The North Korean government is increasingly implementing the death penalty, including for people caught watching and sharing foreign films and TV dramas, a major UN report has found.
The dictatorship, which remains largely cut off from the world, is also subjecting its people to more forced labour while further restricting their freedoms, the report added. The UN Human Rights Office found that over the past decade the North Korean state had tightened control over 'all aspects of citizens' lives'.
'No other population is under such restrictions in today's world,' it concluded, adding that surveillance had become 'more pervasive', helped in part by advances in technology.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said that if this situation continued, North Koreans 'will be subjected to more of the suffering, brutal repression and fear that they have endured for so long'.
The report, which is based on more than 300 interviews with people who escaped from North Korea in the past 10 years, found that the death penalty is being used more often. At least six new laws have been introduced since 2015 that allow for the penalty to be handed out. One crime which can now be punished by death is the watching and sharing of foreign media content such as films and TV dramas, as Kim Jong Un works to successfully limit people's access to information.
Escapees told UN researchers that from 2020 onwards there had been more executions for distributing foreign content. They described how these executions are carried out by firing squads in public to instil fear in people and discourage them from breaking the law.
Kang Gyuri, who escaped in 2023, told the BBC that three of her friends were executed after being caught with South Korean content. She was at the trial of one 23-year-old friend who was sentenced to death. 'He was tried along with drug criminals. These crimes are treated the same now,' she said, adding that since 2020 people had become more afraid.
The report also found the government is using more forced labour than it was a decade ago. People from poor families are recruited into 'shock brigades' to complete physically demanding tasks, such as construction or mining projects.
The government glorifies deaths, labelling them as a sacrifice to Kim Jong Un. In recent years it has even recruited thousands of orphans and street children, the report claims. This latest research follows a groundbreaking UN commission of inquiry report in 2014, which found, for the first time, that the North Korean government was committing crimes against humanity.
The UN is calling for the situation to be passed to the International Criminal Court in the Hague, though referrals are often blocked by China and Russia in the UN Security Council. As the international community calls for action, it becomes clearer that the people of North Korea face severe human rights violations under Kim Jong Un’s leadership.
The dictatorship, which remains largely cut off from the world, is also subjecting its people to more forced labour while further restricting their freedoms, the report added. The UN Human Rights Office found that over the past decade the North Korean state had tightened control over 'all aspects of citizens' lives'.
'No other population is under such restrictions in today's world,' it concluded, adding that surveillance had become 'more pervasive', helped in part by advances in technology.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said that if this situation continued, North Koreans 'will be subjected to more of the suffering, brutal repression and fear that they have endured for so long'.
The report, which is based on more than 300 interviews with people who escaped from North Korea in the past 10 years, found that the death penalty is being used more often. At least six new laws have been introduced since 2015 that allow for the penalty to be handed out. One crime which can now be punished by death is the watching and sharing of foreign media content such as films and TV dramas, as Kim Jong Un works to successfully limit people's access to information.
Escapees told UN researchers that from 2020 onwards there had been more executions for distributing foreign content. They described how these executions are carried out by firing squads in public to instil fear in people and discourage them from breaking the law.
Kang Gyuri, who escaped in 2023, told the BBC that three of her friends were executed after being caught with South Korean content. She was at the trial of one 23-year-old friend who was sentenced to death. 'He was tried along with drug criminals. These crimes are treated the same now,' she said, adding that since 2020 people had become more afraid.
The report also found the government is using more forced labour than it was a decade ago. People from poor families are recruited into 'shock brigades' to complete physically demanding tasks, such as construction or mining projects.
The government glorifies deaths, labelling them as a sacrifice to Kim Jong Un. In recent years it has even recruited thousands of orphans and street children, the report claims. This latest research follows a groundbreaking UN commission of inquiry report in 2014, which found, for the first time, that the North Korean government was committing crimes against humanity.
The UN is calling for the situation to be passed to the International Criminal Court in the Hague, though referrals are often blocked by China and Russia in the UN Security Council. As the international community calls for action, it becomes clearer that the people of North Korea face severe human rights violations under Kim Jong Un’s leadership.
