and handed them over to a middleman to go on a train.

"They asked us to follow this man to live a happy life in the future," she said. "At that time, trains delivered food between China and North Korea … this was the only way out."

The sisters hid among the boxes, she added, and the next thing they knew, they had arrived safely in northeastern China.

Lau's sister was adopted by a missionary and moved to the United States, while Lau, at seven years old, sailed to Hong Kong and settled with a foster family.

Until the court proceedings, she said, they were the only ones who knew her true identity.

__________________________________

How defector hightailed it from hermit state

"When I left, I had no idea it was going to be goodbye forever," Lau Shaun says of the day her parents put her on a journey with an elder sister 39 years ago to flee as far away from home as possible. She was just six at the time.

The strictly one-way train ride was carefully paid for and arranged by their parents so they could leave North Korea for good.

"Dad only told us we needed to follow an uncle to a happy place," Lau said, referring to a middleman the parents had hired to smuggle their daughters out of the country. "We only found out what was going on after we were told to hide among boxes when we were on board."

The North Korean defector, now 45 and feeble with cancer, has been shrouding her true identity all her life, and it was not until a mitigation session last month that a defence lawyer revealed her painful past in open court.

Lau was sentenced yesterday to six months' jail, suspended for two years, after pleading guilty at Kwun Tong Court to one count each of obtaining property by deception and of forgery. She was also fined HK$16,000.

It was in the same courtroom that she lifted the veil on her life for the first time, she told the South China Morning Post.

Lau's parents used to be civil servants, she recalled, jobs that entitled them to a quarter more food than families that did not have civil-service employees.

It was all the more reason why they should not turn their backs on the country they called home.

But once, when Lau was four, she asked her mother why they had to thank "Dear Leader" Kim Il-sung for a pair of shoes she had made for her.

"My mum immediately covered my mouth and said if our neighbours heard it, they would report us to the authority in exchange for a food ticket," Lau said of the early hint that her parents would one day set them on the path of departure.

After the siblings' escape to northeastern China, Lau was adopted by a Hong Kong family while her sister ended up in the United States with a missionary.

In 1980, Lau successfully applied for a South Korean passport with her original birth certificate.

While she might not be campaigning for human rights in her country, Lau would visit the South Korean consulate in Hong Kong every now and then to discuss politics with the staff.

Even so, prior to the court case, her foster family were the only people in the city who knew of her true identity. Not even her husband of two years was privy to the fact, she said, though she was not hiding it on purpose.

"In North Korea, the government treats you like scum regardless of the social rank you belong to … So all deserters hate to reveal their lives to others because it's a scar, a deep burden."

Most defectors tend to take on new identities partly to avoid retaliation from home. Added to that, Lau said, many did not want to be reminded of how their self-esteem used to be trampled.

In her case, 16 of her family members, including her parents, were locked up in a labour camp after the sisters' escape.

Asked if she had ever regretted leaving, she replied: "I was in pain when I was 18, but now I only feel there is a heavy weight on my heart."

KimJongUn · Jan 30, 2015

The Last Time North Korea Agreed To Talks With The South, They Demanded Billions In Cash And Food

Ju-min Park, Reuters
Jan. 29, 2015, 7:09 AM

Statues commemorate Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il.

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea demanded $10 billion in cash and half a million tons of food in 2009 as a precondition of holding a summit with the South, former South Korean president Lee Myung-bak said, adding that he refused to pay anything for holding talks.

A predecessor, Kim Dae-jung, held the first summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in 2000 and was credited with bringing in a period of warming ties, an achievement that was tarnished later by a revelation that he helped channel $500 million to the North.

The two Koreas remain technically at war because their 1950-53 war ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.

Lee, president from 2008 to 2013, said in a book to be published next week that he rejected the North's terms.

"The document looked like some sort of standardized 'summit bill' with its list of assistance we had to provide and the schedule written up," Lee said. Reuters obtained an advance copy of chapters on North Korea on Thursday.

The document referred to a list sent from the North "as a condition for a summit" that included 400,000 tons of rice, 100,000 tons of corn, 300,000 tons of fertilizer and $10 billion in capital the North would use to set up a bank.

"We shouldn't be haggling for a summit," Lee wrote.

Kim Dae-jung's successor, Roh Moo-hyun, met Kim Jong Il for a second summit in 2007.

Kim Jong Il continued to push for a summit with the South before he died in late 2011, but it did not materialize because he refused to acknowledge a 2010 torpedo attack on a South Korean naval vessel, Lee said in the book.

Lee, a conservative who pushed Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear weapons program, left office without meeting the North's leader.

The Cheonan was torpedoed in 2010, killing 46 sailors. South Korea blamed the North which denied any involvement.

Both Kim Jong Il's successor, Kim Jong Un, and current South Korean President Park Geun-hye said this month they were open to the idea of talks.

North Korea on Friday demanded the lifting of sanctions imposed by Lee's government after the 2010 sinking as a condition for resuming dialogue.

(Editing by Jack Kim and Nick Macfie)

Kyo Kusanagi · Jan 31, 2015

North Korea cracks down on soap opera smuggling

Date January 30, 2015 - 4:39PM
Choe Sang-Hun

Jang Se-yul, who defected from North Korea after watching South Korean soap operas, sends DVDs of the shows back to the North. Photo: New York Times

Seoul: As a maths professor in North Korea, Jang Se Yul was among the nation's relatively privileged classes; he got to sit in special seats in restaurants and on crowded trains, and he was given priority for government food rations. Then he risked it all – for a soap opera from South Korea.

The temptation in this case was Scent of a Man, an 18-episode drama about the forbidden love between an ex-convict and his stepsister. A graduate student had offered him the bundle of banned CDs smuggled into the north and, too curious to resist, Jang and five other professors huddled in one of their homes binge-watching until dawn. They were careful to pull the curtains to escape the prying eyes of neighbours. But they were caught anyway and demoted to manual labour at a power plant.

Jang said they most likely escaped prison only because they paid bribes, but facing a lifetime of social stigma – and having had a glimpse of the comforts of South Korea in Scent of a Man – he decided to defect. He now leads a defectors' group that sends soap operas and other entertainment to the north to try to empower people to demand an end to authoritarian rule.

