Executions in North Korea ramped up significantly during pandemic - report

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Executions rose sharply in North Korea during the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a Seoul-based NGO.

From January 2020 to the end of 2024, at least 153 people were executed or sentenced to death - a sharp increase from 44 people in the five years before the pandemic, according to a report by the Transitional Justice Working Group (TJWG).

Some of the most common offences were related to religion, superstition and foreign cultural content - including the consumption of K-dramas and K-pop.

The number of killings declined between 2015 and 2019 amid international pressure following a landmark UN inquiry. But executions surged in 2020, after Pyongyang closed its borders, said TJWG.

The NGO found that executions in North Korea peaked in the early years of Kim's rule, with more than 80 people executed in 2013.

The numbers appear to dip following a landmark UN inquiry which found that Pyongyang was systemically committing human rights abuses.

But in 2020, at least 54 people were executed, and 45 people the following year - contrasting with the average of five executions a year between 2016 and 2019.

Out of the 144 documented cases of executions and death sentences during Kim's rule, the most common offences - accounting for 29 cases - related to religion, superstitions and foreign culture, TJWG found.

K-dramas and K-pop, the biggest cultural exports of South Korea, are banned in the North. Researchers say Kim's regime sees the spread of South Korean pop culture as a threat to its ideology.

A rare video in 2024 showed two teenagers publicly sentenced to 12 years of hard labour for watching and distributing K-dramas.

Other offences that resulted in executions included criticising Kim or the party, intentional homicide, drug trafficking and helping others flee the country, according to TJWG.

"As the regime pursues a 4th hereditary succession of power, there is a high risk of increased executions to strengthen cultural and ideological control and maintain political dominance," TJWG said in its press release.

A total number of 358 people were executed between 2011 and 2024, said the TJWG report, which collected testimonies from more than 250 North Korean defectors across 51 cities and counties.

More than 70% of these executions were public, and the vast majority were carried out by shooting, according to the TJWG, which mapped out 46 execution sites across the country used during Kim's rule.

The group - which was established in Seoul in 2014 by activists and researchers from South Korea, North Korea, US, UK and Canada - tracks human rights violations and publishes regular reports on the death penalty in North Korea.