Women across North Korea are subjected to horrific assaults and abuses, including forced sexual slavery and trafficking, a new report has revealed.
The shocking report, which collated heartbreaking testimonies from women of all ages, was released by London-based Korea Future Initiative today to mark International Women’s Day.
The report said: “The government of North Korea has a problem with women and girls. Acts of sexual violence are perpetuated against females of every class, age and status.
“A thinly disguised misogyny pervades all that the government touches.”
The size of the problem was first appreciated in 2002, when the stream of defectors fleeing the country included more women than men for the first time.
These women, finally free, brought harrowing stories of “rape, human trafficking, forced abortions and sexual slavery”.
One defector quoted in the report said schoolgirls were particularly targeted by – and vulnerable to – sex attackers.
She said: “Lots of sexual violence happens around schools. Since the victims are children, teachers do try and protect them, but protection all depends on one’s social class.
“Some children cannot be protected. If the perpetrators of sexual violence are from the higher classes, they can get away from the law with just one phone call.
“An older girl in my daughter’s school was raped on her way home in the winter. No one knew the perpetrator but the school told her not to come back.
“Eventually we heard she was pregnant. I still feel sorry for her.”
Another woman said foreign visitors were also responsible for exploiting the situation in North Korea and abusing women themselves.
She said her friend at a hotel frequented by foreign visitors would regularly be tasked with escorting sex slaves up to hotel rooms.
The defector said: “A friend worked at a hotel that was very important and catered to officials and foreigners.
“On one occasion, he was told to escort three women to the rooms of two foreigners.
“An older white man was given two women, one of whom kept crying.
“She was younger than my friend’s sister who was fifteen at the time.
“A young white man looked nervous when he opened his door so my friend looked away.”
ther women trafficked into sex slavery are sold into neighbouring China, where there is a surplus of single men – especially in rural areas.
The report said nothing was being by North Korea’s rulers because to work towards fixing the problem would be to recognise a problem existed at all.
It said: “North Korea’s survivors expected to encounter silence, not justice, from the authorities.
“Apologies to survivors or reforms of institutions would acknowledge fallibility and invite retribution from those who have suffered, signalling the beginning of the end for the Kim dynasty.”
Kim, already facing plummeting popularity, cannot afford to accept responsibility for any problem in his crumbling hermit state.
Until the bloody Kim dynasty finally comes to an end in North Korea, women will continue to pay an unimaginable price.