An official at the Bureau of Land and Environment Conservation and Management in the North Korean city of Nampo recently attempted to end his life during a brutal investigation that was instigated by a rebuke from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
“An official at the Nampo Bureau of Land and Environment Conservation and Management came to the attention of a joint investigation by the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea and was called in for several rounds of questioning. Facing unrelenting attacks on his character, the official made a suicide attempt and was rushed to the hospital,” a source in South Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Sept. 18, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
While visiting rice fields flooded after an embankment collapsed at the Ansok Tideland in South Pyongan Province in August, Kim severely criticized Premier Kim Tok Hun and other officials for being irresponsible and ordered a thorough investigation into the Nampo Bureau of Land and Environment Conservation and Management and other organizations.
That prompted the Central Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Organization and Guidance Department and the Discipline Inspection Department of the Central Committee to launch a joint investigation of the Nampo bureau that continued until the end of August.
According to the source, the official at the Nampo bureau who came under scrutiny was brought before investigations for several harrowing rounds of questioning. Investigators browbeat him with threats such as the following: “With your hand on your heart, ponder whether you’re actually qualified to be an official.” “Get ready to be out of a job.” “You may be kicked out of the Workers’ Party, too.” “Imprisonment and even banishment might be in store for you.”
After being repeatedly interrogated and constantly bullied by the team of joint investigators — which had been organized not by the party’s provincial branch, but by the Central Committee — the official didn’t say a word at work while exhibiting signs of distress and anxiety.
Pushed to the edge
Then one day early this month, the official failed to show up for work and did not answer the phone.
It turned out that the previous evening, the official had sent his wife and children to his in-laws, written a suicide note and then drunk a concoction of sodium hydroxide, better known as lye.
When the official was found, he was still clinging to life, and he was rushed to the hospital, the source said.
“Currently, the official is handcuffed to a bed in a solitary cell at a hospital in Nampo. He’s still unconscious, but the investigators think death is too good for him and have instructed the doctors to do whatever necessary to keep him alive so he can answer for his wrongdoing,” the source said.
“This official wasn’t the only one under scrutiny from investigators, but he looked especially anxious. In his suicide note, he insisted he’d managed staff as diligently and conscientiously as he could using the materials and technology available to him. But he admitted to causing a problem, even if accidentally, and said he deserved to die.”
While the Central Committee issued a gag order about the incident, rumors have already been spreading. Several officials have already been arrested in the course of the investigation, creating an uneasy mood throughout Nampo, the source reported.
Translated by David Carruth. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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