North Korea’s security agency has been
tightening its web of surveillance on people that place outbound calls to
relatives in the South, but those exposed are often faced with demands for
bribes in place of criminal punishment. In some cases, the said payoffs reach
dizzying heights of up to 2,000 USD, Daily NK has learned.
“The state has been stepping up its
surveillance and wiretapping on mobile phone users to prevent information from
getting out of the country,” a source in Yangkang Province told Daily NK on
Tuesday. “But the State Security Department [SSD], which oversees the entire
operation, has been using this as an opportunity to take bribes from those
apprehended.”
He added, “A few days ago, a resident from
Kim Jong Suk County was caught by the provincial wire detection management
office (under the SSD) after having been monitored for talking with family
members that defected to South Korea. The individual was caught in the act and
taken away.” The fact that the SSD was overwhelmingly aware that this
individual did little more than exchange routine greetings with her family notwithstanding, she was held in custody for several days and then shipped off to the provincial
SSD office after she failed to meet their bribe demands.
“The wire detection office, which serves as
the primary surveillance department, waits for bribes after they expose someone
instead of handing them directly over to the SSD,” the source explained. “Those
who can offer payments on the spot are let go, but if not, they’re sent off in
a bid for officials to improve their track record.”
A consistent feature of Kim Jong Un’s time
in power has been a tighter grip on monitoring mobile phone calls, particularly
outbound ones, which are considered acts of leaking sensitive internal
information. Anyone caught for such crimes is transported to city and
provincial SSD anti-espionage departments. There, depending on their content of
their conversation on record, they are grouped into one of two criminal categories: economic or
political.
Those apprehended for placing calls to
China are branded economic criminals and sent to the local Ministry of People’s
Security [MPS] unit for processing and punishment; calling South Korea, however,
holds far graver implications. Individuals associated with this act are labeled
political criminals who have sold off information to the enemy, and are hauled
off to political prison camps or long-term re-education camps, particularly the
complex located in the Susong area of Chongjin City, North Hamkyung Province.
“One resident, interrogated for two months
by the anti-espionage department within the provincial SSD, explained that all
he did was ask his son (in South Korea) to send some money because things
were rough,” he said, adding that agents pounced on the chance to
profit on the South Korea stigma, demanding that he cough up 2,000 USD in bribes, despite knowing full well his phone call had nothing to do with conveying state secrets.
“One person who was handed down a
seven-year sentence at Susong Re-education Camp paid cadres at the
anti-espionage department, and only then was she sent to the MPS office as an economic criminal,” the source reported. “The MPS declared it a light economic crime, warranting three months in a labor-training camp.”
Long-term re-education camps are nothing
more than housing for those who cannot afford to meet the state’s
rampant level of corruption. “Money is above the law in the North, so it’s no
wonder people refer to the country as the ‘dollar republic,’” he concluded.
