Interviews with Kang Chol-hwan

I escaped from North Korea about 18 years ago and when I compare it to how it was then to the way it is now today, there are many elements I cannot comprehend. That is the degree to which North Korea has changed. For example, when I escaped from North Korea the economy was controlled by the state. The state would provide food and all basic materials. But now there is no rationing system. So now, ironically, the North Korean economy functions as a free market. People get food from their own gardens or do personal business. If they cannot do either, they usually steal from others. So the state has no control over how people live their daily lives and the state lost control over the people.

This made the North Korean government reform the currency in order to regain the control over the people that they had previously. The currency reform devastated both the livelihood of the people and the national economy. Personally, I think it completely destroyed the foundation for the national economy. The North Korean economy was different before and after the currency reform. A lot of the people lost every bit of hope they had for the Kim Jeong Il regime. Therefore I think that the North Korean government is facing the greatest difficulty in many years.

When the North Korean society was first formed, they claimed to be a paradise for the laborers and for the farmers and that the proletariat would own the society. Today, the officers and cadres of the worker’s party actually owns the society. So from the 1960’s or 1970’s to about the middle of 1980’s the ration system worked well. The proletariat system worked because people did not have to worry about food or starvation. But when the system collapsed in the 1990’s because of economics difficulties, the people of North Korea were living in poverty, and because the cadres of the worker’s party did not have any support from the state, they had to rely on extortion and manipulation of the North Korean population. It led the high-ranking officers to use extortion in extreme amounts. And they would still get benefits, privileges, and special rations, which helped them to monopolize external trade in North Korea. This caused their living standards to improve and made some extremely rich at the expense of the North Korean people who became extremely poor, which polarized the population.

Now out of all of the countries in the world, North Korea is the most corrupt country because you have to bribe for everything. For example, if you want to travel you have to bribe someone in North Korea. So while the North Korean people are suffering from extreme poverty, the elites of North Korea are living a luxurious life. For example, the officials of the worker’s party drive the latest models of Mercedes Benz cars within a poor nation. Also they wear expensive watches like Rolex. When it comes to alcoholic beverages they like to drink expensive beverages such as Hennessey, which the people haven’t heard of before. The North Korean people do not know anything about these expensive brands. This creates two different kinds of classes in North Korea where the extreme rich and the extreme poor coexist today.

Kang Chol-Hwan escaped from North Korea in 1992 and has dedicated his life to bringing attention to the horrifying conditions in North Korea.

When Kang was 9 years old, the North Korean government accused his grandfather of treason and sent the family to one of its most notorious concentration camps, Yodok. Kang lived in the camp for 10 years, surviving on meager corn rations along with rats and earthworms. He and his family were forced to work in fields and mines and to witness public executions of their fellow prisoners.

Following his release from the camp, Kang bought an illegal radio receiver and began listening secretly to broadcasts from South Korea. These broadcasts allowed Kang to understand the differences between totalitarian societies, like North Korea, and free societies. Kang and a friend escaped North Korea by sneaking across the border to China and went from there to South Korea, where he lives today.

Kang described his experiences in his powerful memoir, “The Aquariums of Pyongyang.” President Bush welcomed Kang to the White House in 2005 .

North Korea (the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) is a country of 23 million people in northeast Asia, ruled by Communist dictator Kim Jong-Un. His deceased predecessors—father, Kim Jong-Il, and grandfather, Kim Il-Sung – respectively retain the titles of “Eternal President” and “The Great Leader.”

The Korean War began in 1950, when Kim Il-Sung, backed by the Soviet Union and China, attacked South Korea. The conflict ended in a cease-fire rather than a peace treaty, and the border between the two Koreas remains tense and heavily militarized.

Kim Il-Sung employed harsh tactics to consolidate his power and propagated an extreme personality cult that has been continued by his successors. A blend of communist doctrine, state terror, xenophobia and hyper-nationalism has given North Korea its unique ideology. Despite some recent openings, North Korea remains largely isolated from the rest of the world.

With the end of Soviet communism and withdrawal of economic support, North Korea’s economy collapsed in the 1990s. A massive famine, aggravated by the regime’s indifference, killed as many as 2 million people between 1994 and 1998. While conditions have improved, even today, North Korea faces problems of malnutrition and insufficient access to food.

Tensions between North and South Korea remain high. In 2010, North Korea sank a South Korean naval vessel, killing 46 sailors and attacked a South Korean island, killing four civilians. North Korea has developed and tested nuclear weapons in contravention of several international agreements. The country withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003 in order to test ballistic missiles and eventually a nuclear device. Multilateral negotiations have so far failed to constrain North Korea’s arms buildup and nuclear program.

North Korea is among the world’s most repressive states, engaging in widespread and systematic human rights violations, including extrajudicial executions, torture, forced abortion, arbitrary detention, and denial of the rights of expression, association, assembly, and religion. The government pervasively regulates all aspects of the lives of its citizens, each of whom is categorized as “core,” “wavering,” or “hostile,” according to the history of his or her family’s relationship with the regime. Access to housing, employment, education, and other social and economic goods depend heavily on these security classifications. The government determines where each citizen will live, and travel within the country is strictly limited.

Emigration is prohibited. Refugees who have escaped to China have frequently been forcibly returned to North Korea where they are imprisoned, subjected to torture and other ill-treatment, and sometimes executed. The government operates a network of forced labor camps for an estimated 120,000 political prisoners. While persons convicted of ordinary crimes serve fixed sentences, those convicted of political crimes are confined indefinitely. Punishment is extended to three generations – the offender’s parents, siblings, and children are also incarcerated, as a way to pressure North Koreans to conform. Political offenders are often denied food, clothing, and medical care, and many die in prison.

Freedom House’s Freedom in the World report classifies North Korea as “not free” and as one of nine nations whose lack of political rights and civil liberties are considered the “worst of the worst.”