N Korea ‘treats detainees as worth less than animals’, says HRW

Torture, humiliation, coerced confessions and hunger appear to be “fundamental characteristics” of the North Korean pre-trial detention system, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Monday, citing testimony from former officials and detainees held in the country since Kim Jong Un took power in 2011.
HRW’s 88-page report adds to the documentation of widespread rights abuses in North Korea’s opaque criminal justice system by United Nations investigators, who in 2014 said the country’s supreme leader, Kim, and its security chiefs should face justice for ordering systematic torture, starvation and killings that were comparable with Nazi-era atrocities.
The report drew on interviews from eight former government officials and 22 former detainees – one of whom told the United-States based group that detainees were treated as if they were “worth less than an animal” and “that’s what you end up becoming”.
“North Korea’s pretrial detention and investigation system is arbitrary, violent, cruel, and degrading,” said Brad Adams, HRW’s Asia director.
“North Koreans say they live in constant fear of being caught in a system where official procedures are usually irrelevant, guilt is presumed, and the only way out is through bribes and connections,” he said.
All detainees interviewed for the report told HRW they were forced to sit still on the floor, kneeling or with their legs crossed, fists or hands on their laps, heads down, and with their eyes directed to the floor, for seven to eight hours a day or in some cases 13-16 hours. If a prisoner moved, guards punished the person or ordered collective punishment for all detainees.