Recently, North Korea is focusing on
implementation of mandatory military service for women by procuring “guarantee of enlistment” letters signed by
related officials to use as leverage against families trying to avoid sending
their daughters to the military.
As previously reported by the Daily NK, at the beginning
this year North Korea executed a new directive making military
service mandatory for eligible women between the ages of 17 and 20 in a bid to
strengthen the nation’s defense forces.
“Ahead of the draft this spring, widespread
movements among parents attempting to keep their daughters from mandatory
military service has been gaining traction,” a source in North Pyongan Province
told the Daily NK on March 13th.”[Due to this situation] the authorities have
dispatched soldiers from provincial military mobilization units to collect “enlistment contract agreements” from families with daughters
meeting the requirements for enlistment.”
She added, “Armed with a list of targets of interest
for enlistment, these officers have been seeking out teachers, inminban
[people’s unit] heads, State Security Department [SSD] agents, and Ministry of
People’s Security [MPS] officials to collect joint signatures– the reason being if four “interested parties” sign off evading
military service will be next to impossible for eligible targets.”
According to the source, these letters
contain a host of information relating to the subject’s physical condition,
medical history, and family background, mostly regarding females falling under the directive’s scope–females in the upper classes of middle and high school.
“If any of the signatories falsely signs
off that a healthy candidate has some sort of physical problem to help these girls evade conscription, they become
responsible and are subject to harsh consequences,” the source explained,
adding that because this policy comes directly from the Party and is the first of its type, the guarantors have no choice but to be forthright.
This has distressed most residents, the
source said, because despite all their best efforts, it is virtually impossible
to persuade four people, an exorbitant number compared to the usual one or two one must pay off to avoid such a directive, which in and of itself is burdensome enough.
Unsurprisingly, health checks–the main facet on which these enlistment contracts hinge–are largely based on cursory examinations and inaccurate assessments of good health; North Korea’s chronic shortages of electricity make comprehensive health check-ups of potential army enlistees an infrequent occurrence. “Hospitals are using diesel generators to
conduct X-rays and other more complete health checks, but because of the
fuel costs they frequently resort to hasty physical checks not dependent on
machinery. For this reason, these ‘four-party enlistment guarantee letters’ are often based on groundless claims of a clean bill of health,” she concluded.
