Authorities increase monitoring of defector families

The North Korean authorities are stepping up efforts to prevent the escape of more citizens from the country with new tactics focusing on intimidation. To monitor the family members of defectors, the regime is now dispatching up to as many as seven officers per case in some instances. These officers are regularly visiting the homes of the families to threaten and intimidate them.
 
A source in Ryanggang Province told Daily NK on October 12 that the “authorities are targeting the families of ‘traitors’, especially those who have been appearing on TV in the South ‘slandering’ the North. In the past, only around two security officers would go out to monitor and harass the families, but they are now pouring drastically more resources into these activities.”
“When a person is under surveillance like this, they are prevented from going about their normal business in the markets, for example. They are constantly harassed, with agents issuing veiled threats as cruel jokes straight to their faces,” the source added.
 
According to the source, the family member of a defector in Hyesan was recently at home when a group of police and state security officers suddenly entered her home and started drinking alcohol. Now that the number of surveillance personnel has increased, joint ‘operations’ like this between the Ministry of State Security and the Ministry of People’s Security are becoming commonplace.
 
The regime has also been trying to prevent the spread of news about incidents like these through renewed intimidation campaigns, but the stories continue to spread.
 
“When there are so many security agents stalking you at all times, it is difficult to know who around you is an informer or an undercover agent, leading to intense stress and suffering for the family members,” the source explained. 
 
The agents are also on the lookout for any possible or perceived misconduct they can exploit, for which they can demand a bribe in exchange for keeping quiet.  
 
In addition to terrorizing the citizens with increasing numbers of security agents, the source also tells of “agents actively trying to coerce or incentivize neighbors and others into spying on people,” leading to the targets feeling ostracized. 
 
The source detailed how citizens are “condemning the way the authorities are trying to turn everyone into spies, though many are also ridiculing the attempts, saying ‘if everyone spends their time spying on each other all day long, there will be nothing to report!'”