Interviews with Kang Chol-hwan

The North Korean government has sustained itself for more than 50 years because they have strong control of outside information. It doesn’t matter for the older generation, but the younger generation has a strong desire to listen to news from outside. It’s a source of stress for the younger generation because they know that the outside world exists. Since there is no information about the outside world, this creates a strong desire to know. Also the younger generation is aware that if they get caught listening to outside news they will be punished for committing a political crime.

I was lucky because I had a friend whose father traveled a lot overseas so at his home I had exposure to foreign broadcasting, which peaked my interest and curiosity. I bought two radios. I hid one and registered the other one so I would not cause any suspicion with the authorities. So, I would receive information from foreign broadcasts. One of them was KBS, a social education program. Another one was from America called Voice of America. Another was Radio Free Asia. The last one was a Christian broadcasting station called Far Eastern Broadcasting. In total there were four foreign broadcastings.

In the free world there are movements of resistance in order to fight for democracy. In North Korea, there is no case in which you just get investigated or questioned then released. Once the authorities find that you are engaged in counter-revolutionary activities, you are executed and your family gets sent to a detention center. The regime in North Korea is so extreme that any resistance movement is carried out differently than in the free world because you have to be in hiding. So that’s why the movement occurs under ground. When we listen to the radio from outside, we spread the news from these sources and create secret organizations. We then engage in secret activities such as putting writings on the walls, posters, distribute leaflets. And we do this very carefully in hiding because we are afraid of being executed.

When I was in the concentration camp there were acts of cruelty and atrocity just like in Hitler’s Nazi camps. There were murders committed. It doesn´t matter whether a society is socialist or capitalist, these are crimes against humanity, which destroy people. The North Korean people who have experienced these murders and acts of atrocity understand that a regime that does this is not normal and that it is the universal enemy of humanity. Because the regime is controlling the North Korean people in a violent and intimidating manner, people are scared of speaking their minds, which is why they do not express their feelings because the consequences they may face are severe.

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.”