North Korea executed citizens to watch foreign films, expanding repressive control

A new report from the United Nations has exposed dramatic increase in violence and state oppression in North Korea, including public executions to share or watch foreign media such as films and television dramas. This report also detailed the widespread forced labor and deterioration in humanitarian conditions under the Kim Jong Un regime.

Published by the UN Human Rights Office and based on interviews with 300 recent escapes, the report illustrates a picture of a terrible life in one of the most closed countries in the world. He found that in recent years, North Korea has intensified supervision, cracking down on personal freedom, and ratified laws that allow death penalties due to violations that seem small.

“There is no other population under such restrictions in the world today,” the report concluded, as quoted by the BBC.

This study identified at least six laws that were imposed since 2015 which allowed to be executed, including to distribute or consume foreign media – especially South Korean entertainment. According to Escapees, public execution by firing teams has become more common since 2020.

Kang Gyuri, who fled from North Korea in 2023, remembered a brutal incident involving his friends. “He was tried along with drug criminals. This crime was treated the same now,” he said, referring to three friends who were executed for watching South Korean content.

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The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warns that unless the global community takes action, the people of North Korea will continue to suffer under one of the most oppressed regimes in modern history. “If the situation continues, North Korea will experience more suffering, brutal oppression, and afraid that they have survived for so long,” he said.

This report also highlighted that since the collapse of diplomatic talks in 2019, Kim Jong Un has intensified its focus on the development of weapons, making citizens in poverty and devastating hunger. A woman, who fled in 2018, illustrates how life becomes unbearable. “On the early days of Kim Jong Un, we have several hopes, but that hope does not last long. The government gradually prevents people from making a living independently, and the act of life is a daily torture,” he said.

The United Nations also documented the recruitment of poor citizens – including orphans – into dangerous forced labor groups known as “shock Brigade.” This confirmed the ongoing operation from at least four political prison camps, where torture, harassment, and death remain common, regardless of what was described by the report as “slight decline in violence by guards.”

Given this finding, the United Nations has called for North Korean human rights violations to be referred to the International Criminal Court. It also urged Pyongyang to close prison camps, end the death penalty, and apply human rights education for its citizens.