North Korea women suffer serious sexual abuse but no ‘MeToo’
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korean refugees say sexual violence against women in their former homeland is part of daily life. But a new report suggests there’s little chance that abused women in the North will get to say “MeToo” anytime soon.
North Korea’s extremely patriarchal society means many women feel powerless to demand accountability over sexual violence, many are also ashamed of being abused, and some choose to keep silent because of flimsy law enforcement and support systems, according to a report published Thursday by New Yorkbased Human Rights Watch based on interviews with 106 North Koreans who left the country, more than half of them after 2011.
Three women who left North Korea and three South Korean experts, separately interviewed by The Associated Press, agreed that sexual violence is a serious problem in the North, though the voices and economic power of women have gradually increased in recent years because of their role in burgeoning capitaliststyle markets. Some said that North Korean women didn’t even understand that widespread assaults and harassment were abuse.
“Sexual violence in North Korea is an open, unaddressed and widely tolerated secret,” Kenneth Roth, Human Rights Watch’s executive director, said in a statement. “North Korean woman would probably say ‘MeToo’ if they thought there was any way to obtain justice, but their voices are silenced in Kim Jong Un’s dictatorship.”
The report comes as U.S.-led global diplomacy focuses on North Korean nuclear disarmament. The country’s abysmal human rights status, however, has been largely ignored. It’s not the first outside documentation of sexual violence in North Korea, but the report will likely anger North Korea, which often complains about what it claims is persistent U.S. hostility.
Kim’s propaganda service has called North Korea a “socialist paradise” and bristles at outside criticism of its rights conditions as a U.S.-led attempt to force regime change. A 2016 dispatch said every woman in the North is “highly valued and respected” and that they “all can lead a worthwhile life as a heroine of the times.” But this is also the country that called former female South Korean President Park Geunhye a “prostitute.”
According to the report, titled “You Cry at Night but Don’t Know Why,” and the six people reached by the AP, sexual violence targeting women is rampant in North Korea. They say it happens in detention facilities, open markets, checkpoints, trains, streets and army bases.
The report details sexual abuse by men in official positions of power, such as prison guards, police officers, prosecutors, soldiers and market supervisors.