Torture, forced abortions and insects for food: Life inside North Korean jails, says this NGO

By Yoonjung Seo, Andrew Raine and Gawon Bae, CNN
 Fri March 24, 2023

Extrajudicial executions, rape, forced abortions, jail without trial, torture, starvation rations that leave prisoners so hungry some turn to eating insects. These are just some of the abuses commonplace in North Korean prisons and other detention facilities, according to former detainees whose testimony forms the basis of a new report released by a human rights watchdog this week.

Using interviews with hundreds of survivors, witnesses and perpetrators of abuse who have fled the country, along with official documents, satellite images, architectural analysis and digital modeling of penal facilities, the non-profit NGO Korea Future has built up what it says is the most detailed picture yet of life inside the secretive country’s penal system.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/23/asia/north-korea-torture-prison-report-intl-hnk-dst/index.html


Beatings and forced abortions: Life in a North Korea prison

By Laura Bicker, BBC News, Seoul
Mar 27, 2022

After crawling into her cell, Lee Young-joo was ordered to sit cross-legged with her hands on her knees.

She was not allowed to move for up to 12 hours a day.

A slight shuffle or a hushed whisper to her cell mates would be harshly punished.

Continued: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-60870739


Women in North Korea’s Detention Centers Face Sexual Abuse: UN Report

by Anya Ruppert 
July 28, 2020

A report released by the UN Tuesday revealed North Korean women undergo forced labor, sexual violence, and forced abortion and infanticide in the country’s detention centers.

The report acknowledges that “over seventy years since its establishment, [North Korea] remains a closed society and leaving the country without official permission is a crime under domestic law.” However, women who manage to escape and then forcibly return or fail to flee, face extraneous inhumane punishments.

Continued: https://theglobepost.com/2020/07/28/north-korea-women/


Report: North Korean soldier under investigation after burying baby

Report: North Korean soldier under investigation after burying baby

By Elizabeth Shim
Aug 3, 2018

Aug. 3 (UPI) -- A North Korean soldier buried her newborn child alive after hiding her pregnancy for months, according to a South Korean press report.

A source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK Thursday the woman had conceived a child during an affair with a married senior officer, the news service reported Friday.

Continued: https://www.upi.com/Report-North-Korean-soldier-under-investigation-after-burying-baby/4771533298542/


North Korea Forbids Doctors To Perform Abortions, Implant Birth Control Devices

North Korea Forbids Doctors To Perform Abortions, Implant Birth Control Devices

2015-10-14

North Korean authorities have issued a directive banning medical professionals from performing birth control procedures and abortions in an effort to reverse the isolated country’s falling birth rate, sources inside said.

“This central policy was announced at a lecture for health care workers on Oct. 8,” a source in the country’s northern Yanggang province told RFA’s Korean Service. “The new policy says that birth control procedures are illegal, and gynecologists who implant birth control devices in their patients will be punished by law.”

Continued: https://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/north-korea-forbids-doctors-to-perform-abortions-implant-birth-control-devices-10142015145920.html