[imText1]No. 18 Political Prison Camp, a “completely controlled zone” located in Kaecheon, North Pyongan Province holding approximately 100,000 people in atrocious, degrading and often fatal conditions, has been revealed.
At the founding ceremony of the Free North Korea Campaign (representative Ahn Myung Chul), which took place at the Press Center in Seoul on the 18th, Lim Jong Soo, a survivor of the No. 18 Political Prison Camp, said, “No. 18, which holds about 100,000, is located across the Daedong River from No. 14 Prison Camp, where Shin Dong Hyuk (who has already arrived in South Korea) was previously held.”
The existence of six North Korean political prison camps was explained: No. 14 (Kaecheon, South Pyongan Province), No. 15 (Yoduk, South Hamkyung Province), No. 16 (Myunggan, North Hamkyung Province), No. 22 (Hoiryeong, North Hamkyung Province), and No. 25 (Chongjin, North Hamkyung Province).
North Korea’s political prison camps are divided into “Revolutionary Zone,” where prisoner families and accomplices are imprisoned and can be released after a period of confinement, and “Completely Controlled Zone,” where criminals are imprisoned for life. Among the 15,000 defectors who are currently in South Korea, there are at least 30-40 survivors of political prison camps and 3 survivors of “completely controlled zone”.
Lim, who came forward to provide testimony about the No. 18 camp, was imprisoned at the No. 18 prison camp as a second-generation prisoner of war in 1967 due to his father’s crime according to the guilt-by-association system. He entered South Korea in January 2004.
He said, “My mother, two brothers, and a younger sister were with me in the camp, but my brothers died from eating grass and my mother was hit by a train while working on a railroad.”
Lim also said, “Detained children were iron-branded on the abdomen with a symbol of the camp. Like Shin Dong Hyuk, a survivor of a completely controlled zone, I too have such a mark on my abdomen.”
He also testified that at the political prison, “15~20 are publicly executed around this time of the year.”
Lim also noted, regarding life at the camp, “The teachers try to instill animosity towards parents by saying, ‘You are paying for the crime of your parents.’ As a result, one woman buried her elderly parents alive.”
Lim also explained that prisoners do not have citizen registration cards, so there isn’t even a process for reporting their deaths.
Defector Lee Chun Shim (pseudonym), who testified regarding the harm resulting from the sexual torture of women in North Korean detention facilities, said, “In order to deprive money from defector women caught in China, they have even made the women do squats completely naked hundreds times. It is not rare for the officials to search the anus and genitals of the women using sticks or their fingers.”
He added, “Women who confess that they have swallowed money are forced to drink soapy water to induce vomiting or diarrhea.”
Lee denounced the repatriation of pregnant women from China, since, “Women have even been injected up to 200cc of disinfectant with a needle and had their fetuses aborted.”
Ahn, who was originally a guard of the No. 22 Political Prison Camp, which consists of only a “completely controlled zone,” said at the ceremony, “Among 300,000-some detainees in political prison camps, 90% are held in completely controlled zones. The No. 22 Political Prison Camp and No. 25 Soosung Reeducation Camp in Chongjin even have the crisis plan of concealing their existence by constructing dams and then destroying them, burying the prisoners alive.”
“Free North Korea Campaign” will network with South Korean and foreign human rights organizations and plans to lead the movement to expose the reality of the “completely controlled zones” and the terrible things that go on within them.
