Kaechon internment camp

{{location map+|North Korea|caption = Location of Kaechon camp in North Korea| float=right|width=|places=

{{location map~|North Korea|label=Pyongyang|position=bottom|lat=39.063457|long=125.789200|region=KP-01|mark=Blue pog.svg}}

{{location map~|North Korea|label=Kaechon|position=top|lat=39.571086|long=126.055466|region=KP-02}}}}

The camp was established around 1959 by Kim Il Sung{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/mar/16/escape-north-korea-prison-camp |title=How one man escaped from a North Korean prison camp |author=Blaine Harden |date=16 March 2012 |newspaper=The Guardian |access-date=4 February 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120509181622/http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/mar/16/escape-north-korea-prison-camp |archive-date=May 9, 2012 }} in central North Korea near Kae'chŏn county, South Pyongan Province. It is situated along the middle reaches of the Taedong river, which forms the southern boundary of the camp, and includes the mountains north of the river, including Purok-san. Bukchang, a concentration camp (Kwan-li-so No.18) adjoins the southern banks of the Taedong River. The camp is about {{convert|155|km2|mi2|abbr=on}} in area, with farms, mines, and factories threaded through the steep mountain valleys.{{cite web|url=http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|title=Committee for Human Rights in North Korea: Satellite Imagery of the North Korean Gulag: Kwan-li-so No. 14 Kaechon Overview, p. 209|access-date=2012-12-07|archive-date=2015-03-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150313045221/http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|url-status=dead}}[http://www.ned.org/about/board/meet-our-president/archived-presentations-and-articles/north-korean-human-rights-prison- North Korean Human Rights: Prison Camps in 2012...], ned.org; accessed October 30, 2014.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/19/AR2009071902178.html|newspaper=The Washington Post|first=Blaine|last=Harden|title=N. Korea's Hard-Labor Camps: On the Diplomatic Back Burner|date=July 20, 2009}} The camp includes overcrowded barracks that house males, females, and older children separately, a headquarters with administrative buildings, and guard housing.{{cite web|url=http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|title=Committee for Human Rights in North Korea: Satellite Imagery of the North Korean Gulag: Kwan-li-so No. 14 Kaechon Headquarters|page=211|access-date=2012-12-07|archive-date=2015-03-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150313045221/http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|url-status=dead}} Altogether around 15,000 are imprisoned in Kaechon internment camp.{{cite web|url=http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|title=Committee for Human Rights in North Korea: The Hidden Gulag (Section: Testimony Kwan-li-so No. 14 Kaechon, p. 48)|access-date=2012-12-07|archive-date=2015-03-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150313045221/http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|url-status=dead}}

The main purpose of the Kaechon internment camp is to keep politically unreliable individuals classed "unredeemable" by the North Korean government isolated from society and to exploit their labour.{{citation|title=Prison Camps of North Korea - Camp 14 Kaechon|work=U.S. State Department Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor|url=http://www.humanrights.gov/features/prison-camps-of-north-korea/camp-14-kaechon/|access-date=January 15, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150514205337/http://www.humanrights.gov/features/prison-camps-of-north-korea/camp-14-kaechon/|archive-date=May 14, 2015|url-status=dead}} Those sent to the camp include officials perceived to have performed poorly in their job, people who criticize the regime, their children, anyone who was born in the camp, and anyone suspected of engaging in "anti-government" activities.{{cite web | title= End horror of North Korean political prison camps|work=Amnesty International |date=May 4, 2011| url= https://www.amnesty.org/en/appeals-for-action/north-korean-political-prison-camps | access-date=January 15, 2014}} Prisoners have to work in one of the coal mines, in agriculture, or in one of the factories that produce textiles, paper, food, rubber, shoes, ceramics, and cement. Livestock raising is considered the occupation of choice for the prisoners as it gives them the chance to steal animal food and pick through animal droppings for undigested grains.

Witnesses have reported that prisoners interned in the camp are required to work for long periods, often from 5:30 to midnight.{{cite web|author=Yang Jung A|url=http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataId=nk02500&num=2313|title=My Mother is Executed. Yet I am not sad.|publisher=Daily NK|date=2007-07-03|access-date=2012-12-10}} Even 11-year-old children have to work after school and thus rarely see their parents.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/09/world/asia/09iht-korea.4.6569853.html?pagewanted=2&_r=2|work=The New York Times|first=Choe|last=Sang-Hun|title=Born and raised in a North Korean gulag|date=July 9, 2007}} Other reports describe prisoners being beaten and severely punished for minor infractions.{{cite news|work=60 Minutes Overtime|author=Anderson Cooper|url=http://www.cbsnews.com/news/un-witness-describes-horrors-of-north-korea|title=UN witness describes horrors of North Korea (Anderson Cooper's remarkable interview with Shin Dong-hyuk, who was born in "Camp 14", a North Korean gulag described in a UN Human Rights report)|date=February 18, 2014}}{{cite web|author=Shin Dong-Hyuk|url=http://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/book-11162008180959.html/extracts-11192008085805.html|title="A Glimpse of Horror", Radio Free Asia|date=December 1, 2008|publisher=Radio Free Asia|access-date=2012-12-07}}

Food rations are scant, consisting of salted cabbage and corn. The prisoners are emaciated; they lose their teeth, and their gums blacken. Many die of malnourishment, illness, work accidents, and the after-effects of torture. Many prisoners resort to eating frogs, insects, rats, snakes, and even cannibalism in order to try to survive. Eating rat flesh helps prevent pellagra, a common disease in the camp resulting from the absence of protein and niacin in the diet. In order to eat anything outside of the prison-sanctioned meal, including these animals, prisoners must first get permission from the guards.

