By Theodore Shoebat
It is commonly believed that the Middle East has the worst persecutions against Christians. But this is not true. More Christian are being slaughtered in North Korea than anywhere else. Christians are being systematically slaughtered in Nazi and Soviet style concentration camps. Recent photos from satellite imagery reveals their structures:
According to one report:
Newly-released satellite images show that North Korea’s prison camp system, where detainees are subjected to forced labor, torture, starvation, rape and death, may be expanding.
Up to 120,000 men, women and children are imprisoned in the gulags, known as “kwanliso” in Korean, according to the United Nations.Pyongyang officially denies that the camps exist, but multiple human rights groups have documented their ongoing operation via survivor testimony and satellite imagery.On Tuesday, Washington-based Human Rights in North Korea (HRNK) released images of Camp No. 25, a camp near Chongjin, on North Korea’s northeast coast.According to HRNK, the map underwent an expansion before 2010, when it almost doubled in scale, and has continued to operate at its larger size.“Our satellite imagery analysis of Camp No. 25 and other such unlawful detention facilities appears to confirm the sustained, if not increased importance of the use of forced labor under Kim Jong-un,” HRNK executive director Greg Scarlatoiu said in a statement.HRNK’s report comes after separate analysis by Amnesty International this month concluded that Pyongyang “is continuing to maintain, and even invest, in these repressive facilities.”“These camps constitute the cornerstone of the country’s large infrastructure dedicated to political repression and social control that enables widespread and systematic human rights abuses,” Amnesty said in a statement.“Assessments of the satellite images of two political prison camps — known as kwanliso — collected in May and August show the addition of new guard posts, upgrading of a reported crematorium, and ongoing agricultural activities.”The 2014 UN report estimated that “hundreds of thousands of political prisoners” have died in the North Korean gulags over the past 50 years amid “unspeakable atrocities.”“The inmate population has been gradually eliminated through deliberate starvation, forced labor, executions, torture, rape and the denial of reproductive rights,” the report said, drawing a parallel between the camps and those of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.A former bodyguard of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il told CNN in 2014 of beatings and forced starvation in the camp he was imprisoned in after he unsuccessfully tried to flee to South Korea.
Christians in North Korea face rape, torture, enslavement, and being killed for their faith, a damning new report from Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) has warned.
CSW, a UK-based religious freedom charity, said in the report, Total Denial: Violations of Freedom of Religion or Belief in North Korea, that freedom of religion or belief “is largely non-existent” under dictator Kim Jong-Un’s leadership.
“Religious beliefs are seen as a threat to the loyalty demanded by the Supreme Leader, so anyone holding these beliefs is severely persecuted,” the report says.
“Christians suffer significantly because of the anti-revolutionary and imperialist labels attached to them by the country’s leadership.”
Among the documented incidents against Christians are “being hung on a cross over a fire, crushed under a steamroller, herded off bridges and trampled underfoot”.
Christians in North Korea face rape, torture, enslavement, and being killed for their faith, a damning new report from Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) has warned.
CSW, a UK-based religious freedom charity, said in the report, Total Denial: Violations of Freedom of Religion or Belief in North Korea, that freedom of religion or belief “is largely non-existent” under dictator Kim Jong-Un’s leadership.
“Religious beliefs are seen as a threat to the loyalty demanded by the Supreme Leader, so anyone holding these beliefs is severely persecuted,” the report says.
“Christians suffer significantly because of the anti-revolutionary and imperialist labels attached to them by the country’s leadership.”
Among the documented incidents against Christians are “being hung on a cross over a fire, crushed under a steamroller, herded off bridges and trampled underfoot”.
Other crimes include “extra-judicial killing, extermination, enslavement/forced labour, forcible transfer of population, arbitrary imprisonment, torture, persecution, enforced disappearance, rape and sexual violence, and other inhumane acts”.