Kim’s North Korea Is Executing More Young People in Public

Public executions of young North Koreans are on the rise, Seoul says, as Pyongyang seeks to stamp out South Korea’s cultural influence.

On Thursday, the South Korean Ministry of Unification, an agency responsible for inter-Korean relations and potential future unification, released its second annual report on human rights in North Korea, based on the testimonies of North Korean defectors.

One recounted witnessing the public execution of a 22-year-old in South Hwanghae province in 2022. The young man’s crimes were listening to 70 South Korean songs and watching and sharing three South Korean films.

The North Korean Embassy in China did not immediately respond to Newsweek‘s email requesting comment.

The North Korean government tightly controls information flowing into the country, including the internet, save for a small minority of government elite members. Exposure to foreign media, especially from its ideological foe in the South, is considered a threat to Pyongyang’s narratives and its grip on power.

Consuming or distributing foreign media is considered “antisocial” behavior that runs contrary to the “three evil laws” introduced by Kim Jong Un‘s regime in recent years to maintain control over North Korean society. Another law bans South Korean language styles and vocabulary, calling this “puppet language.”

Penalties for infections are severe, ranging from years of forced labor to death.

“However many executions are actually taking place in the North, it’s clear the Kim monarchy considers any outside information an existential threat,” Sean King, an Asia scholar and senior vice president of the New York–based consultancy Park Strategies, told Newsweek.

“We continue to promote the free flow of information into, out of and within the DPRK and condemn implementation of the so-called three evil laws, which include draconian punishments and target youth,” a State Department spokesperson previously told Newsweek. The person used the abbreviation for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

North Korean authorities also mete out severe punishments for those caught attempting to leave the country or communicating with people in other nations.

Other minor crimes punishable by death include theft of copper and other commodities from factories and stealing agricultural products like rice. These punishments are documented by the Seoul-based Transitional Justice Working Group, which released a 2017 report based on interviews with 375 North Koreans.

North Korea says that public executions occur only on rare occasions and that the death penalty is seldom used.

Authorities in North Korea are encouraged to make trials and executions public to deter would-be violators, according to Human Rights Watch, a nongovernmental organization.

In a September report, Radio Free Asia cited North Koran sources as saying that every able-bodied person is required to attend executions.

On one occasion, an estimated crowd of 25,000 in the northern city of Hyesan was forced to watch as nine people were executed by firing squad for having slaughtered government-owned cattle and distributing the meat to businesses.

“I kept thinking of the horrific scene of yesterday’s shooting, so I couldn’t sleep all night and trembled with fear,” one resident said.

Activist groups in South Korea, including many North Korean defectors, have sent balloons into North Korea carrying anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets in the hundreds of thousands, as well as thousands of USB drives containing South Korean pop music and TV series.

This has infuriated the North, which has responded by sending balloons carrying bags of trash and manure across the southern border.