North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un

NORTH KOREA: 5 EXECUTED FOR AIDING AND ABETTING ESCAPES

December 28, 2015: Authorities in North Korea’s Yanggang Province back in September executed five residents for aiding the escape of others from the country. A Daily NK source reported that the province’s state security officials carried out the executions to set an example, as its stricter surveillance and control on the border had failed to reduce the number of those escaping the country. 
“People have belatedly learned that five individuals were executed by shooting mid-September in Hyesan for helping people defect,” the source from Yanggang Province reported. “They’re building walls and fences along the border, but the number of people escaping hasn't really dropped neither has those who are helping them. So the execution was to try to set an example.” 
Two additional sources residing in Yanggang Province corroborated this news. 
The five who were executed were a couple in Hyesan’s Kanggu who ran a kindergarten, a woman in her 40s who lived in Songbong-dong 16-ban, and another couple in Kangan-dong 47-ban who worked as smugglers, according to the source, who described all the victims as being “very social” and “independent people who tried to make ends meet with their own businesses.” 
“In the final sentencing, each person was found guilty of aiding some 80 people in their escapes, but most people say the numbers were overstated,” she asserted. People say it would almost be impossible for the five of them to have helped nearly 400 residents flee, and that officials wrongfully used a tally of all those unaccounted for on the resident registry. 
Locals in the area have criticized the execution as an unjust ruling, noting the likelihood that officials used forced confessions that greatly embellished the figures. They also believe with most of those involved working in trade or business, they would have ended up helping some people in the process of their work, but that gave authorities an excuse to take things to the extreme. 
“A relative who works in law enforcement told me that the Yanggang branch of the State Security Department launched a campaign in September to weed out those who had helped people defect ahead of the 70th Party Foundation Day anniversary in order to produce results,” the source explained. 
“They stepped up surveillance around Kangan-dong, Kanggu-dong, and Songbong-dong, where smuggling is most prevalent, so people there became targets. To put it mildly, those five were just exceedingly unlucky.” (Sources: dailynk.com, 28/12/2015)