North Korea’s 10,000 students turn themselves in to seek sentence reduction for violating ban on watching South Korean drama

The streets of Pyongyang, North Korea, on April 27 amid an epidemic

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un recently instructed to pay more attention to the mindset and dress of young people and to increase the punishment for watching South Korean movies and plays, as more than 10,000 students have surrendered to the authorities for a reduced sentence, North Korean sources said.

South Korean media reported on April 28, citing North Korean sources, that a recent directive sent to the Labor Party committees of North Korean cities and provinces mentioned that 10,000 students in one city surrendered to watch “illegal images” and surrendered more than 5,000 DVD players at the end of last year.

In December last year, North Korea amended the “reactionary ideological and cultural background law”, which makes those who spread South Korean images punishable by death and those who watch them by 15 years in prison, officially declaring war on the “Korean Wave”.

The report said that the North Korean authorities are offering severe punishment to offenders, but at the same time encouraging people to turn themselves in by saying “surrender is not a crime”, probably because they consider that strengthening the control and punishment mechanism alone is not enough to eradicate the Korean Wave that is spreading vigorously among the people. The source also said that if there are 10,000 people who have turned themselves in, there must be more who have not.

According to the Central News Agency, foreign economic sanctions, coronavirus epidemic and natural disasters are all unfavorable factors that accelerate the unrest among the North Korean people. The North Korean government has therefore tightened its control over the people’s thoughts, especially for the young group who aspire to foreign culture and are less loyal to the party. In early April, Kim Jong-un said in a meeting of the Workers’ Party that “the issue of youth upbringing is a matter of life and death for the party, the revolution, the motherland and the people,” and asked the party’s cadres to take a closer look at everything from the clothing of young people to their words and actions.