Inequality 'assigned at birth' in N. Korea

Education, jobs, access to scarce food and health care, and even whom you marry all hinge on how loyal your forebears are viewed to have been to the Kim dynasty that took power six decades ago.

The study released Wednesday by the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea says all adults in the communist state are categorized as one of three classes: loyal, wavering or hostile. The nongovernment human rights group says it amounts to a caste system.

Despite the emergence of informal markets since the late 1990s challenging state control, the study says the class system persists and is behind the discrimination and abuses faced by the lowest echelons of the North's closed society.

“Throughout its 64-year existence, the Kim regime has claimed that North Korea is an egalitarian workers' paradise,” said the committee's executive director, Greg Scarlatoiu. “Yet, inequality is assigned at birth, perpetuated throughout a person's lifetime and cruelly enforced by those in power to benefit themselves and their supporters.”

The North Korean government denies such a discriminatory class system exists.

The study, titled “Marked for Life,” is based on interviews with 75 North Korean defectors. It also cites a 1993 manual issued by North Korea's Ministry of Public Security to guide its officials on how to investigate a citizen's socio-political classification, or “songbun,” which translates in Korean as “ingredients.”

The ministry maintains a file on everyone from the age of 17 that is updated every two years, the study says.

The songbun system has its origins in social class restructuring enforced by the North's communist founders, led by Kim Il Sung, that began even before the state's formal creation in 1948, to elevate peasants and laborers at the expense of landlords, businessmen and religious leaders.

Those considered most loyal had fought alongside Kim against Japanese colonialists and then against U.S.-backed forces in the 1950-53 Korean War. Those deemed hostile collaborated with the enemy or had family members who fled to South Korea.

Moving up a songbun category is rare and requires a lifetime of devotion to the Kim family regime and Communist Party. But songbun can be downgraded for political or criminal offenses or failing to cooperate with authorities.

When an individual is sentenced to the North's gulag of political prison camps — estimated to hold 150,000-200,000 people — family members are considered guilty by association and generally accompany them, the study says.

Today the loyal class, which makes up about a quarter of the 24 million population, still dominates the powerful military and the Korean Workers' Party. They alone are entitled to live in the relatively prosperous capital Pyongyang and monopolize the prestige universities and best jobs, the study says.

SHARE CLOSE
Blogger		Google+
Live Journal		Plurk
Stumble Upon

Tweet

	PREVIOUS ARTICLE
	Netizens back Singapore artist arrested on vandalism charges

NEXT ARTICLE
Cousin of Japanese Emperor Akihito dies at 66

Write a Comment

Terms

Enter your comments - 3000 characters max

Type in image code

 Receive China Post promos
 Respond to this email

Submit