North Korea is one of the world’s most repressive states, where civic space is rated ‘closed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor. The government restricts all civil and political liberties for its citizens, including freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, association and religion. It prohibits all organised political opposition, independent media, civil society and trade unions.
In June 2024, North Korea’s human rights situation was discussed in the UN Security Council (UNSC) as diplomats, experts and activists strongly condemned a deteriorating rights situation, saying North Korea is increasing the suffering of its people while pursuing its nuclear programme.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk told the meeting that repression of freedom of movement and expression had intensified in North Korea in recent years, and that socio-economic living conditions had become unbearably harsh due to food shortages. UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in North Korea Elizabeth Salmon also stressed that Pyongyang’s continued prioritisation of its military, nuclear and missile programmes has put a heavy burden on the people, particularly women and children.
In the same month, South Korea’s unification ministry released its 2024 Report on North Korean Human Rights with testimonies from 649 North Korean defectors. The report details extensive efforts by North Korean authorities to control outside information flow, especially targeting the youth.
A new report by the UN Human Rights Office in July 2024 highlighted that the use of forced labour by North Korea against its citizens has become deeply institutionalised. Volker Türk said that “people are forced to work in intolerable conditions – often in dangerous sectors with the absence of pay, free choice, ability to leave, protection, medical care, time off, food and shelter. They are placed under constant surveillance, regularly beaten, while women are exposed to continuing risks of sexual violence.”
The report concludes that people in North Korea are “controlled and exploited through an extensive and multi-layered system of forced labour” that is “directed towards the interests of the State rather than the people.” The system “acts as a means for the State to control, monitor and indoctrinate the population.”
In August 2024, the UN Secretary-General published a report on the situation of human rights in North Korea to the UN General Assembly. It said that during the reporting period, there was a noticeable escalation in the repression of the rights to freedom of expression, information, thought and conscience. He said that since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic North Korea has enacted several laws aimed at regulating the flow of external information and foreign media content. After the adoption of these laws, the OHCHR received numerous reports of increased repression based on the application of these new laws. This includes the Law on Protecting the Pyongyang Cultural Language, The Youth Education Guarantee Law and the Law on Rejecting Reactionary Thought and Culture.
In recent months, individuals have been arrested and punished severely for accessing foreign media, while more foreign films have been banned by the regime. There has been an increasing crackdown on anti-socialist fashion and clothing as well as harsh sentences for possession of mobile phones.
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Arrests and harsh punishment for accessing foreign media
The North Korean regime has been intensifying its repression and imposed new laws to restrict access to unsanctioned information and media content and devices, as previously reported.
According to Daily NK, the regime conducted simultaneous closed trials in Pyongyang and North Hwanghae Province on 13th July 2024, for violations of the Law of Rejecting Reactionary Thought and Culture. The courts sentenced two defendants to death. Authorities accused them of distributing South Korean movies, dramas and songs. The courts determined that these individuals not only consumed South Korean culture but also engaged in ‘anti-state activities by accepting the ideology of a hostile country’.
On 18th July 2024, it was reported that two individuals in Kaechon, South Pyongan Province, received severe sentences for their involvement with South Korean videos. A man in his 30s, received seven years of “reform through labour” for borrowing an SD card containing South Korean films. A woman in her 50s who lent him the card was sentenced to 15 years.
On the same day, two female workers on a construction crew were arrested for anti-socialist behaviour by Pyongyang police after an informant said they had talked about a South Korean television show they had watched. They were overheard by another worker who reported them to the regimental chapter of the Socialist Patriotic Youth League.
Eight employees of Pyongyang’s Kwangbok Cutting-Edge Product Development and Exchange Company were arrested by the domestic counter-espionage bureau of the Ministry of State Security on 28th July 2024. The employees had gathered to watch forbidden videos and read forbidden books from overseas while staying late in the office. A source in Pyongyang told Daily NK recently that the researchers were arrested, and their family members, including parents and siblings, were taken away in early August.
In August 2024, four university students were removed from school, another was sentenced to eight months of hard labour and government officials were fired because they secretly watched a big budget North Korean propaganda film that was banned only five months after its release, without explanation. According to Radio Free Asia (RFA), the blockbuster “72 Hours,” directed by the country’s leader Kim Jong Un, details how the North Korean army captured Seoul in only three days.
More foreign films banned by the regime
In August 2024, North Korea added more movies and TV shows to its banned list. This time, the regime banned Chinese media, including movies or drama series, produced in Hong Kong and mainland China. According to reports, this ban may reflect souring ties with China. The border has not fully reopened to trade between the two countries after it was closed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some videos from Russia and India were also on the banned list.
Crackdown on anti-socialist fashion and clothing
The regime has also used laws to crack down on anti-socialist culture, including clothing young people are wearing as well as other forms of fashion.
In August 2024, RFA reported that North Korea had added the “rooster hairstyle” and blouses with see-through sleeves to its banned fashion list, saying they “obscure the image of a socialist system. Violators face up to six months of labour sentences, the sources told RFA.
The new regulations were detailed in a video lecture shown to the public, with hairstyle violators forced to shave their heads.
Most of these can be made illegal under the draconian Rejection of Reactionary Thought and Culture Law, which aims to root out an invasion of so-called capitalist or anti-socialist behaviour.
In September 2024, it was reported that North Korean authorities, through the Socialist Patriotic Youth League, were intensifying a crackdown on youth fashion, particularly by those who imitate Kim Jong Un’s baggy pants clothing and hairstyle. No explanation was given for this crackdown.
Harsh sentences for possession of mobile phones
On 3rd September 2024, Daily NK reported that around 30 North Koreans in Jagang province received harsh sentences for using Chinese phones to contact the outside world.
They were apprehended by Jagang province’s state security bureau in April and May 2024 and were all given severe sentences in two hearings in September 2024. The Ministry of State Security’s opinion that these individuals “were not merely criminals but also internal agitators with the potential to oppose the party and the state” had a big impact on their sentences.
Jagang province’s state security bureau accused one of the arrested individuals of being a spy. That individual and three other repeat offenders were transferred to a political prison camp along with their family members in August 2024. The other arrested individuals were handed over to the provincial police. One person, a first-time offender, was given a one-year corrective labour sentence, while the others were sentenced to hard labour in prison for ten years to life. In addition, the family members of those given prison sentences were banished to rural counties in Jagang province.