Images show N Korea sealing its border with China

North Korea has used the Covid-19 pandemic to seal up its northern border with China, new images show. Human Rights Watch (HRW) describes a situation which has seen repression. The border was only reopened a few months ago, largely to improve trade with China. UN member states should immediately address North Korea’s humanitarian crisis, HRW says.

Satellite images show 482km (299 miles) of new fencing in the areas investigated. Another 260km of fencing which was already in place was also enhanced. Images also detail things like new guard posts and the creation of buffer zones. The images were taken between 2019 and 2023 and cover about a quarter of its northern border.

One escapee, who spoke to her relative back home, said rice and wheat could no longer be smuggled into the country. Not even an ant can make it across the border now, her relative told her. Lina Yoon, senior Korea researcher at HRW, said North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un should end the policies. The crackdown has also stopped the flow of cash from people in South Korea to their relatives and contacts in the North.

HRW estimated that by the start of 2023, only about one in 10 money brokers were able to send money across. The toll UN sanctions, imposed on Pyongyang in 2017 following nuclear tests, have had on people. Sanctions had an especially hard impact on women, the main breadwinners in most households. One former trader who had been in contact with relatives in North Korea said a relative used to catch squid and crabs, and was able to live off the informal trade with China.

Because of Covid-19 and the sanctions, this trade was stopped.

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