Latest Reports

Digital Hostages: Internet Freedom in North Korea

This report examines the state of internet freedom in North Korea, shedding light on the limited access to information, suppression of free expression, and the government's overarching control over online activities.
English

Human Rights in the DPRK: 10 years after COI

10 years later we revisit the report made by the United Nations Comission of Inquiry and take a look at the current human rights situation in the DPRK
English | Korean

PSCORE Reports

Deepen your knowledge

We provide data and testimonies for public use. Through interviews with North Korean defectors living in South Korea, we provide reports to our reader with a unique perspective that can only be found here at PSCORE. Feel free to take part of our reports!

In the year 2014, the UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) on human rights in the DPRK concluded that human rights abuses were still occurring on a structural level extending into all aspects of life. North Koreans are under extensive control of the government when using the Internet and individual digital devices, which is unimaginable for most people as in this new digital world the Internet has become a part of people’s daily lives.
English | Korean

During the first half of 2019, there were over 33,000 defectors in South Korea. We are currently living in a time when, while the Korean Peninsula is still divided, the chances of meeting a North Korean are high. If that is the case, are we capable of communicating with them with no problems?
English | Korean

This report deeply focuses on the omnipresent forms of abuse (physical, sexual, psychological) and neglect perpetrated on children in North Korea and how it affects their future.
English | Korean

A piece on how North and South Koreans view one another and the efforts and hardships encountered by both to reach an understanding of each other.
English | Korean

Sexual violence has risen in importance as a social issue. However, Sexual violence happens all too often in North Korea.
English | Korean

A local plane was hijacked en route to Seoul in 1969. 11 of those that were on the plane remain missing. These people deserve the collective efforts of the international community and the South Korean government to be rescued. English | French

Read about North Korea's education system, child labor, and child abuse.
English | Korean |
Français | Russian

This report exposes how the North Korean education system violates human rights and proposes how to approach changes for North Korea's education system.
English | Korean

This compilation of testimonies covers a wide range of the daily life in North Korea such as school and prison camps through collective farms and military services.
English | Korean

This report focuses on the different types of arduous labor children must face within and outside the education system.
English | Korean

This report covers Human Rights abuses committed by the North Korean authorities in the territory of the Democratic People Republic of Korea over the course of the last decade.
English

This report focuses on the violation of human rights for workers who leave North Korea to work abroad.

English

This paper is a review of PSCORE's ten-year journey since its founding by Mr. Kim Young II in 2006.
English

This book discusses the human rights violations that occur in North Korea, a nation widely known for its nuclear tests, hereditary dictatorship, and communism.
English | Korean

Read about North Korea's customs and human rights violations concerning: education, food, labour, economy, media, culture, people politics as well as crime and punishment.
English | Korean

The Korean War 1950-1953

To expand your knowledge, we have made a list of recommendations for you with a variety of books, movies, documentaries, and TEDTalks that cover different aspects of North Korea and its history as well as defectors’ personal experiences. Why not familiarize yourself with how it all started during the Korean War between 1950-1953? Don’t forget to download and read our reports as well to deepen your knowledge further.

TEDTalk: Defectors' Stories

Documentaries

The Story of Us

Morgan Freeman has recently released a great documentary “The Story of Us”, the first episode of which covers a North Korean defector’s story. You can find the trailer here – make sure to watch it on Netflix!

Inside North Korea

My Hometown Means the Sea: A North Korean Defector

North Korea - Mind Blowing Games

Movie Recommendations

Crossing

Yong-Soo (Cha In-Pyo) lives in a small coal-mine village in North Korea with his wife and young son. Although living in extreme poverty, the family is happy just to be with each other. Then one day, Yong-Soo’s pregnant wife becomes critically ill. Let alone medicine, Yong-soo can’t even find food for her in North Korea. So he secretly crosses the borders of China hoping to find the medicine for his wife

48m

Located on the border between North Korea and China, the Amnok River, or Yalu River in Chinese, separates the two countries by just 48 meters. “48m” captures the devastating circumstances that drive North Koreans to escape as well as what happens when they get caught. The film is co-produced and financed by a group of North Korean defectors.

Apostle

In a small North Korean village near the border of China, there are believers who get together in an underground church, away from the eyes of the persecuting government. When the missionary from China, their only support route, is cut off, things begin to get very tense.

Over the Border

Kim Sun-ho is a horn player for the Mansoodae Art Company, Pyongyang's state orchestra. He comes from a well-to-do family in North Korea and is about to marry his sweetheart, War Memorial guide Lee Yeon-hwa. One day, Sun-ho's family receives a letter from his grandfather in Seoul, whom they had thought was dead.

 

A North Korean fisherman breaks his boat by accident and floats to South Korea. After going through violent interrogations in the south he is repatriated back to North Korea.

Book Recommendations

By Park Yeonmi

The real story of Park Yeonmi who escaped with her mother in 2007 at 13, only to be sold as a slave in China, before she could finally reach South Korea in 2009.

By Barbara Demick

Award-winning journalist Barbara Demick follows the lives of six North Korean citizens over fifteen years, witnessing the death of Kim Il-sung, the rise to power of his son Kim Jong-il, and a devastating famine that killed one-fifth of the population.

By Kang Chol-Hwan and Pierre Rigoulot

A true story of a North Korean defector, Kang Chol-Hwan, who came from a privileged family in Pyongyang but was imprisoned at the age of 9 for a crime his grandfather had – supposedly – committed.

By Lee Hyeonseo

In her memoirs, Lee Hyeonseo tells the story of her escape to China, and the struggles she faced when trying to adapt to a “free” life, and when crossing the border again to help her family escape.

By Young-Sook Moon

This book tells the fictional-yet-very close to reality story of Yeong-dae, who loses both his parents during the famine and sets off on a desperate journey to China to find his sister.

By Bandi

The manuscript of seven short stories was smuggled out of North Korea in 2014; the author, who still lives there, tells through fiction the daily lives of North Koreans.