I Want to Study : The Reality of School Life in North Korea

Recently, North Korea has been promoting the adoption of the Childcare Law(2022) as a “model example of human rights protection” in the international community, with the state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun declaring that “childcare benefits are available even in remote mountainous areas,” while advertising that North Korea respects children’s human rights.

However, to truly understand the human rights situation in North Korea, we must pay attention to the human rights violations hidden behind such distorted propaganda.

I was born in North Korea and lived there for 15 years before defecting and settling in South Korea, where I have now lived for 9 years. I would like to share the everyday human rights violations I experienced during my student years.

During my school years, my home and school were my entire world. That vast yet narrow world tormented me every day, like the alarm sound set to go off every 10 minutes, constantly reminding me of my helplessness.

In North Korea, schools impose all management costs, such as maintenance fees, facility upkeep, and teachers’ salaries, on students. If students are unable to pay these fees, they face corporal punishment or bullying in the classroom. Teachers forcibly collect these fees from students, and those who cannot pay experience immense shame. Ultimately, all of this burden falls on the parents, and if they are unable to bear the costs, the students cannot endure the humiliation and pressure and choose to drop out.

In North Korean schools, violence and corporal punishment are routine. If a student is unable to pay, teachers indiscriminately beat the student with a stick, striking their hands, buttocks, thighs, and calves. These acts of violence inflict both physical and psychological trauma on young students, amounting to child abuse. However, the problem is that in North Korea, there is no recognition of child abuse, and violence against children is accepted as a natural part of life.

North Korean students spend more time holding a shovel and pickaxe than they do studying. During their study hours, they are forced into labor. Whether it’s disaster recovery, mobilizing for farming, or collecting scrap metal, students are deployed for various types of forced labor. I was brainwashed by repetitive ideological education in North Korea and didn’t question the forced mobilization, thinking it was simply a natural part of life. However, after coming to South Korea, I realized that schools are meant to be places for students to receive an education, and that North Korea’s forced mobilization deprives students of their academic opportunities and rights, constituting a violation of human rights.

More than 70 years have passed since the division of South and North Korea. While South Korea has rapidly developed, North Korea remains stuck in the past. In a world where AI is replacing human labor, North Korea still blocks access to the internet and is isolated from the outside world, leaving its people living in the 1950s. There is no freedom of movement, and even within North Korea, people cannot travel freely. Those who criticize Kim Jong un are either sent to political prison camps or executed, and their families face reprisals. Young students who want to study are forced to drop out of school because they lack money, and they are subjected to forced labor. In this way, North Korea, with no regard for human rights, continues to deceive the world by promoting human rights on the international stage. I strongly urge the international community to continue to pay attention, so that North Korean students can study freely without any other worries.