North Korea 'holding 200,000 prisoners'

[unreal.livejournal.com]

Amnesty International says new images and testimony point to terrible conditions in huge network of prison camps.

A photo of the Oh family from 1991, the only known image taken inside North Korean prison camp Yodok

Amnesty International says new satellite images and testimony from a former inmate show North Korea is holding about 200,000 people in its huge network of political prison camps where torture is rampant and conditions near slavery.


The human rights group based in London released on Wednesday recent satellite photos which show four of six camps located in the impoverished country's South Pyongan, South Hamkyung and North Hamkyung provinces.

North Korea has long been regarded as having one of the world's worst human rights records, but it rejects outside criticism and denies the existence of prison camps.

"North Korea can no longer deny the undeniable," Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International Asia Pacific director, said in a statement.

"Hundreds of thousands of people exist with virtually no rights, treated essentially as slaves, in some of the worst circumstances we’ve documented in the last 50 years," Zarifi said.

"Conditions in these camps are inhuman and [leader] Kim Jong-il must close them immediately," he added.

'Torture cells'

Prison camps are believed to have been in operation since the 1950s and can be categorised into two: 'total control zones' where inmates are never released without any proper trials; and 'revolutionary zones' where conditions are more lenient, Zarifi said.

"These are places out of sight of the rest of the world, where almost the entire range of human rights protections that international law has tried to set up for last 60 years are ignored," he said.

Kyoung-il Jeong, a former inmate at a revolutionary-zone Yodok prison, testified that inmates are fed 200 grams of corn gruel and often thrown into a cube "torture cell" where it is impossible to either stand or lie down.

"Seeing people die happened frequently – every day." Jeong said. "When an officer told me to, I gathered some people and buried the bodies. After receiving extra food for the job, we felt glad rather than feeling sad."

According to another testimony by a former detainee at Yodok, an estimated 40 per cent of inmates died from malnutrition between 1999 and 2001, Amnesty said.

A former inmate, Kim, testified that prisoners witnessed executions and those caught for attempting escape were executed after months-long interrogation.

Source: aljazeera

Comments

[modeldom.livejournal.com]

I watched a documentary about North Korean defectors living in the south and he says that the food is so scarce that people boil tree roots just to eat something and that he saw a little girl die 'cuz a military officer hit her in the head when she failed to answer something at school or smth. it's heartbreaking.

[paulaaaaa.livejournal.com]

This is really heartbreaking, reminds me of that one North Korean family that that I watched in a documentary when they were in China. They were most likely caught by the officials of North Korea cause they were gone by the time the filming crew got back there. It's so sad, and they had a baby with them. ):

[djkenz.livejournal.com]

I did a research paper for my universty class on prison camps in North Korea.
Seriously sad shit...
If you really want more info about them, there is a book out called The Hidden Gulag with all these eyewitness accounts.
I seriously wanted to cry the whole time I read it..

[slayerizedcarol.livejournal.com]

i will look into this thanks :)

[fate-otaku.livejournal.com]

I read this book Nothing to Envy, and it's stories of North Korean people who successfully fled the country, and I felt like I needed to give every piece of rice I had to everyone in North Korea. :(

[newlines.livejournal.com]

:( i really wish that this would come to an end soon... i've read some articles about these prison camps, and some of the stuff i read made me want to throw up.

i was watching the 1N2D baekdusan special the other day, just for old time's sake, but i really hope that the north and south can be united one day.

[pinkinmoon.livejournal.com]

i can't even have any words right now jfc ffs

[slayerizedcarol.livejournal.com]

wow i feel so helpless asjdkfjsdfj i don't know what to do and hearing this just makes me want to flip the whole world jdfa. I really hope this comes to and end soon.