"I am sure these soaps have an impact on North Koreans, and I am the proof", he said. "In the future, if they spread, they can even help foster anti-government movements".

North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, has issued increasingly pointed warnings to his subjects about the "poisonous elements of capitalism" crossing China's border with the north. Defectors say there has been a severe crackdown on smugglers, and in the fall, South Korean intelligence reported hearing that Kim was so shaken by the spread of the soaps that he ordered the execution of ten Worker's Party officials accused of succumbing to the shows' allure, according to lawmakers who briefed the news media.

Defectors say the soaps have had an outsize impact, less for their often outlandish plots than their portrayals of the creature comforts of South Korea. It was those portraits of wealth, Jeon Hyo Jin said, that inspired her to make the dangerous decision to flee in 2013 at the age of 18.

"The kitchens with hot and cold tap water, people dating in a cafe, cars clogging streets, women wearing different clothes each day – unlike us who wore the same padded jacket, day in day out," said Jeon, who now lives in Seoul. "Through the dramas, I learned how strange my own country was, how full of lies."

New York Times

KimJongUn · Jan 31, 2015

Jong-un has replaced old guard

Although three aides hand-picked by his father remain strong

Jan 29,2015

Since inheriting power from his father in 2011 at the age of 28, Kim Jong-un has carried out a reshuffle to usher in a generational leadership change. Kim has recruited technocrats in their 50s and 60s to serve in top positions, replacing people appointed by his late father Kim Jong-il.

The generational change was publicly praised by the Rodong Sinmun, the mouthpiece of the ruling Workers’ Party. In an opinion piece on May 5, 2014, entitled “A period of rejuvenation,” the newspaper stressed the importance of youths because they are more focused on working than talking.

Before his death, Kim Jong-il selected three patrons to help his son in the power transition: Park To-chun, a 71-year-old Workers’ Party secretary in charge of military procurement; Kim Pyong-hae, a 74-year-old secretary in charge of overseeing senior officials; and Kim Yang-gon, a 73-year-old secretary in charge of South Korea affairs.

Kim Jong-il personally recruited the three and paid special attention to them. The trio of technocrats, who had no special political backing, was considered the best protectors of the monolithic leadership of Kim Jong-un, along with Jang Song-thaek, who was Kim’s powerful uncle and political guardian.

And while Kim Jong-un replaced many political guardians from the older generation and executed his uncle, he has kept faith in that trio. “He told them they just have to take orders from him and didn’t have to listen to anybody else,” a South Korean intelligence official told the JoongAng Ilbo. “They have earned his deep trust.”

In a New Year address, the young ruler did not hesitate to declare that the third generation power succession was completed in the North. Analysts in the South believe the trio’s influence will grow stronger. They said Kim Yang-gon’s role will become more important than ever this year, especially since Kim talked about a possible inter-Korean summit in the New Year speech.

The 75-year-old Foreign Minister Ri Su-yong will also handle important tasks for the young ruler, including a proposed visit by Kim to Russia in May.

Another important task for Ri will be restoring frosty relations between Pyongyang and Beijing and pushing forward talks with Japan. Efforts to arrange a North Korea-U.S. dialogue are also a mission.

Ri’s ties to the young ruler go back decades. He was the North Korea ambassador to Switzerland when Kim studied in the European country and Kim named Ri foreign minister last April. One month later, Ri managed to arrange a meeting between the North and Japan in Sweden.

He also gave a speech at the UN General Assembly in September last year, the first time a foreign minister has done so in 15 years.

“In addition to his special ties to Kim, Ri is bold and shows leadership, so he easily took control over the Foreign Ministry,” another source informed about the North said.

Other rising powers in Pyongyang’s elite circles are Han Kwang-sang, director of the Workers’ Party’s Finance and Accounting Department; Ma Won-chun, director of construction at the National Defense Commission; Kim Pyong-ho, deputy director of the party’s Propaganda and Agitation Department; Hong Yong-chil, deputy director of the Machine-Building Industry Department; and Pak Thae-song, party secretary in charge of South Pyongan Province.

They are technocrats in their 50s and 60s and Kim recruited them when he was heir-apparent. Ma, an architect and city planner from the prestigious Paektusan Architectural Institute, gained Kim’s trust by successfully completing major projects such as the Masikryong Ski Resort.

Hwang Pyong-so, a 66-year-old general in charge of the General Political Bureau of the Korean People’s Army, will likely remain influential in the military, analysts said. Hwang was the most frequent companion for Kim during his public activities last year, and Kim promoted him rapidly over the past years.

Last April, Hwang was promoted to vice marshal and named director of the General Political Bureau in May. In September, he was appointed the vice chairman of the National Defense Commission.

Kim Chun-sam, first vice-chief and director of the Operational Bureau of the KPA General Staff, and Ri Pyong-chol, first deputy director of the Workers’ Party, also accompanied Kim on military site inspections frequently over the past years.

“Kim Chun-sam had served as the commander of the Pyongyang Defense Command and he will likely be promoted to chief of the general staff,” said Cheong Seong-chang, senior research fellow of the Sejong Institute. “Ri Pyong-chol was former commander of the air force and he appears to be serving the powerful Guidance Department, in charge of ideology and appointments.”

Kim also appointed younger technocrats for economic tasks. Among the seven vice premiers of the cabinet, three are in their 50s and another three are in their 60s.

“The Kim Jong-un regime has promoted the goal of economic recovery, and more generational change will come in the cabinet in the hiring of technocrats,” a South Korean government official said.

Primer Pak Pong-ju, 76, and Vice Premier Ro To-chol, 65, are called the duumvirate of the North’s economic affairs. Pak was known to have close ties with Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s executed uncle, as they together carried out various economic projects under the Kim Jong-il reign.

When the North sent an economic survey team to the South in 2002, Jang and Pak were both members. When Pak pushed forward the July 1, 2002 economic reforms, Jang was a strong backer.

