{"id":28050,"date":"2012-04-02T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-04-01T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/csw-yeo.1wp.site\/press\/north-korea-petition-presented-to-un-on-nk-gulags-1343\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T18:33:06","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T17:33:06","slug":"north-korea-petition-presented-to-un-on-nk-gulags-1343","status":"publish","type":"press","link":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/press\/north-korea-petition-presented-to-un-on-nk-gulags-1343\/","title":{"rendered":"North Korea: Petition presented to UN on NK gulags"},"content":{"rendered":"

The International Coalition to Stop Crimes against Humanity in North Korea (ICNK), consisting over 40 prominent human rights organizations and activists, today submitted a petition to the special procedures of the United Nation Human Rights Council calling for the UN to help shut down North Korea’s vast gulag system.<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n

North Korea holds as many as 200,000 people in its gulag system, known as the kwan-li-so. In these prison-camps, both real and imagined dissenters are imprisoned alongside their relatives- including the elderly and children- under a guilt-by-association system that was instituted by Kim Il-sung and which is now overseen by Kim Jong-eun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The environment in the gulag is horrific, making the suffering of the prisoners one of the most serious human-rights and humanitarian disasters in the world today” said Jared Genser, Managing Director of Perseus Strategies and pro bono counsel to the ICNK. Prisoners, including children, must undergo backbreaking labor, such as mining, logging, and farming, seven days a week for twelve or more hours a day. The labor is usually dangerous and a large percentage of the prison population, approximately 20-25, dies each year due to the horrendous labor conditions. It is estimated that over the past few decades more than 400,000 of the camp prisoners have perished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The labor conditions are only part of the misery the prisoners face,” said Ha Tae-keung of Open North Korea. “They also endure starvation-level food rations.” One defector reported the daily ration as approximately twenty grains of corn per inmate, an amount so meager that prisoners have to dig through cow dung to search for undigested grain in order to stave off death. Even though illnesses such as pneumonia and tuberculosis run rampant in the camps, there is no medical treatment available for prisoners. They are forced to work while sick, and for those who are no longer physically able to work, they are sent to sanatoriums to await their death. Alongside the hard labor and starvation, prisoners must also face the routine occurrence of torture, rape, and extra-judicial killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Kim Jong-eun now has a choice to make,” said Kanae Doi, Japan Director of Human Rights Watch. “He can do nothing and continue operating the gulag system, thus making him responsible for the ongoing crimes against humanity his government is committing. Or, he can shut down the gulag and put this terrible chapter in the history of his country to an end.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The petition submitted today urges the UN to carry out an investigation and reporting on the gulag. ICNK hopes to maximize the use of the UN system for the benefit of the victims in North Korea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The UN used a similar procedure to investigate the situation of U.S. detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. In that case, the UN issued a single report that shined a bright light on the abuses at Guantanamo and put forth recommendations that have helped reduce the number of prisoners detained in the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The time is ripe for this approach because for too long North Korea has not only denied any wrongdoing, it has also continued to ignore and repeatedly reject recommendations by the international community to take action. David Knaute, Asia Director for the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), said, “The Koreans imprisoned in this system need the help of the UN. The international community owes them nothing less.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its petition, ICNK calls on the UN to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n