Children imprisoned at North Korea’s political prison camps face serious human rights abuses, including forced labor, beatings and other punishments, Daily NK has learned.
Speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons, a source in North Korea familiar with the country’s prison system told Daily NK on Tuesday that “the political prison camps’ internal regulations set inmates to work from age 5, though actual conditions differ from camp to camp.”
“They set children to work from around ages 4 to 6, when they can understand orders and signal with their bodies and hands. Children under the age of 10 may do different work from adults, but past age 10, they do the same work as adults, though their workload differs. As no separate regulations call for children to be given safe work apart from adults, it’s common for children to be tasked with work where they can get injured or killed.”
According to the source, the camps’ regulations prescribe nine to 15 hours of work daily for inmates, while some managers force inmates to do more than 15 hours. Children are no exception.
Article 32 of the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) recognizes the right of children under 18 to be protected from economic exploitation and all forms of hazardous work.
As a UN member state and a party to the CRC, North Korea has a duty to implement this article. However, the country continues to wantonly subject children to forced labor.
In particular, children in the political prison camps suffer beatings and other punishments if they fail to fulfill their workloads.
“If they cannot fulfill their work quota, even children suffer punishments like having their food cut off, corporal punishment, additional work, confinement in a prison cell or being sent to tougher parts of the camp, just like adults,” the source said.
“In the camps, making socially commonsensical and ordinary distinctions between children and adults, men and women and young and old violates the rules and is treated as a counterrevolutionary act of sympathy with forces hostile to the revolution,” the source said. “No distinction between children and adults is made in the camps. Both are equally subject to beatings.”
This also contradicts Article 37 of the CRC, which reads, “No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” This means children in the political prison camps do not receive even the basic protections stipulated in international treaties.
Children in the camps reportedly receive no nutritious food, either.
“You can’t even imagine providing nutritious food to children,” the source said. “If children take in sufficient nutrients, they might develop the strength to flee or embrace other ideas, so they are provided just enough food to stay alive.
“If a camp manager mentions the nutritional intake [of prisoners, including children] or the quantity and quality of the food, they’ll be sent to the stockade and branded a reactionary, regardless of who they are.”
Article 24 of the CRC requires party states to take appropriate measures to eradicate childhood diseases and malnutrition by providing adequate nutritious foods and clean drinking water.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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