A North Korean prison camp survivor has given a rare testimony exposing public executions and starvation at the detention centre where she was held for 28 years.
Kim Hye Sook was aged 13 when she was sent to join her parents at the Gwalliso No 18 political prisoners camp where detainees were treated “worse than dogs” while carrying out enforced labour and being abused by guards.
Ms Kim, who was released in 2001 and now lives in South Korea, sobbed as she told a conference in Geneva how she was forced to watch public shootings and went without food to feed her brothers and sisters, who remain in detention.
An estimated 200,000 political prisoners are languishing in North Korea’s six camps, which the government denies even exist, said the news conference’s co-hosts the Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights.