Two female switchboard operators who were caught engaging in non-socialist behavior last year recently faced a struggle session at the cultural center of the Songjin Steel Mill, Daily NK has learned.
“A woman working as a switchboard operator at Songjin Steel Mill invited a female colleague to her father’s birthday party and then played South Korean music for a dance party. This came to the attention of the police and the two women were publicly criticized,” a source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The two women were arrested late last year and investigated for two months. After the Lunar New Year, they were sent to a public ideological struggle session and also face legal consequences, the source said.
According to the source, the two women, who worked as switchboard operators at the Songjin Steel Mill, were both into South Korean movies, dramas, and music and had formed a close relationship while secretly watching South Korean videos.
One of the switchboard operators invited the other to her home on the birthday of her father, an official with the food administration office in Kimchaek, in late December 2023. The two of them played South Korean music on the stereo, turned up the volume, and danced to the music from early in the evening until 11 PM.
The wife of a city policeman who had recently moved to the neighborhood had also been invited to the father’s birthday party. After the police officer’s wife returned home, she told her husband that the songs at the party had the distinctive feel of South Korean music, prompting the police to investigate the incident.
“Sensing an opportunity for promotion, the police officer checked the facts of his wife’s claim and immediately reported the affair to his superiors. As a result, the two switchboard operators at the steel mill were promptly arrested, and their own superiors – the manager of the switchboard room and the secretary of the steel mill’s Socialist Patriotic Youth League chapter – were also reprimanded over the matter,” the source said.
After their arrest, the two women were subjected to a two-month investigation and then dragged in front of all the steel mill workers for a public ideological struggle session for non-socialist behavior. The source said the two women stood on stage with their hands tied and heads bowed as they endured scathing criticism in front of the entire workforce.
“The officials denounced the women’s non-socialist behavior during the struggle session and at the same time sternly warned the other workers of the need to eliminate all non-socialist elements from their lives. In the end, the official’s daughter, who was identified as the instigator, was sentenced to three years in prison, and her colleague was sent to a forced labor camp,” the source said.
The cadre at the municipal food administration office was dismissed from his post and transferred to a labor-intensive job for failing to keep his daughter in line, the source added.
Translated by David Carruth. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Daily NK works with a network of sources living in North Korea, China, and elsewhere. Their identities remain anonymous for security reasons. For more information about Daily NK’s network of reporting partners and information-gathering activities, please visit our FAQ page here.
Please send any comments or questions about this article to dailynkenglish@uni-media.net.
