North Korea turns China border into gun-packed killzone with fanatic guards every 160ft & impassable fences, pics show
NORTH Korea has turned its border with China into a killzone manned by fanatical guards in posts every 160ft, satellite pictures show.
Chilling new images show how the secretive ‘Hermit Kingdom’ run by brutal dictator Kim Jong-un has used the Covid pandemic to beef up security.
Human Rights Watch have analysed pictures taken by Maxar Technologies and the campaigners say the measures have sealed the border with its neighbour.
“Kim Jong-un has been using the pandemic to further seal North Korea off from the world,” said Lina Yoon from the campaign group.
The 800 mile long border with China is the main route for defectors looking to escape the repressive country and also for smugglers.
Compared to the border with South Korea – the world’s most heavily fortified frontier – it was relatively lightly defended.
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But that has now changed and there are now more guard posts, which stand every 160ft, to supplement watchtowers just under a mile apart.
North Korean border guards have shoot to kill orders for dealing with defectors and smugglers.
In the 4.6 miles around Hoeryong city on the Tumen River – the investigation shows that five watch towers have been increased to 169 guard posts since 2019.
Extra fences have also been added and the road border guards patrol along has been widened.
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North Korea should have spent the money improving the lives of its impoverished population, says Yoon.
“The government should redirect its energies to improving access to food, vaccines, and medicine, and respecting freedom of movement and other rights.”
She says the regime wants to control the supply of food in the country.
“But as North Koreans know from the past, solely state-run distribution of food and essential goods only entrenches repression and can lead to famine and other catastrophes,” she said.
North Korea imposed strict Covid controls in January 2020, which it claimed was needed to control the virus but the effect has been to stop cross-border trade.
That’s resulted in severe shortages of food and medicine in the already desperately poor country.
A North Korean who reportedly tested positive for coronavirus was shot while trying to escape across the border back in 2020.
A Chinese border guard shot the defector as he tried to cross the Tumen River, Daily NK reported, citing a source in China.
North and South Korea are divided by a Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) which is the de facto barrier that divides the Korean Peninsula roughly in half.
It was created by agreement between North Korea, China and the United Nations in 1953 and is 160 miles long and about 2.5 miles wide.
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Much of the border, one of the world's most dangerous flashpoints, is strewn with landmines and laced with barbed wire.
