North Korea issued an order to army mobilization departments nationwide on Oct. 12 calling for the recruitment of additional troops, a source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK last Friday.
The source said the order likely aims to supplement shortages of manpower in the military.
North Korea carried out its regular autumn recruitment in August and September. Following the latest order, however, army mobilization departments nationwide are reportedly going “on-site” take part in recruiting additional soldiers.
Rumors have recently been circulating inside North Korea that the authorities might lengthen the term of military service, too.
South Korea’s National Intelligence Service had reported that North Korea shortened the period of military service last year by about two years — from nine to 10 years to seven to eight years for men, and from six to seven years to five years for women.
However, with word going round that the period of service might increase again, many more young people are reacting negatively to recruitment efforts or avoiding enlistment altogether.
In fact, Chongjin’s army mobilization department dispatched guidance officers to factories and other workplaces to carry out initial surveys for additional recruitments, but the surveys reportedly yielded little.
Most young people who were interviewed flatly refused to enlist in the military by offering a variety of excuses, including illness and only-child status, according to the source.
The source said one young person in Chongjin’s Ponam District was exempted from the additional recruitment efforts after he gave the city’s army mobilization department a note saying he required over three months of “stabilization treatment” after stepping in front of a passing car on Oct. 14.
In Hoeryong’s Nammun-dong neighborhood, one young person caused a local uproar when he disappeared for several days after hearing news of the additional recruitment efforts.
The source said young people nowadays think entering the army is “worse than death” under the belief that the experience robs them of their youth for no good reason.
“[Young people] are avoiding military duty even more because they saw how soldiers who completed their military duty are not sent home, but rather forcefully sent to difficult-to-live areas of the country,” he explained.
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