Following the crossing of a North Korean crackdown vessel over the de
facto maritime demarcation line between the two Koreas at the end of last month, many residents within
North Korea have taken to referring to these particular boats as “pirate ships” or “Makhno Units,” to describe the escalating nature of their reckless pillaging
out at sea.
The term “Makhno Units” refers to the anarchist group led by peasant-anarchist leader, Nestor Makhno, who launched operations in Ukraine against the Hetmanate regime in 1918.
“Crackdown boats are meant to clamp down on
Chinese fishing boats that illegally fish in North Korean waters, but they also
extort oil and food from those fisherman; in fact, they often go as far as
holding these Chinese fishermen hostage and demanding money, food, and oil from
the relevant companies in exchange for their release,” a North Korean defector
who formerly held a high-ranking position within North Korea’s military recently reported to Daily NK.
Violence in these incidents can quickly
escalate, he added, noting that the beatings unleashed on these Chinese fishermen
are frequently severe enough to cause death.
Crackdown ships fall under the 3rd corps
stationed in South Pyongan Province and the 4th corps located in South Hwanghae
Province. Each regimental level typically operates 12 independent patrol ships,
but the 3rd Corps, composed of the 56 and 57 regimental levels, has 24 of these
vessels.
These vessels, tasked primarily with
regulating foreign–namely Chinese–illegal fishing boats are concentrated in
the narrow channels of the Yellow Sea; patrol ships, on the other hand, operate
predominantly in the spacious waters of the East Sea.
While the size of crackdown vessels runs parallel
to those of the patrol killers with the navy, the sphere of activity between
the two differs significantly. Crackdown boats operate only in adjacent waters and
patrol killers’ scope extends to territorial waters near the Northern Limit Line (NLL) boundaries
of international waters. In addition, patrol killers boast two to three engines compared
to the lone engine present on crackdown boats, which also fit fewer passengers than
patrol killers despite the similarity in size, according to the source.
Moreover, soldiers on crackdown ships are permitted only
to carry personal firearms like light and heavy machine guns to handle private
foreign fishing ships, deemed “enemy vessels,” their combat power is
significantly less than than that of patrol vessels, which house an array of weapons
including torpedoes and tanks.
Regarding the recent infiltration of the
crackdown vessel over the NLL, the source said, “The fact that the crackdown ship,
whose activity is confined only to the adjacent seas, infiltrated the NLL
should be understood as a military provocation; it is clearly a move to
undermine the legitimacy of the NLL.”
*The content of this article was broadcast to the North Korean people via Unification Media Group.