In his official biography Escape from Camp 14 by Blaine Harden, Shin Dong-hyuk claimed that he was born in the camp and lived there until escaping in his early twenties. In 2015, Shin recanted some of this story.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/prominent-n-korean-defector-shin-dong-hyuk-admits-parts-of-story-are-inaccurate/2015/01/17/fc69278c-9dd5-11e4-bcfb-059ec7a93ddc_story.html|author=Anna Fifield|title=Prominent N. Korean defector Shin Dong-hyuk admits parts of story are inaccurate|newspaper=Washington Post|date=17 January 2015}} Shin told Harden that he had changed some dates and locations and incorporated some "fictive elements" into his account. Harden outlined these revisions in a new foreword but did not revise the entire book. Shin said that he did not spend his entire North Korean life at Camp 14. Though maintaining that he was born there, he stated that, when he was young, his family was transferred to the less severe Camp 18, and spent several years there. He said that he was tortured in Camp 14 in 2002, as punishment for escaping from Camp 18.{{cite web|url=http://www.blaineharden.com/|title=A new Foreword to Escape from Camp 14|work=blaineharden.com|author=Harden, Blaine|date=2015}}{{cite web |url=http://www.nknews.org/2015/03/author-of-book-on-north-koreas-founding-addresses-shin-controversy/ |title=Author of book on North Korea's founding addresses Shin controversy |work=NK News|author=John Power |date=March 18, 2015}}

Kim Yong (1995–1996 in Kaechon, then in Bukchang) was imprisoned after it was revealed that the two men who were executed as alleged US spies were his father and brother. He witnessed approximately 25 executions in his section of the camp within less than two years.{{cite web|title=The Hidden Gulag – Exposing Crimes against Humanity in North Korea's Vast Prison System (pp. 51-52)|work=The Committee for Human Rights in North Korea|url=http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|access-date=April 25, 2012|archive-date=March 13, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150313045221/http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|url-status=dead}}

• Camp 14: Total Control Zone
• Human rights in North Korea
• Kaechon concentration camp
• Prisons in North Korea
• Pukchang concentration camp
• Slavery
• Yodok concentration camp

{{reflist|30em}}

• {{cite book|author=Blaine Harden|title=Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West|publisher=Viking|date=March 29, 2012|type=HC (hardcover)|isbn=978-0670023325}}

• [http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/CoIDPRK/Pages/ReportoftheCommissionofInquiryDPRK.aspx United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights] – Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
• [https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa24/001/2011/en/ North Korea: Political Prison Camps] - Amnesty International document on conditions in North Korean prison camps (May 2011).
• {{cite web|website=HRNK.org|url=http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|title=Committee for Human Rights in North Korea – Overview on North Korean Prison Camps with Testimonies and Satellite Photographs|access-date=2012-09-14|archive-date=2015-03-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150313045221/http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf|url-status=dead}}
• {{cite web|website=NorthKoreanRefugees.com|date=September 2007|url=http://www.northkoreanrefugees.com/2007-09-atbirth.htm|title=Life Funds for North Korean Refugees (NGO): Political prisoner Shin Dong-hyuk tells about his life in the camp}}
• {{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/09/world/asia/09iht-korea.4.6569853.html|title=Born and raised in a North Korean gulag|work=The New York Times|date=July 7, 2007}}
• {{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/10/AR2008121003855.html |title=Escapee Tells of Horrors in North Korean Prison Camp|newspaper= Washington Post|date=December 11, 2008}}
• {{cite web|website=Eng.NKHumanRights.or.kr|url=http://eng.nkhumanrights.or.kr/board/bbs_list.php?board_table=bbs_evidence|title=Citizens' Alliance for North Korean Human Rights|access-date=2010-04-15|archive-date=2011-07-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721171956/http://eng.nkhumanrights.or.kr/board/bbs_list.php?board_table=bbs_evidence|url-status=dead}} Witness accounts by North Korean refugees
• {{cite news|url=http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataId=nk00100&num=2051|title=Escape from 'Total Control Zone' - North Korea's Papillon|work=Daily NK|date=May 11, 2007|access-date=April 15, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716084531/http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataId=nk00100&num=2051|archive-date=July 16, 2011|url-status=dead}}
• {{cite web|url=http://freekorea.us/camps/14-18|title=One Free Korea: Camps 14 and 18, North Korea: Satellite Imagery|website=FreeKorea.us}} Detailed satellite images with comprehensive explanations

{{coord|39.571086|N|126.055466|E|region:KP-PYN_type:landmark|format=dms|display=title }}

{{Political prison camps of North Korea}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaechon Internment Camp}}

Category:Concentration camps in North Korea

Category:Incidents of cannibalism

Category:Kaechon

Category:Government buildings completed in 1965