The United Nations Office at Geneva
Multimedia Newsroom
“Today’s report finds that the overall human rights situation in DPRK has not improved over the past decade and, in many instances, has degraded, bringing even more suffering to the population,” spokesperson Liz Throssell told the biweekly briefing in Geneva.
The report points to the introduction of more laws, policies and practices that are subjecting citizens to increased surveillance and control in all parts of life, Throssell said.
“The report says political prison camps continue to operate. The fate of the hundreds of thousands of disappeared people, including abducted foreign nationals of the Republic of Korea, Japan and elsewhere, remains unknown,”she said.
Citizens continue to be subjected to unremitting propaganda by the State for their entire lives. The right to food continues to be violated, with some State policies exacerbating hunger.
“Today, the death penalty is more widely allowed by law and implemented in practice,” Throssell stated.
Enjoyment of freedom of expression and access to information have significantly regressed, with the implementation of severe new punishments, including the death penalty, for a range of acts.
James Heenan, head of the office working on DPRK, who joined the briefing remotely from Seoul, highlighted that these acts included sharing foreign media and TV shows, including so-called K-dramas.
“We do have credible evidence that individuals have been executed not just for watching K-dramas. The crime is for distributing, distributing at a certain level, foreign information, foreign media,” he explained.
“The report, which is based on hundreds of interviews by the Office along with supporting materials, points to the increased use of forced labour in many forms, particularly so-called “shock brigades”, usually deployed to take on physically demanding and hazardous sectors such as mining and construction. They often come from poorer families and in recent years, the Government has used thousands of orphans and street children in coal mines and at other hazardous sites and for extensive hours,” Throssell said.
Heenan explained further how children are exposed to different forms of forced labour
“One is in schools, school children are used, to do things like particularly harvest season to collect the harvest from the fields, but also to do manual work around the school or along roads and so forth. The government says that this is just part of a sort of a, curriculum to help them learn life skills. But the information we've had for many years now is that it meets meets the qualification of forced labour because the children have no choice. And often the work is is quite, quite backbreakingand takes a lort of their days,” said Heenan.
If DPRK continues on this current trajectory,according to the report, the population will be subjected to more of the suffering, brutal repression and fear that they have endured for so long, Throssell highlighted.
The UN Human Rights Office continues to document human rights violations, some of which may amount to international crimes.
There were reports of some limited improvements. Escapees reported nominal improvements in the treatment of people in detention facilities.
Several laws have been enacted or amended, reportedly strengthening fair trial guarantees and protection against ill-treatment of persons deprived of liberty. The country is engaging to a degree with the international human rights system, ratifying two futher human rights treaties and complying with some treaty bodies’ reporting obligations.
However, the disconnect between the State’s international obligations and ultimately the reality of the lives of its citizens remains stark, the report concludes.
The report lays out some immediate steps to foster credibility of the Government’s commitment to human rights and provide momentum for a new path.
These include: ending the system of political prison camps and guilt by association; ending the use of the death penalty; restarting family connections, including through meetings; ending torture and ill-treatment in places of detention; providing information on those abducted or forcibly disappeared by the State; distributing information about human rights to the population; inviting the High Commissioner and other human rights mechanisms to visit the country; and accepting UN Human Rights technical assistance on rights in detention.
ENDS
For more information and media requests, please contact:
In Geneva:
Ravina Shamdasani: + 41 22 917 9169 / ravina.shamdasani@un.org
Liz Throssell: +41 22 917 9296 / elizabeth.throssell@un.org
Facebook unitednationshumanrights
Instagram @unitednationshumanrights
STORY:UN Human Rights Spokeperson Liz Throssell: DPRK report on suffering, repression and fear since 2014
TRT: 03:22
SOURCE: OHCHR
RESTRICTIONS: Pictures ©SARAM – Foundation for Human Rights in North Korea.
LANGUAGE: English/NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 12 September 2025 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
SHOTLIST:
- Covers of UN Human Rights reports are used as backdrops
- Pictures of North Korea are use as backdrops © SARAM – Foundation for Human Rights in North Korea.
- SOUNDBITE (English)—UN Human Rights Elizabeth Throssell , UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “Today’s report finds that the overall human rights situation in DPRK has not improved over the past decade and, in many instances, has degraded, bringing even more suffering to the population.”
