RUTHFULLY YOURS

Analysis of images by the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea indicates that the size of Camp No. 25 alone has increased 72 per cent and perimeter guard posts, which numbered 20 in 2003, had increased to 43 in 2010.

The camp is believed to house some 5,000 prisoners, in conditions that human rights groups have described as “deplorable.”

^{The perimeter fence of Camp No. 25 in 2005 (DigitalGlobe)}

The detailed pictures, provided by DigitalGlobe, a US-based commercial satellite image company, also show the perimeter fence has been extended by around 4,600 feet, agricultural plots have been rearranged and a new gateway has been constructed.

Based on the images and information from defectors, the human rights group believes North Korea is being forced to expand its prison network for a number of reasons, one being the purges conducted by Kim Jong-un of senior members of his father’s administration out of concern that they pose a threat to his power base.

^{The perimeter fence of Camp No. 25 in 2009 (DigitalGlobe)}

As well as these individuals, their families and bureaucrats that supported their roles in the previous administration are being sent to prison camps.

In addition, patrols have been stepped up along North Korea’s border with China to capture defectors, while Chinese authorities are also cooperating in returning North Koreans who make it over the border but are caught in China.

A third explanation that is being put forward is a consolidation of the regime’s gulag system.

“If a dismantling of some of North Korea’s political prisoner camps and prisoner transfers to expanded facilities are in progress, it is essential to ensure that the North Korean regime does not attempt to erase evidence of atrocities committed at the camps, including the starving prisoners,” said Greg Scarlatoiu, executive director of the committee.

^{The perimeter fence of Camp No. 25 in 2011 (DigitalGlobe)}

North Korea remains defiant in the face of international criticism of its human rights record, as well as of its ongoing efforts to develop ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads.

On Monday, as Park Guen-hye was being sworn into office as president of South Korea, Kim Jong-un attended a live-fire artillery practice.

North Korean state media reported that Kim told his entourage that if the exercise had been an actual combat situation, then the enemy “would have been hit so hard that they would not have been able to raise their heads.”