Jang was executed in late 2013 and a massive purge of his allies followed. Pak, however, managed to survive by betraying him. At a Workers’ Party conference that decided Jang’s purge, Pak reportedly testified that Jang had monopolized projects to earn foreign currency.

Vice Premier Ro has long served the State Planning Commission, which creates all economic plans for the North. Since 2009, he has headed the commission.

Ro is also the architect of the economic reforms of June 28, 2012. He was also considered a Jang ally and rumors spread that he had sought political asylum in China, which South Korean officials denied.

“Premier Pak is a reformist,” said a South Korean official. “The development plan of a tourism belt from Wonsan to Mount Kumgang, unveiled by Kim Jong-un during his New Year’s address, will actually be championed by Pak.”

Ri Yong-nam, 55-year-old minister of external economic affairs, is another influential technocrat. Last year, he managed to attract a $25 billion investment from Russia for a railway project.

The North’s economic policies, particularly the businesses that earn foreign currency, used to be headed by the military, but the cabinet took many of them over after April 2012. “The military became too addicted to the taste of money,” Kim said at the time. “Guns and bullets will be provided by the party and the country and the soldiers only need to fight well.”

Ri Yong-ho, then chief of the general staff, reportedly protested Kim’s direction and Kim dismissed him from the post.

BY SPECIAL REPORTING TEAM, SER MYO-JA [[email protected]]

KimJongUn · Jan 31, 2015

North Korea ranks least democratic in ’14 index

Jan 29,2015

North Korea ranked as the least democratic country with the lowest amount of economic freedom, according to a recent analysis by Britain’s Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).

Coming in last out of 167 countries, North Korea received an overall score of 1.06 out of 10, according to the EIU’s report on the Democracy Index for 2014. The annual index measured government function, political participation, political culture, civil liberties, the electoral process and pluralism, among others.

Having consistently pulled in some of the lowest scores on the democracy index, North Korea got a zero ranking for civil liberties and pluralism. The EIU, the research and analysis arm of the London-based media company Economist Group, has published the Democracy Index since 2006.

By contrast, South Korea ranked the second-highest among the Asian nations on the democracy index, coming in at 21, with an overall score of 8.06. Seoul’s score has increased over the past seven years, up from 7.88 in 2006. Democracy “can be seen as a set of practices and principles that institutionalize, and thereby, ultimately, protect freedom,” the EIU said. “The emergence of democracy in Asia has often been associated with direct action and street protest,” the report pointed out.

It added that South Korea’s democracy “took off after the June Democratic Uprising of 1987,” referring to mass protests nationwide in which the people demanded a direct election.

Northern European countries ranked high, with Norway coming in first with a score of 9.93, followed by Sweden, Iceland, New Zealand and Denmark. Japan scored the highest in Asia, with a score of 20. China, however, ranked low at 114.

BY SARAH KIM [[email protected]]

KimJongUn · Jan 31, 2015

Border Chinese fear marauding North Koreans

Date January 30, 2015 - 4:45PM

Li Chunfeng and his wife Yuzi, who along with their son, Xianghu, were killed by a North Korean who stole across the Chinese border in 2014.

Helong: On a cold, clear winter day last month, a North Korean soldier packed a pistol and slipped across the frozen Tumen River into northeastern China. He trekked about a mile to the tiny village of Jidi Tun. Then at dusk he opened fire on two elderly couples, killing all four people.

In most places, a solitary killer from another country would not cause much anxiety. But in China, whose relationship with North Korea has gone from warm to frosty in the last two years, and where many citizens ridicule the young and unpredictable North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, the government treated the episode with alarm.

The soldier was not the first North Korean to cross the border and wreak havoc. In September, a North Korean civilian walked into a nearby Chinese village and killed an elderly couple and their son in a robbery.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un inspecting a winter river crossing attack drill, in a photo supplied by North Korea's state news agency. Photo: Korean Central News Agency

Over the past decade, many North Koreans have slipped into China to steal food, and even as Kim has made it more difficult with increased security on his side of the border, they continue to come.

In a triple killing in September, a North Korean man in his early 30s walked into Nanping village and bludgeoned to death an elderly couple and their son as they slept, according to a relative of the victims who talked about the killing on the condition of anonymity for fear of angering local officials.

The North Korean killed Li Chunfeng, 63; his wife, Yuzi, 60; and their son, Xianghu, 26, with a hammer, the relative said. The North Korean man stole about $120 in Chinese currency, a cash bag from the son's taxi and two cellphones, he said.

The government installed floodlights and cameras in the two villages after the December killing, but no one feels safe, the Lis' relative said. The state-run China Defense News reported two weeks ago that the government had established and armed local militias to help secure the border, but locals said no such forces exist.

"We should get compensation for the house and land," the relative said. "This is a tremendous loss economically and emotionally for the family. I asked a Chinese official, 'Did the family die for nothing?' He said I should contact the Red Cross to arrange donations."

New York Times

KimJongUn · Feb 2, 2015

North Korea reportedly sacks head of Kim’s bodyguard corps

Published: 2015-02-01 21:25
Updated: 2015-02-01 21:25

North Korea “reportedly” sacked the chief of its Supreme Guard Command, the elite personal bodyguard force tasked with protecting the North’s leader Kim Jong-un, in the wake of last month’s killings by a North Korean army deserter, a Chinese scholar wrote in an op-ed for state media on Saturday.

Hu Mingyuan, associate researcher at the Center for Northeast Asian Studies, a research institute of the Jilin province that shares borders with North Korea, did not specify where he got the information.

In the op-ed piece published by state-run China Daily newspaper, Hu suspected that, if the reported dismissal is true, it might indicate Pyongyang’s willingness to move toward warmer ties with Beijing.

China lodged a diplomatic protest after a North Korean army deserter killed four Chinese citizens in a robbery attempt in the Chinese border city of Helong on Dec. 28 last year. The North Korean soldier was shot dead during a manhunt, Chinese officials said.

“The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) has reportedly dismissed all officials, including the head of Pyongyang’s Supreme Guard Command, considered responsible for a DPRK army deserter crossing the border last month and killing four Chinese nationals while trying to commit robbery,” Hu said.

“If the report of the removal of the Pyongyang officials is true, it has to be said the DPRK has had a drastic change of heart,” Hu said.

“By holding the military leadership accountable for the shooting and robbery incident, DPRK leader Kim Jong-un has sought to not only appease the public rage in China but also strengthen China-DPRK relations,” Hu said.

Nobody answered calls to the office of Hu’s research center on Saturday.

The North’s current Supreme Guard commander, Yun Jong-rin, was last seen in public on Dec. 2 last year, in a photo published by the Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the reclusive state’s ruling Workers’ Party.

(Yonhap)

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

Mandatory Military Service Extends to Women

Choi Song Min | 2015-01-28 17:33

Beginning this year, North Korea is to execute a new directive, set to make military service mandatory for eligible women between the ages of 17 and 20, as a bid to strengthen the nation's defense forces.

“Late last year, we received orders for all women who have graduated from middle and high school to undergo mandatory military service,” a source based in North Hamkyung Province told Daily NK on Tuesday.

This measure has been handed down to army mobilization offices in each province, city, and county, with implementation reportedly already underway. “The preliminary screening and physicals related to enlistment, which begins in April, are all complete and duty sectors have been organized," he said.

Most candidates pass these screenings barring any outstanding physical problems or contagious diseases such as tuberculosis and/or hepatitis. The minimum height requirement for women to serve was lowered to 142cm in 2012, but this standard is not strictly enforced, according to the source.

Customarily, enlistment in North Korea occurs twice a year in April and August, and up until now, women served only voluntarily, while men invariably underwent mandatory service. School graduates aged 17-18 years enlist in April, while the enlistment period for workers at or under the age of 20 takes place in August.

This new policy, however, will not apply equal serving period requirements to both men and women. “Unlike men, who have to serve for ten years, mandatory service for women is only up to the age of 23,” the source said. “A 17-year-old who enlists in April will serve until she is 23, but a 20-year-old worker who enlists in August will only serve three years," adding that a rumor of men's service being extended by a year has been swirling around recently, but cannot yet be confirmed.

As reason for the new mandate, he cited the high child mortality rate and low birth rate stemming from the Arduous March [the North Korean famine of 1994-1998], speculating that the military is hoping to make up for the shortfall in viable troops by drafting more women.

He also explained that this year, admission quotas for female applicants to universities and technical schools have yet to be announced, presumably “to only recommend those who have completed their military service or exceptionally gifted students from special schools who may be exempt from service altogether.”

Naturally, the new directive has stirred up concern among the public, who question how families are supposed to get by if the women, who normally provide for the family by engaging in various types of business, are drafted into the military. Unsurprisingly, many female residents have begun to look into bribing officials in order to keep their daughters out of the draft.

Back in March 2003, at the sixth session of the 10th Supreme People’s Assembly, it was announced that military service was to be reduced to 10 years from 13 for men, and to seven from 10 for women. Only women signing up voluntarily were to serve, while men in some extremely specialized units would still be required to fulfill 13 years of service.

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

NK Uses Student Informants to Quash Hallyu

Seol Song Ah | 2015-01-29 18:06

In a bid to clamp down on the spread of cultural content from South Korea, Pyongyang is planting informants among students, a number of whom have already received harsh punishment from teachers for watching South Korean films.

“Surveillance and crackdowns on South Korean TV dramas and movies has become more severe, but the number of students who are enjoying such content continues to rise,” a source based on South Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Wednesday. “High school students recently received severe corporal punishment and had to write letters of apology for watching a movie and listening to music from the South.”

The source explained that the recent incident involved six or seven students gathered at one house to enjoy the contraband entertainment, smuggled in on a flash drive, but because of the informant, whom none of the students suspected, they were summoned by the Kim Il Sung Socialist Youth League. “The State Security Department culture of having people watch over one another so that students cannot build trust is spreading within schools," she said.

This most recent measure, enumerating among a host of ever-increasing efforts to crack down on the spread of Hallyu [Korean Wave] appears to be related to socio-political classification, or songbun [family political background and loyalty. Last November, leader Kim Jong Eun, during a visit to Sinchon Museum in South Hwanghae Province, an important anti-U.S. propaganda site, emphasized the need to intensify education of these doctrines. So far this year, he has also emphasized the importance of songbun across the young generation through all mediums of media in the North.

Education on ideology and rank within society is the responsibility of the youth league, and teachers are designated for each branch of these league by the respective Party cadres presiding over the region. These instructors are largely in their 20s or 30s and graduates of teachers’ colleges with a specialty in revolutionary history.

According to the source, transgressions previously subject to punishments--smoking, fighting, and dating--are frequently overlooked by leaders of the Kim Il Sung Socialist League in favor of catching students with media from the South, emphasizing its status as a serious crime. Not only does the monitoring organ employ a system utilizing members from within the league, but "regular students as well, to more effectively keep tabs on and expose students who covertly own flash drives with this content," she noted.

If students are summoned by the teacher, who was tipped off by the informants, there is no investigation or opportunity for the accused to offer a defense. If they deny possessing or viewing the South Korean content, they are hit severely, only able to return home after composing a letter of apology and gaining final approval of a "sound ideological state" by the teacher.

As always, those born into privilege are largely exempt from such punishment. “Party cadres or parents with money buy a few cartons of cigarettes as bribes for the teachers, but children of ordinary workers have no choice but to write those letters and subject themselves to the possibility of abrasive condemnation at ‘ideological struggle sessions,’ a more specialized and severe type of self or mutual self-criticism session," she concluded.

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

Report: NK-China Trade Down for First Time in 6 Years

Lee Sang Yong | 2015-01-30 13:02

North Korea’s trade volume with China last year dropped by 2.79 percent, recording roughly 6.36 billion USD, down from 6.54 billion USD the previous year, according to a report by Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency [KOTRA]. Coal was one of the areas in which the North saw a slump in exports; conversely, it saw an increase in textiles

North Korea’s exports to China recorded 2.84 billion USD, a 2.48 percent dip, while imports also dropped by 3.04 percent to 3.52 billion USD.

However, the North’s trade deficit with China stood at roughly 681 million USD, a 5.32 percent decrease from the previous year.

This marks the first time in six years the North’s trade volume with China has seen a decline, following an upward trend for several years, according to KOTRA’s report.

Natural resource exports, which previously made up for 71.4 percent of overall exports as of 2011, dropped to 56.9 percent last year.

One of North Korea’s main exports, coal, plunged by 17.69 percent last year, dropping from 47.46 percent to 39.97 percent of overall exports. On the other hand, textile exports jumped to 26.6 percent of all exports from 17.1 percent in 2011.

The increase in textile exports is likely connected to the expansion of processing trade that utilizes North Korean labor by Chinese companies, according to KOTRA. The trade agency also reported that North Korea’s trade sector, previously heavily reliant on natural resource exports, appears to be undergoing changes due to decreasing unit prices and a drop in demand.

Notably, China’s crude oil exports to North Korea recorded nil all of last year, according to the report, but petroleum exports jumped by 48.22 percent.

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

Corruption Probe Prompts Retaliation

Choi Song Min | 2015-02-03 17:55

North Korea’s Central Party has reportedly launched inspections into safety authorities and high-ranking officials at local law enforcement units under the Ministry of People’s Safety in the face of growing corruption and use of coercion on residents. This is seen as a move to dispel mounting discontent among the public that is stemming from the tighter grip and control leader Kim Jong Eun has been enforcing.

A local source also speculated that the measure could be a sign that the Central Party has determined this unruly governing from state agencies to be hindering overall state control of the public.

“At the beginning of last month, documents were handed down from the Central Party for orders to investigate local law enforcement offices in the province,” the source based in North Hamkyung Province told the Daily NK on Monday. “The documents contained orders for provincial Party committees to put together surveillance teams and investigate each and every case of verbal and physical abuse against residents and acts of bribery from these law enforcement officials.”

According to these orders, the provincial Party department oversees the entire inspection, aimed at investigating all acts of corruption from law enforcement officials, and with information procured from residents, purports to penalize all assailants involved. The source explained that the orders come amid mounting anxiety from residents due to the reckless misconduct from law enforcement officials, which he asserted has grown more severe as of late.

The Kim Jong Eun era has stepped up surveillance and control to enhance solidarity and discipline over the public, and in the process, law enforcement officials have become more corrupt, with many openly demanding bribes, and for those unwilling to comply, unleashing on them a torrent of verbal and physical attacks without hesitation.

In many of these cases, wielding their positions for monetary gain, law officials team up with loan sharks and force people to pay back their money; so frequently do these incidents involve bribes to be resolved, many residents refer to these corrupt officials as ‘digger wasps’ behind their backs and curse their general existence.

According to the source, the pretenses offered for these bribes grow increasingly flimsy and baseless. “They inspect people’s belongings not only at the markets, but also as they pass by streets and alleys and use whatever random excuse they come up with to demand money and bribes. Cases of assault and imprisonment for people who don’t willingly comply keep increasing,” he said.

Desperate to keep the goods and profits on which residents are so reliant to maintain their livelihoods, some have taken extreme measures to express their anger. “Recently in a town in Musan County, a female gasoline merchant in her 40s attempted to set herself on fire using diesel oil after being humiliated by a security official who also confiscated her goods,” he said. Following this incident, five officials attacked the woman’s entire family in the middle of the night for her act of revolt, which led to strong protest from other residents in the village.

Suicides have been another gruesome outcome of this corruption. “Toward the end of last year, dozens of households in the coastal areas of both North and South Hamkyung Provinces lost their homes or committed suicide because they were unable to pay back debt,” the source said. “Many people ended up with mountains of debt because of the abysmal squid catch, but law enforcement officials would come and pressure them to pay it back, citing alleged legal procedures, or overlook assaults from loan sharks. This has caused a lot of suicides."

Outlined by the Central Party as anti-revolutionary actions that derail the Party and the public, acts like these are presumably subject to severe punishments, but the source reported that in an internal inspection within the provincial Party such as this, existing relationships will play a pivotal role, predictably allowing for those with money and power to evade punishment.

Another source in North Hamkyung Province reported that some residents have actually suffered retaliation for reporting incidents of abuse. Because the probe is an internal investigation, even if one is to report corrupt officials, others with whom the subject in question is close or the subject him or herself may hold a grudge and seek retribution. Once the true nature of the investigation presented itself, many residents have said, “This inspection is just for show so they can try to tame the increasingly disaffected populace. If they really thought of verbal and physical attacks as serious crimes, not a single law enforcement official would be alive.”

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

Yeonmi Park hits back at North Korean video

Famed defector plans to pursue proof that father died in China, not in North Korea

February 3rd, 2015
Subin Kim

Defector-activist Yeonmi Park has refuted accusations against her by North Korean state media in an interview with defector media.

While confirming that those who appeared in the North Korean video are her relatives, Park argued against the video’s claims in an interview published by New Focus on Tuesday.

“My father defected in 2008 and I have my family picture, which is taken in China,” she said in the interview, in opposition to the video’s claim that her father didn’t defect and died of cancer in North Korea.

“There are around 10 defectors in South Korea who used to live with my family. He died while under treatment in China and his tomb is also in China,” she said.

Park said previously that she and her mother defected with her father, but now says her father crossed over later on. When asked about her inconsistency, she answered that she hadn’t wanted her mother to seem “odd.”

“It was a defection and also human trafficking and I wanted to hide it,” she said. “Since I was worried that my mother might be seen as odd I said that my father defected with us…But after doing lots of interviews with foreign press, I decided to be honest so I corrected that my father crossed the river after we defected.”

To refute the video’s claim that her father died in the North Korean port city of Nampo, Park said she is going to retrieve her father’s remains in China for DNA testing, as well as to meet doctors in the Chinese hospital where she said her father had received treatment.

She also added that her agent is checking on press companies that are reporting only the point of view of North Korea, and that they are considering legal action against them.

Park has not yet responded to requests for comment from NK News.

