Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Pyongshin Sangja]

http://www.freenorthkorea.net/archives/freenorthkorea/cat_defectors_testimony.html
Exposed- Kim Jong-Il�s Slave Camps
John Larkin
Far Eastern Economic Review
December 5, 2002

Pyongyang's infamous slave-labour camps have long been talked about, but the general public has never seen photographs of them. Until now. Satellite images ordered by the REVIEW show one such camp. A former prison guard there corroborates the images.The REVIEW has obtained satellite photos of one of the biggest slave camps, nestled in the mountains of North Korea's rugged far northeastern frontier with China. The photos were purchased from DigitalGlobe, a U.S.-based commercial provider of satellite imagery, after the REVIEW handed over geographic coordinates for some of the camp's key facilities. The images were then corroborated on four separate occasions by Ahn, the only person known to have escaped from No. 22 Camp, where he worked from 1990-94. South Korea's Unification Ministry said in its annual White Paper on Human Rights in North Korea this year that the camp is still operating. Neither the ministry nor South Korea's National Intelligence Service would comment on the photos.Satellite imagery of the camps that intelligence services in South Korea and the United States are believed to possess has not been released. With no physical evidence to refute North Korea's denials that these camps exist, the testimony of defectors has largely failed to lift the veil of mystery enveloping them. "These places don't officially exist," says another former guard, Choi Dong Chul, who worked at several labour camps before defecting to South Korea in 1995. "They're North Korea's biggest secret."

http://www.msnbc.com/news/859731.asp?cp1=1
I WAS imprisoned for seven years at the political brainwashing camp Kaechon in Pyungbuk province.� I was in prison from 1987 till January 1993. I was imprisoned at the age of 39.
I worked at the chief product supply office, I was the general manager of the product supply office, in North Korea we were supplying food and materials to people. And I was imprisoned because the North Korean economy was in recession and the supply of materials was not in good condition, that�s why I was imprisoned.
In Kaechon Prison, there were more than 6,000 prisoners. All of them were political prisoners, and they were treated just like beasts.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/859864.asp?0cb=-213130711&cp1=1
In North Korea, the prisoners camps are divided into two parts, economic prisoners camp and political prisoners camp. Also they are divided into two types. One is camps, the other is prison. The prisoners with light crimes are in the camps. And prison is for the serious criminals, because they cannot put all of them into prisons, because there are numerous people. Hundred of thousands of people do forced labor just like the camp in Russia before.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/859865.asp?0cb=-313130711&cp1=1
They trained me not to treat the prisoners as human beings. If someone is against socialism, if someone tries to escape from prison, then kill him. If there�s a record of killing any escapee, then the guard will be entitled to study in the college. Because of that, some guards kill innocent people. Beating and killing is an everyday affair.
They are not treated as human beings; they are just like dogs or pigs.

http://ncafe.com/northkorea/200K_in_NK_death_camps.html
North Korea's Concentration Camps House 200,000
Chosun Ilbo by Kim Kwang-in ([email protected]) December 5, 2002

North Korea is known to operate five concentration camps now, accommodating a total of over 200,000. Once condemned as political criminals in the North, not only they themselves, but also their families are incarcerated in concentration camps without trial. With all contacts with the outside world cut off, they are subject to control in the supply of food and daily necessaries, marriage and childbirth, let alone undergoing serious violations of human rights.

http://www.freenorthkorea.net/archives/freenorthkorea/cat_defectors_testimony.html
The sad fate of North Koreans in China as a poor homeless race came home to me in Yanji. There is a pecuniary reward for every North Korean defector captured, and the Korean-Chinese go all out searching for North Koreans in hiding to hand them over to the Chinese police. The arrested North Koreans are strung together with a wire that is pierced through their noses. In groups of fifty, these people are deported through Domun. China gets one log in return for every captured North Korean.
The women are sold for rape and forced into prostitution by Chinese and Korean-Chinese. Some women try to go back to North Korea with the money they earned to feed their families, only to be caught and imprisoned in police detention centers. The slightest mistake could label one of these women as a traitor. Pregnant women often suffer the most, as officers would kill the fetuses while in the womb by kicking the women's belly. In the market in Yanji, you see North Korean children whose fingers have been cut off for stealing food.

http://www.freenorthkorea.net/archives/freenorthkorea/nkrefugees-thinleg-01.jpg
http://www.oirishtimes.com/korea.htm
The pictures, given to Garapedian by a refugee support group in Seoul, depict families eating pine bark, rats, snakes and anything else to stay alive. One shows a man at a market stall, with Jang captioning it "Man selling human flesh (saram hoki) at a farmers' market in Hoeroung city".

"All of the North Koreans we interviewed knew about it. Jang's picture of a dismembered child in a cooking pot says more than any of the numbing statistics," Garapedian wrote.

[indiercj]

What's the difference between camps and prison? Any stats?

[Walter Mitty]

As near as I can figure, the first poster says "America's reckless rampage will be stopped!" but I'm not quite sure. Anybody want to puzzle out what the others say?

[Butterfly]

How do we know these are concentration camps as the thread title suggests?

[Walter Mitty]

[Real Reality]

Are those crop ciricles? (camp 3)

[kylehawkins2000]

How do we know they are concentration camps?

I believe some are pure speculation but there has been at least one person escape from one of the camps and defect into China before making his way to South Korea.

He wrote a book called "The Prisoners of Pyongyang". There are English versions available. I believe his name is "Ahn" although I cannot remember for sure at the moment.

Apparantly he verified that one of the photos was the camp that he was imprisoned at.

[kylehawkins2000]

Sorry, It just came to me....

The name of the book was actually "Aquariums of Pyongyang" and it was written by Kang Chol Hwan.

[Marathe]

what did dachau look like from the air?

[itaewonguy]

the sooner we bomb that country the better!!!!
please just give some warning so I can get the HELL out of the south!!

[On the other hand]

[Son Deureo!]

[dogbert]

[Son Deureo!]

Thanks! I'll add that one to my vocabulary right quick.

[dogbert]