Daily NK has learned that the North Korean
authorities are constructing a new guard post in a high mountainous area to
assist in the detection of Chinese-manufactured mobile phone usage by residents
making calls outside the country’s borders.
A source in North Hamgyung Province
reported to Daily NK on August 28th, “The post is going up on top of the
mountain bordering the Tumen River and is under the management of the 27th unit
of the Chosun People’s Army [KPA], the division responsible for mobile phone
detection, and construction is being carried out by the North Hamgyung Province
border guards.”
He reported that guards have been making at
least two daily trips up the mountain to transport bricks and cement required
for the post’s construction. “The fact that it’s made of brick means that it’s
not going to be a temporary installation,” he said, nothing that the materials
employed in the construction have been provided by the army and not procured
from construction agencies or other organizations as is often the case.
This most recent measure by the authorities
not only seeks to regulate calls placed from illegal phones, but stave off
those who continue to try, “Placing this guard post on the top of a mountain
suggests they are trying to track down every violator,” the source asserted.
Until present, regulation of Chinese mobile
phones has mostly consisted of house searches conducted by the Ministry of
People’s Security [North Korean police] and hand-held signal detectors carried
by State Security Department agents. Previously, residents circumvented these
monitoring measures by heading to high mountainous areas relatively free of
regulation, with added benefits of improved mobile phone reception.
“Those waiting for remittances, making
money from aiding defections, and wishing to contact family in the South are
all likely to take a hit [from this new guard post]. Mobile phone jammers in
Hoeryong, Musan, and Onsong have already prevented many from making calls; it’s
going to get a lot harder for anyone to make outside calls for the foreseeable
future,” he explained.
“Everyone knows that in most areas the
State Security Department can detect outside calls at any time, but they always
thought that heading to the mountains was a fairly uncomplicated way to dodge
repercussions.” As most measures in North Korea, he predicts it will serve only
as a temporary solution, noting that most residents have already begun asking,
“Can’t we just bribe them [the guards] to make calls?”
“[The authorities] have ramped up border
control resulting in diminished numbers of people crossing back and forth, or in other cases defecting, thus reducing the
money guards are able to earn from bribes to look the other way,” the source reported.
“Going forward it may be that people will
head up to the mountains, with only their SIM cards and a bribe for the guards
on their person, for the opportunity to use a place an outside call undetected,”
he said, concluding, “It would still be far easier than trying to escape
detection when making outside calls from inside the city.”
