North Korean residents subject to new inspections in nationwide crackdown

The North Korean authorities have been ramping up surveillance over residents in recent days following the delivery in early March of mandatory nationwide lectures emphasizing the cost of committing “anti-state” crimes. 
“The ‘Central Anti-Socialist Group’ (a special task force focusing on identifying ‘anti-socialist’ elements) has initiated inspections after new State Security-led lectures in early March,” a source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on March 26. 
“These nationwide inspections are meant to eradicate any anti-socialist activity and to mete out severe punishment to those they find to be in violation,” he added. 
It appears that one of the primary goals of the sweeping inspections is to instill fear in the residents.
The crackdown may have been in the works for some time as part of a wider policy to rein in social changes occurring within the country in recent years. Kim Jong Un emphasized his intention to focus on such “anti-socialist” culture in his 2018 New Year’s address, saying the country will “crush the bourgeois reactionary culture” this year, adding that “a vigorous struggle should be waged to tighten moral discipline throughout society, establish a socialist way of life and eliminate all kinds of non-socialist practices, so as to ensure that all the people, possessed of ennobling mental and moral traits, lead a revolutionary and cultured life.” 
“The aims of the crackdown are so broad that basically nobody will be able to escape inspection,” a source in Ryanggang Province said.
“Activities targeted in the crackdown are stated to include: spreading religion, illegal border-crossing, smuggling, illegal foreign communication, using foreign currency, selling or using illegal drugs, practicing superstition, speculative investing, high-interest lending, possessing or circulating illicit media (such as DVDs or USBs), running an unpermitted business, and gambling.”
According to Article 6 of the North Korean Criminal Code, those convicted of “damaging socialist culture” may be sentenced to varying periods of hard labor. The source said that the latest crackdown does not include any new laws or provisions, but that it is rather intended to thoroughly enforce existing laws and boost support for the socialist system.
But as the North Korean authorities focus on policies of self-reliance and boosting foreign currency earnings while fighting the “imperialists” and internal cultural changes, this will do little to change what a separate source in North Hamgyong Province described as “the widespread public opinion that socialism has failed.”