North Korea released its video via the propaganda channel Uriminzokkiri last week in an effort to discredit Park’s stories regarding her and her family’s defection, as well as their life in the North.

Last fall the North released a similar video targeting defector-activist Shin Dong-hyuk, which featured Shin’s father denying key parts of his son’s story. Earlier this month Shin admitted that he changed parts of his story – including the camp where he spent most of his time in North Korea – and is now reportedly working with author Blaine Harden on revising the book Harden wrote about his story.

Main Picture: Wikimedia Commons

MagoichiSaika · Feb 4, 2015

North Korea cancels domestic flight route

Two routes remain, mostly used by North Korean passangers

February 3rd, 2015
Leo Byrne

North Korea cancelled one of only three domestic flight routes in December last year after just six months of operation.

The route ran from Pyongyang to Sandok airport, near the city of Hamhung on the DPRK’s eastern coast. The cancellation was likely due to under demand for the service, as the city is also accessible by rail and road.

“Sondok was cancelled due to lack of use – Rail/road to Hamhung is comparatively good so people saw little need for the flight,” Troy Collings, DPRK Managing Director at Young Pioneer Tours told NK News.

The cancellation means that the DPRK now has two routes remaining. Pyongyang to Samjiyon, near the Chinese border and Pyongyang to Orang, the domestic airport near the city of Chongjin, up in the country’s north-east. A further flight was also added to the Pyongyang – Orang route.

The cancelled route was not used by western tour companies, however it appears that North Korean customers also preferred travelling to Hamhung overland.

“We never used that flight as it’s much more cost effective to go by road and I don’t know of any other tour operators who used it either. The other flights are still operating as well despite the current lack of tourists” Collings told NK News.

“[North Korea’s domestic flights] are mostly for domestic use at this point. Western Tourists only occasionally use them … we expect that to change in 2015 as we and other tour companies begin incorporating them into their schedules” he continued.

The availability of jet fuel is often a concern in the DPRK, which probably imports around half of its yearly requirements from neighboring China. According to Chinese customs data, deliveries of aviation kerosene increased last year, which could have allowed the DPRK to restart its domestic flights last July.

Tourists are currently banned from visiting North Korea due to strict measure put in place to stop the spread of Ebola. Officials and business visitors have to undergo a 21 day quarantine.

Featured image: Eric Laffrogue

KimJongUn · Feb 6, 2015

North Korea's Kim Jong-un executes army general

Date February 5, 2015 - 5:09PM

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un watches a drill by the armoured infantry in a photo supplied by the state-run news agency. Photo: Korean Central News Agency

Seoul: North Korean leader Kim Jong-un executed an army general last month in his latest purge of senior officials.

General Pyon In Son, one-time head of operations in the Korean People's Army, was killed for expressing an opinion that differed to that of to MrKim's, a South Korean official told reporters in Seoul on Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. The official didn't say what they disagreed on.

Mr Kim still mistrusts the military, the official said, adding that senior officers are growing increasingly uneasy. The "Supreme Leader" also removed Ma Won Chun, a National Defence Commission official overseeing construction design, from office in November for alleged corruption and a failure to follow orders.

Mr Kim has relied on purges to consolidate his grip on power since he took over North Korea, a country with a nuclear arms program and 1.2 million troops in 2011. After killing his uncle and one-time deputy Jang Song-thaek in 2013, he executed about 50 officials last year on charges ranging from graft to watching South Korean soap operas.

"The purge of Pyon sends a message that helps to discipline the military," said Kim Yong Hyun, a professor of North Korean studies at Dongguk University in Seoul. "The execution is a symbol that will help tighten loyalty."

Mr Pyon was promoted to a four-star general in March last year and then removed from office in November, according to the North Korea Leadership Watch blog. South Korea's Unification Ministry's website still identifies him as a general who oversees military operations.

Mr Kim's younger sister Kim Yo-jong may be married and even pregnant, the official said, saying she has a ring on her finger and has recently been seen wearing comfortable shoes in public.

Yonhap News said on January 2 that she married one of party secretary Choe Ryong-hae's sons, citing two unidentified people in China. But the official said it's unlikely she wed Mr Choe's son because that would concentrate too much power in Mr Choe.

Earlier on Wednesday, North Korea said it wouldn't agree to talks with the United States and is now focused on its ability to destroy the country with conventional, nuclear and cyber-warfare attacks.

Mr Kim's regime accused the US of "inching closer to the stage of igniting a war of aggression" by stepping up its sanctions, holding military drills with South Korea and predicting the future collapse of the administration, the official Korean Central News Agency said, citing a statement from the National Defence Commission.

Washington Post

KimJongUn · Feb 8, 2015

North Korea test-fires higher-precision rocket that can sink ships

PUBLISHED : Saturday, 07 February, 2015, 3:18pm
UPDATED : Saturday, 07 February, 2015, 3:19pm

Agence France-Presse in Seoul

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un (centre) watches the test-firing of a new anti-ship rocket, at an undisclosed location, in this photo released on Friday. Photo: EPA

North Korea has test-fired a new “ultra-precision” intelligent rocket to be deployed across its navy, state media said today, in the latest evidence that Pyongyang is stepping up its development of missile technology.

The exercise was carried out by the North’s East Sea fleet under the watchful eye of leader Kim Jong-un, according to Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

“The ultra-precision anti-ship rocket blasted off from a rocket boat. The intelligent rocket precisely sought, tracked and hit the ‘enemy’ ship after taking a safe flight,” KCNA said, without giving a location or date.

The new anti-ship rocket would be deployed across North Korea’s navy “before long”, it added.

Satisfied with the “perfect” development of the new rocket, Kim called for the production of “more tactical guided weapons of high precision and intelligence”.

The nuclear-armed communist country has pushed for the development of new ballistic missiles and rockets, despite heavy sanctions imposed by the international community.

Pyongyang’s rhetoric has become increasingly bellicose since the UN passed a resolution condemning North Korea’s human rights record and calling for its leaders to be investigated for crimes against humanity, and Washington blamed it for a cyber attack on a US film company.

South Korea and American experts believe the North could be on the way to developing missiles that could threaten the US mainland, although opinion is split on how much progress it has made.

