North Korea censors sunglasses, weddings and slang – report

What exactly the punishment is for these infractions is unclear.

However, the crackdown on South Korean-made culture appears more severe.

A 2020 law made watching or distributing South Korean entertainment punishable by death.

This year’s report includes an account of a public execution which had earlier been revealed by the BBC, where a 22-year-old farmer was killed for listening to 70 songs, watching three films and distributing them.

It is thought to be the only account of an execution being carried out under the “reactionary ideology and culture rejection law” to emerge so far.

A video from earlier this year showed two teenagers being sentenced to hard labour for a similar crime.

The South Korean report has been released at a time of increasing tensions between the neighbouring countries.

The North has sent more than 2,000 balloons filled with rubbish across the border since last month – some of which were found to have parasites inside.

A meeting between Kim Jong Un and Russia’s Vladimir Putin last week has further strained relations.

It is notable, then, that this is only the second time the report has been released, despite having been compiled annually since 2018.

They were previously not released in order to avoid provoking North Korea.