Kim Jong-un executes four party officials, two pimps over vice ring offering sex with top varsity students
North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un ordered public execution of at least six people for their alleged involvement in a high-class prostitution ring that sold top university students for sex in karaoke bars and baths, according to reports. Four party officials in North Korea were among the defendants who were caught in the vice ring involving female students.
The said six people were reportedly executed by firing squad last month in Pyongyang, according to news site Radio Free Asia. "They were accused of buying sex or pimping in a network of paid trysts between officials and students at a high-end public bathhouse patronized by the city’s elites," the outlet revealed. "I was at the scene of the public execution and saw four Pyongyang party officials and two pimps being executed for organized prostitution. This particular case involved long-term organized prostitution for officials, using karaoke rooms at Munsuwon, located in Tongdaewon district."
“Many people, especially party officials and policymakers in Pyongyang are involved in this case," the outlet added. "The head of Munsuwon and even famous movie stars conspired to arrange sexual encounters with the Central Committee and other party officials, offering female students in their 20s a side job with guaranteed pay of more than $500 per month. The women involved are college students in their early to mid-20s attending the Pyongyang University of Music and Dance, or the Pyongyang University of Dramatic and Cinematic Arts."
The prostitution racket was exposed as multiple students expressed shock after they learned what their jobs entailed and alerted the police, a source told the outlet.The source also added that Kim became enraged after learning that students from his favorite schools were becoming involved in the sex trade. "He appears to have ordered the execution by shooting," they said.
Prostitution is illegal in North Korea. However, it is generally tolerated with occasional crackdowns on similar rings. Reports state that authorities, however, sometimes extract bribe from those caught in the act. Prostitution, according to North Korean law, carries a sentence of one to five years of hard labor. “There have been many cases of prostitution in Pyongyang recently, but no one has been shot to death over it,” the source said. “It seems to be that because central officials and college students are involved, the authorities wanted to make an example through public execution.”
The news comes days after it was reported that leading officials in North Korea were cracking down on dog ownership in the region among its elite class as food supplies run short in the hermit nation. Pyongyang chiefs have made the move in an effort to appease citizens of North Korea who are furious about the current situation. The decision of a clampdown on pet ownership is also said to be a move made against capitalist "decadence", reports state. An insider reportedly told a right-wing South Korean newspaper that Kim Jong-un issued a ban on pet ownership last month citing that it stemmed from "tainted" capitalist ideology.
"Authorities have identified households with pet dogs and are forcing them to give up or forcefully confiscating them and putting them down," the source told The Chosun Ilbo. Reports state that some of the dogs seized from pet owners would be sent to state-run zoos, while the other would be given to restaurants.The publication also reported that pet owners in the country are "cursing Kim Jong-un behind his back", as the source said that "ordinary people raise pigs and livestock on their porches, but high-ranking officials and the wealthy pet dogs, which stoked some resentment”. One defector, while talking to the outlet, said that the clampdowns are not enforced with much enthusiasm. However, it has been more strict this time around.