Human Rights Watch: Sexual violence widespread in North Korea



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Yoon Su-Ryun was arrested while illegally introducing herbal medicines from North Korea to China. She managed to escape border guards, but after seven months of detention, she no longer left and was reported to the police. In the prison cell, she was raped by a police officer.

"I could not fly and he was young, I was thinking" if I refuse that, what extra penalty can I get. "So I just give up, she says in a new HRW report.

Also Goh Myun-Chulwho was high-ranking at the secret police, said that he and his colleagues were watching TV in a hotel room in Pyongyang once a month, and then chose their favorite actors when they asked the staff of the Hotel to pick them up.

"At that time, I thought they'd be happy to call you in. We had the power and the influence, we paid them and they knew that if we loved what they could do to we could call them if they had problems or needed a service, "he told HRW.

Pyongyang Metro.
Pyongyang Metro. Photo: Roger Turesson

The report is based on interviews with just over 100 North Koreans, about half of whom left the country after 2011, eight of whom are former state employees. The interviews testify to a widespread culture in which men take the right to commit acts of violence against women.

"This happens in so many normal meetings that women have with men, especially men in power.There has been so much abuse of power, even from conductors and factors that make women believe that they have no choice but to accept the violence, not to denounce it or to defend themselves, "says Brad TT, editor-in-chief of the report.

Anyone wearing any kind of uniform are protected by the state. Women who, in the late 1990s, started working as shop assistants to support their families are a particularly vulnerable group. 21 women interviewed reported having been sexually abused by police or other people on their way to work.

"A large number of women told them that they were in a night train where the driver was forced.The women tell them that they were too scared to scream, fearing to be thrown out. of the train while moving, or being dropped somewhere, or being beaten, says Adam.

North Korea is far from any metropolitan movement and also lacks sheltered housing, support groups for sexually ill people and the country has a distorted image of the concept of rape – it takes extreme violence combined with vaginal penetration to be considered a crime. Many raped women are also rejected by their families who are ashamed of them.

Some lightning is not in sight either, quite the opposite.

"One of the consequences of the love affair between US President Donald Trump and North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Un has been that countries like South Korea and the United States exert much less pressure on human rights, said Adam.

TT: What do you expect from the report?

– We have shed light on the question. There has been no international discussion on this subject. We hope that countries like Sweden will be able to put pressure on the North Korean regime and demand legal changes, measures and recognition of the problem. You have to start somewhere, says Brad Adams.

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