The United Nations has accused North Korea of stepping up executions and repression under Kim Jong Un’s rule, including killing citizens caught watching or distributing foreign films and television dramas.
A new report by the UN Human Rights Office says life in the reclusive country has grown harsher over the past decade, with forced labour, extreme surveillance, and tighter restrictions on personal freedoms.
According to the report, at least six new laws since 2015 have expanded the use of the death penalty.
Offences such as watching South Korean dramas or sharing foreign media now attract the same punishment as serious drug crimes.
Several escapees told investigators that public executions by firing squad have been used to instil fear.
One defector, Kang Gyuri, who fled in 2023, told the BBC that three of her friends were executed for possessing South Korean content. “These crimes are treated the same as drug offences now,” she said.
The UN says nearly all the defectors it interviewed described worsening hunger, with having three meals a day considered a luxury.
The Covid-19 pandemic deepened food shortages, while the government cracked down on local markets and sealed borders with China, making escape nearly impossible.
Forced labour has also increased, with workers, including orphans and street children, pushed into dangerous construction and mining projects.
Deaths from overwork are often glorified by the regime as sacrifices for the state.
The report concludes that Pyongyang maintains near-total control over its people, leaving them unable to make basic social, political, or economic decisions.
It also confirms that at least four notorious political prison camps remain active, where torture, forced labour and deaths from malnutrition persist.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, warned that unless urgent action is taken, North Koreans “will be subjected to more suffering, brutal repression and fear.”
The UN is urging the international community to refer the matter to the International Criminal Court, but such a move would require UN Security Council approval, a step likely to be blocked by North Korea’s allies, China and Russia.
Despite growing condemnation, Kim Jong Un recently appeared in Beijing alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, underlining his strengthening ties with both powers.