- .North Koreans face execution for link with Christian missionary - Kim Jung-wook
- .Kim Jong-un is combating a wave of dissatisfaction against his "juche" doctrine and repressive regime
- .No end to his brutality - having previously killed his Uncle Jang Song-Thaek and other top officials close to him
Thirty-three North Koreans face execution after being charged with attempting to overthrow the repressive regime of Kim Jong-un.
The Koreans have landed themselves in hot water after it emerged they had worked with South Korean Baptist missionary Kim Jung-wook and received money to set up 500 underground churches. It is understood they will be put to death in a cell at the State Security Department.
The Koreans have landed themselves in hot water after it emerged they had worked with South Korean Baptist missionary Kim Jung-wook and received money to set up 500 underground churches. It is understood they will be put to death in a cell at the State Security Department.
Experts believe the North Koreans are being punished more harshly than usual as North Korean leader Kim Jong-un combats a wave of dissatisfaction at the regime's isolationist "juche" doctrine.
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Sorry: Kim Jung Wook, a South Korean Baptist missionary, says he is sorry for his 'anti-state crimes'
Interrogated: The missionary speaks under the portrait of late leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il during a news conference in Pyongyang
Missionary Kim Jung-wook was arrested and jailed last year for allegedly trying to establish underground churches. Last week he held a press conference at which he apologized for committing "anti-state" crimes and appealed for his release from North Korean custody.
He told reporters that he was arrested in early October after entering the North from China and trying to make his way to Pyongyang with Bibles, Christian instructional materials and movies.
Kim Jung-wook said he had received assistance from South Korea's intelligence agency.
"I was thinking of turning North Korea into a religious country, and destroying its present government and political system," he said at the time.
"I received money from the intelligence services and followed instructions from them, and arranged North Koreans to act as their spies. And I also set up an underground church in China, in Dandong, and got the members to talk and write, for me to collect details about the reality of life in North Korea, and I provided this to the intelligence services."
A South Korean intelligence source in China took issue with Kim's account, saying that the missionary did not enter North Korea voluntarily, but was kidnapped by agents of the Pyongyang government in China.
During Kim Jung-wook's press conference, North Korean officials also showed video of North Koreans who confessed to coming into contact with the missionary.
The North Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo reported that they said that Kim told them to build a church on the site where a massive statue of North Korea's founder, Kim Il-Sung, stands in Pyongyang whenever the regime falls.
North Korea continues to hold Korean-American missionary Kenneth Bae, who was detained while leading a group on a tour of North Korea in 2012 and later sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. Bae was moved to a hospital last summer in poor health, but said at the news conference that he was being transferred back to prison.
All smiles: Kim Jong Un (right), smiles with Vice Marshal and Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission Choe Ryong Hae (centre) and Vice Marshal and the military's General Staff Chief Ri Yong Ho in 2012
Treachery: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Choe Ryong Hae pictured in July last year, before rumours of a disappearance surfaced
Kim Jong Un is fast gaining a reputation for brutality and destroying those closest to him.
Yesterday there were reports that North Korea's number two leader Choe Ryong Hae's had disappeared and there are fears that he is the lastest to be purged.
Choe is said to have displeased the leader by taking management of several state-owned industries. It is understood that Choe is in jail and being interrogated.
Choe held several top positions in the North Korean leadership after Kim ordered the high-profile execution of Jang Song Thaek, the previous incumbent and Kim's uncle and mentor.
Kim's uncle Jang, 67, was executed in December, after being accused of plotting to overthrow the communist regime.
Jang was married to Kim Kyong Hui, Kim's aunt and former leader Kim Jong-Il's sister and was killed by firing squad.
It has since been claimed that members of his uncle's family were rounded up by the dozen following his arrest and subsequent death in December.
Jang Song-Thaek's children, brothers and grandchildren were condemned to death, according to media reports in South Korea.
As well as his uncle, other high-ranking members of the military have been purged by Kim Jong-Un, including three defence ministers and three chiefs of the army's general staff.
Kim Chol, the vice minister of the army, was reportedly put to death in October 2012 by soldiers firing mortar rounds at him.
In August last year, members of a female musical group, Unhasu Orchestra - which included the dictator's ex-girlfriend - were reportedly publicly machine-gunned apparently for watching pornography and filming themselves naked.
There are said to have been between 40 to 80 public mass executions in North Korea in 2013.
Executed: Jang Song Thaek, previously considered the second most powerful man in the secretive state, is seen with his hands tied with a rope as he is dragged into the court by uniformed personnel shortly before his death
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