In 2012, Pyongyang demonstrated its rocket capabilities by sending a satellite into orbit, but it has yet to conduct a test that proves it has mastered the technology required for an effective inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM).

South Korea’s defence ministry in January said the North had already made “significant” steps in developing technology that would allow it to equip such a missile with a bomb.

The same month, the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University released satellite images that offered fresh evidence North Korea is developing a marine-based missile system that would allow it to strike back if hit by a nuclear attack.

Commercial satellite pictures suggested a new North Korean submarine - first seen in July last year - housed one or two vertical launch tubes used to fire either ballistic or cruise missiles, the think tank said.

Development of a submarine-launched missile capability would take the North Korean nuclear threat to a new level, allowing deployment far beyond the Korean peninsula.

KimJongUn · Feb 8, 2015

Train platforms full of dead bodies, cleaning filthy toilets with bare hands and eating rats to survive: North Korean defector reveals harsh reality of life inside brutal labour camps

Ji-hyun Park spent a year inside hellish labour camp after arrest
Made to clean filthy toilets with bare hands as punishment
Starving and desperate, people would eat rats, snakes and wild plants
She says: 'You could say the whole of North Korea is one big prison'

By Laurie Hanna For Mailonline
Published: 00:00 GMT, 6 February 2015 | Updated: 00:59 GMT, 6 February 2015

A woman sentenced to a North Korean labour camp has revealed she was forced to clean out filthy toilets with her bare hands as people ate rats in a desperate attempt to survive.

Ji-hyun Park spent a year inside one of the country's notorious detention camps after being deported from China where she had fled to escape starving to death.

Now, she has revealed the truth about life inside the secretive state and said: 'Really it was unspeakably bad. You could say the whole of North Korea is one big prison.

'The people are all hungry. And now, there aren't even rats, snakes or wild plants left for them to eat.'

Labour: Ji-hyun Park spent a year inside the brutal Chongjin labour camp, where she was forced to perform back-breaking manual labour after being deported from China as an 'economic defector'

Harsh: After disobeying orders, Ji-Hyun was forced to clean out the filthy toilets in the labour camp with her bare hands

Devastated: Recalling the North Korean famine of the late 1990s, Ji-hyun said: 'A lot of people died between 1996 and 1998. The train station platforms were full of dead bodies'

North Korean labour camp survivor shares her experiences

Brave Ji-hyun has now spoken out about her ordeal to Amnesty International in a short film called 'The Other Interview'.

The name refers to the recent controversial Sony Pictures comedy 'The Interview', where two TV producers are recruited by the CIA in an attempt to assassinate current North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

Outraged North Korea authorities initially called for the film to be banned and said releasing it would be 'act of war'. In December, Sony's email database was then hacked and several thousand embarrassing emails were released.

Ji-hyun first left North Korea during the the famine that ravaged the country in the late 1990s. Estimates on the number of people who died have been as high as four million.

She said: 'A lot of people died between 1996 and 1998. The train station platforms were full of dead bodies.'

The country was then being run by Kim Jong-il, the totalitarian ruler whose son Kim Jong-un is now in power.

Heartbroken, Ji-hyun had to leave her dying father behind as she paid to be trafficked into China along with her sister to escape the famine.

But authorities soon discovered her origins and sent her back to North Korea, where she was sentenced to hard labour as punishment for her attempt to escape.

As she was arrested in China, Ji-hyun was classified as an 'economic defector' and sent to the brutal Chongjin labour camp in the Songpyong district.

Revealing the truth about life inside the camp, where prisoners are forced to call the guards 'teachers', she said: 'We were worked harder than animals.

'Our working day began at 4.30am, before we could have anything to eat. In the summer when the days are longer, we would work until 8pm or 9pm in the evening.

'We would only stop working when it got pitch dark. And the day doesn't end there. 'After eating we had to reflect on our day's performance, recite the Worker's Party's principle
s and learn songs. By that time, it'd be close to midnight.'

Tears: An emotional Ji-hyun broke down as she spoke about her past life and said: 'Really it was unspeakably bad. You could say the whole of North Korea is one big labour camp'

Cramped: women were herded into the labour camps in their hundreds and ordered around by guards they were forced to call 'teachers'

Ji-hyun also recounts being sent to the mountains in the Ranam district of the country, where the prisoners were forced to clear the mountainside to create terraced fields.

Starving women would eat raw potatoes straight from the ground with dirt still on them as they were so desperate for food.

Prisoners would also pick seeds out of animal dung to eat, and feast on food left out for dogs and cows as they desperately struggled to survive.

Ji-hyun said: 'We cleared the land with our bare hands. Four women had to pull an oxcart, two in the front and two in the back, carrying a ton of soil in the cart.

'We wouldn't do this at a walking pace either. We had to run.'

In another horrific memory, she recalls: 'If you got caught trying to wash your sanitary towel, you were ordered to wear it on your head, dripping blood and all, and beg for forgiveness.'

Starving: Working long hours on the mountainside to create terraced fields, the starving women would eat rats and raw potatoes in their fight for survival

Anyone caught trying to to defect to South Korea were sent to political prison camps and never seen again.

In an interview with Amnesty International, Ji-hyun says that after her family were displaced during the famine, she stayed to look after her elderly father.

A heartbroken Ji-hyun remembers: 'As my father's condition grew worse, he wasn't able to speak anymore. He could only gesture with his hands, telling me to go, to leave North Korea.

'My father kept gesturing to me to go. I couldn't be there for him when he passed away. I left him there in that cold room. I left him a bowl of rice and a change of clothes. I left North Korea like that.'

Wiping away tears, she adds: 'I wasn't by my father's side when he passed away. Like a selfish child, I left just to save my own skin.'

But just two weeks after being trafficked into China there, she was told she must marry a man to ensure her family's wellbeing.

Traffickers were prepared to sell her on and share the money with her family. When Ji-hyun refused, she was threatened with deportation, which forced her to then agree to marry the stranger.

