Yodŏk (also romanized Yodeok, Yodok, or Yoduk) is a concentration camp in North Korea. It is located in Yodŏk-gun County in South Hamgyong Province. The official name is Kwan-li-so (reeducation center) No. 15. In the 1990s, an estimated 30,000 prisoners were in the lifetime area, and around 16,500 prisoners in the revolutionizing zone (many of them family members of prisoners and people repatriated by means of kidnapping or other forceful means from Japan, South Korea or China).
Yodŏk camp has a lifetime-imprisonment "total-control zone", but also "revolutionizing zones", from which prisoners are sometimes released. That is why there are testimonies by refugees about Yodŏk.
Structure
The encampment is surrounded by a barbed-wire fence measuring 3 to 4 meters and walls 2 to 3 meters tall topped with electrical wire. The fence is studded with watchtowers, and is patrolled by 1,000 guards armed with automatic rifles, hand grenades, and guard dogs.
Labor operations at the Kuŭp-ri section of Yodŏk include a gypsum quarry and a re-opened gold mine, where some 800 men work. There were also textile plants, distilleries, and a coppersmith workshop.
Both revolutionizing areas have public executions by hanging and shootings for prisoners who had tried to escape or who had been caught “stealing” food. In at least one case, an attempted escapee was tied and dragged behind a car in front of the assembled prisoners until dead.
Accounts from former prisoners
Kang Chol-hwan, a prisoner from 1977 to 1987, estimates around 4% of prisoners in the Kuŭp-ri revolutionizing zone died per year, mostly because of malnutrition and disease. Although complete families (including children) were imprisoned based on the claimed guilt of one member, any sexual contact between prisoners is not allowed and pregnancies are forcibly aborted. Guards, however, sexually abuse female prisoners, who are then punished if they fall pregnant. Kang described life in Yodŏk camp in the book The Aquariums of Pyongyang.
The family of Oh Kil-nam, an economist who defected to North Korea in 1985 with his wife Shin Suk-ja and their two daughters, but then fled to Europe alone before defecting back to South Korea, are believed to be held at Yodok. Kang Chol-hwan and An Hyuk claim to have had contact with them while they were imprisoned there.
Lee Young-kuk, a prisoner from 1995 to 1999, estimates that around 20% of prisoners in the Taesuk-ri revolutionizing zone died per year, while new prisoners arrived each month. As cells were not heated, most prisoners suffered from frostbitten ears and swollen legs during the winter months.
In 2004, a Japanese television station aired what it said was footage showing scenes from the camp.
In 2008, a new documentary, "Yodok Stories", by Andrzej Fidyk came out, telling a story of a small group of people that have managed to escape from Yodŏk camp.
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The life in Yoduk, Part 1
Uploaded by Teemsejin on Jun 11, 2009
The woman in the video who fled North Korea testifies about the life at Yoduk Prision in North Korea.
There are only a few surviving North Korean defectors in the world who escaped to North Korea sucessfully.
This video is produced by AIMS Korea.
POR: YOUTUBE Y WIKIPEDIA
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