- Cut Aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English)—UN Human Rights Elizabeth Throssell , UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “The report says political prison camps continue to operate. The fate of the hundreds of thousands of disappeared people, including abducted foreign nationals of the Republic of Korea, Japan and elsewhere, remains unknown.”
- Cut Aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English)—UN Human Rights Elizabeth Throssell , UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “Today, the death penalty is more widely allowed by law and implemented in practice.”
- Cut Aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English)— James Heenan, UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “We do have credible evidence that individuals have been executed not just for watching K-dramas. The crime is for distributing, distributing at a certain level, foreign information, foreign media.”
- Cut Aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English)—UN Human Rights Elizabeth Throssell , UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “The report, which is based on hundreds of interviews by the Office along with supporting materials, points to the increased use of forced labour in many forms, particularly so-called “shock brigades”, usually deployed to take on physically demanding and hazardous sectors such as mining and construction. They often come from poorer families and in recent years, the Government has used thousands of orphans and street children in coal mines and at other hazardous sites and for extensive hours.”
- Cut Aways: Briefing room
- SOUNDBITE (English)— James Heenan, UN Human Rights Representative Seoul, Korea: “One is in schools, school children are used, to do things like particularly harvest season to collect the harvest from the fields, but also to do manual work around the school or along roads and so forth. The government says that this is just part of a sort of a, curriculum to help them learn life skills. But the information we've had for many years now is that it meets meets the qualification of forced labour because the children have no choice. And often the work is is quite, quite backbreakingand takes a lort of their days.”
- Covers of UN Human Rights reports
- Pictures of North Korea © SARAM – Foundation for Human Rights in North Korea.
END
Similar Stories
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , UNMAS , WHO
Just how many people are still trapped in the Sudanese city of El Fasher?
That’s the burning question for relatives of the many thousands of people believed to still be there, since paramilitary fighters overran the regional capital of North Darfur last month, after a 500-day siege.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
At the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva, UN Human Rights spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan made the following remarks on the ongoing violence in the occupied WestBank.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
At a Special Session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva today, the UN Human Rights Chief, Volker Türk made the following remarks on the situation in El-Fasher, Sudan.
2
1
2
Statements , Conferences , Edited News | HRC
UN Human Rights Council holds special session on Sudan as mass atrocities reported in El Fasher
The UN Human Rights Council convened an emergency session on Friday on the situation in and around El Fasher, Sudan, following reports of mass killings in the North Darfur capital. States passed a resolution that will mandate an investigation into likely mass atrocities during the capture of El Fasher by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on 26 October.
1
1
2
Edited News | UN WOMEN
Sudan: Women’s bodies ‘a crime scene’ as tens of thousands flee El Fasher atrocities – UN Women
In war-torn Sudan, rape is being systematically used as a weapon and simply being a woman is “a strong predictor” of hunger, violence and death, the UN’s gender equality agency warned on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
The UN human rights office (OHCHR) on Friday called for an end to continuing expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, where “unchecked” settler violence has surged since the war in Gaza began more than two years ago.
1
1
1
Edited News | WFP
The crisis in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) continues to worsen amid ongoing fighting that has driven tens of thousands of people from their homes and created acute hunger, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | WFP
Gaza: One million receive food parcels as humanitarians race to ‘push back hunger’
Food is slowly returning to the shelves in Gaza amid “apocalyptic scenes” but supplies are still desperately inadequate, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday, as they issued fresh calls for wider access and continued financial support.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Seif Magango today told the bi-weekly UN press briefing in Geneva of more details that are emerging on the atrocities committed in El Fasher, in Sudan during and after its takeover by the Rapid Support Forces.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Seif Magango made the following comment on Friday at the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani made the following comment on Friday at the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , WHO
Sudan: UN Raises Alarm Over Mass Atrocities in El Fasher as Survivors Report Executions, Killings and Rapes
More details continue to emerge about atrocities committed during and after the fall of El Fasher to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan on 23 October. Since the powerful paramilitary group made a major incursion into the city last week, the UN Human Rights Office has received “horrendous accounts of summary executions, mass killings, rapes, attacks against humanitarian workers, looting, abductions and forced displacement,” said Seif Magango, spokesperson for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).