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Hundreds of North Korean public execution sites identified by Seoul-based human rights organisation Transitional Justice Working Group

  • Four in five escapees interviewed had witnessed such events, report reveals
  • More than half said they had been forced to watch

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South Korean protesters and North Korean defectors hold portraits of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un during a rally near the US embassy in Seoul in February. Photo: AP

As a boy of about 9 or 10, Kang Chun-hyok waded between grown-ups’ legs and made his way to the front of a crowd of hundreds assembled near a brick factory in his hometown, not far from North Korea’s border with China.

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Six soldiers aimed their rifles at the condemned man, who looked like he could barely walk. Each fired three shots, and then it was over. The man’s crime: stealing copper wires from power lines, a state property.

“I was curious, and wanted to pick up shell casings. But I was shocked,” recalled Kang, now 33, who fled North Korea in 1998 and lives in Seoul. “The scene was so real, I was so young.”

He is far from alone. Four in five North Korean escapees interviewed for a new report by a South Korea-based research group said they witnessed a public execution in their lifetime. More than half said they had been forced to watch one.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un holds up a child as he watches a performance in an undated photo released on June 3. Photo: KCNA via Reuters
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un holds up a child as he watches a performance in an undated photo released on June 3. Photo: KCNA via Reuters
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Ever since US President Donald Trump’s dramatic pivot to personal diplomacy with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in early 2018, both US and South Korean officials have tiptoed around mentioning the North Korean regime’s human rights record for fear of upending talks.

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