Survivor: Today, Ji-hyun lives in Manchester with her partner and four children, where she is rebuilding her life after suffering in the labour camps

Dynasty: Kim Jong-il (left) was the leader of North Korea when Ji-hyun was imprisoned. His son Kim Jong-un (right) is the current leader of the country

She was then put in a safe house, where prospective buyers would come to look at her.

Ji-hyun said: 'They would come and haggle over my price. It was no different from an animal being sold in the marketplace.' She was then sold for 5,000 Yuan – approximately £500.

She said: 'When you get sold off, the person who bought you will say, "I've paid for you so now you must do whatever I tell you. If you disobey in the slightest, I could report you.

Even if I kill you, no-one's going to say anything, and no-one will know what happened to you"'.

'That's how they intimidate and threaten North Koreans into forced marriages.'

FOUR MILLION DEAD: THE FAMINE THAT DEVASTATED NORTH KOREA

Famine struck North Korea in the 1990s due to a combination of economic mismanagement, failing crops and a series of flood and droughts.

Experts have claimed as many as four million people may have died - but it has been impossible to provide a definitive total due to the secret nature of the totalitarian state.

The country requested humanitarian aid in 1995 to try to prevent further deaths, but the problems persisted until around 1999.

One of the long-lasting effects has been severe malnutrition in the nation's young people.

It has been estimated that approximately 45 per cent of under-fives in the country today suffer from stunted growth due to malnutrition.

Ji-hyun then fell pregnant and gave birth to a baby boy, alone and in a guarded hut. She named her son Chol – which means 'iron' – because she wanted him to have a strong character.

But her time in China was cut short when she was deported by the authorities. She was separated from her son and husband at the police station, and did not get the chance to say goodbye to them.

After contracting tetanus in her leg, Ji-hyun was left unable to work or even walk. Now considered useless to the regime, the authorities discharged her from the labour camp.

Frightened and alone, she returned to China were she was eventually reunited with her son. Terrified of being deported back to North Korea, Ji-hyun then arranged for them to travel to Mongolia.

They arrived at the border by foot and clambered through two wire fences, taking extra care not to alert the border guards who were on patrol.

But Ji-hyun and her son were unable to make it through the fences, and panicked as Chinese police cars pulled up to investigate.

Luckily, a mystery man then appeared and cut through the wire fences, allowing the two to finally enter Mongolia.

Ji-hyun then fell in love with the man who saved her life and the couple are now live in Manchester with their three children and her son. They plan to get married in the near future.

Sold: When she arrived in China, Ji-hyun was sold off by the traffickers who had got her into the country. She was eventually bought for approximately £500

Torn apart: When the Chinese authorities arrested and deported her, Ji-hyun was taken away without getting to say goodbye to her son. Years later, the pair would be emotionally reunited

Kate Allen, Amnesty International UK Director, said: 'This is the other film North Korea really doesn't want you to see, and with good reason.

'People in North Korea are subjected to an existence beyond nightmares. The population is ruled by fear with a network of prison camps a constant spectre for those who dare step out of line.

'Thousands of people in the camps are worked to death, starved to death, beaten to death. Some are sent there just for knowing someone who has fallen out of favour.

'Amnesty is releasing "The Other Interview" so that people all over the world can hear first-hand how people in North Korea are suffering appallingly at the hands of Kim Jong-un and his officials.

'They don't want you to see it, which is precisely why you should.'

For more information and to watch the film in full, visit: www.amnesty.org.uk/northkorea

KimJongUn · Feb 10, 2015

Family Caught for Attempting to Defect

Kang Mi Jin | 2015-02-05 21:24

A family was recently apprehended near the China-North Korea border by State Security Department [SSD] agents after attempting to flee the country and is currently facing possible transfer to a re-education camp. Of the group, originally comprising four people, one of whom sources within the North revealed successfully fled while detained in custody, three are currently undergoing torture and investigation in the hands of security agents.

“A family of four from North Hamkyung Province attempted to escape with the help from a border guard and a smuggler near the end of last month; however, someone tipped off the proper officials, resulting in their arrest,” a source in Yangkang Province reported to Daily NK on February 4th. “To expedite the family’s escape, the smuggler got a number of soldiers, all of whom he deemed trustworthy, involved. But too many caught wind of the family’s plot to defect, which led to the family’s eventual capture.”

The family’s eldest son purportedly fled while being held in custody, leaving behind the parents and their younger son to endure relentless interrogation at a SSD-run detention center, where they are “as good as dead,” according to the source, because not only were they themselves planning to defect, but now their son presumably succeeded in doing so despite being held in custody.

She speculated that the three members remaining in custody will be sent to a re-education camp following the protracted interrogations, though the repercussions could prove more severe because of the son’s escape. She added that the SSD has stepped up pressure on the heads of inminban [people’s unit], threatening, “if anyone knew that he [the escapee] was bound for South Korea and did not inform us beforehand, they will face equal punishment." Because the group was known to be headed for South Korea, “no excuse is sufficient to escape severe forms of torture,” according to residents familiar with this case--and the multitude of ones that predate it.

To stave off similar incidents the SSD has reportedly been conducting indiscriminate probes into the homes of residents living along the river. Those aware of the situation wasted no time in pointing out the obvious absurdity of such a measure, saying, “You think the person who ran away would still be here [North Korea] after knowing his death is certain?”

The source asserted that the investigations, carried out by both SSD and Ministry of People’s Safety [MPS] officials will continue until the defector is tracked down and used as an example to resolve the issue and warn others from trying to do the same.

Fortified border control utilizing special units is customary around major holidays, namely the birthdays of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, which is coming up on February 16th, however, in light of the recent incident, soldiers have commented it seems like the “special border units are already in overdrive.”

Moreover, tightened measures dating back to last September remain firmly in place, cracking down on outside phone calls and the flow of remittances into the country through border regions, resulting in a marked decrease of those fleeing the country, and an increase of arrests of those who try.

Against this backdrop, the source said these SSD border guards, yet to apprehend the escapee, “won’t be able to sleep at night,” and regarding the situation, some residents have remarked that “during times like this no one can even dream of escaping, but they [the family] were really fearless.”

North Korea

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