North Korean leader Kim Jong Un
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un guides the launch of a Hwasong-12 missile in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on September 16, 2017. KCNA via Reuters

A defector who risked her life to escape North Korea has revealed the cruelty of Kim Jong Un. Hee Yeon Lim, whose father was a senior officer under the dictator, said she saw musicians executed and classmates turned into sex slaves.

Hee Yeon (not her real name) talked to the Mirror to reveal the horrors she personally witnessed from Kim’s regime. She led a relatively affluent life in Pyongyang with her family. Her father, Colonel Wui Yeon Lim, was a top official under the Korean People’s Army. When he died at 51 of alcohol problems five years ago, Hee Yeon, her mother and her younger brother escaped in a terrifying van trip to China. They smuggled to Laos before finally reaching South Korea. She left behind a boyfriend, who had no idea that her family was fleeing the oppressive country.

She considered her childhood normal but with the public restriction of only having adoration for the regime. Her father earned meagre salary but they had comfortable life because he accepted bribes. Yet despite their privilege, they were not immune to the horrible things happening all around them.

The public has to witness executions

She told the publication the time she saw the public murder of 11 North Korean musicians who were accused of making a pornographic video. Kim had just succeeded his late father, Kim Jong Il, as the supreme leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea when the musicians were publicly executed.

“We were ordered to leave our classes by security men and made to travel to the Military Academy in Pyongyang. There is a sports ground there, a kind of stadium. The musicians were brought out, tied up, hooded and apparently gagged so they could not make a noise, not beg for mercy or even scream,” Hee Yeon said. “What I saw that day made me sick in my stomach. There were lashed to the end of anti-aircraft guns.

“There were around 10,000 people ordered to watch that day and I was standing 200 feet from these victims. A gun was fired, the noise was deafening, absolutely terrifying, and the guns were fired one after the other. The musicians just disappeared each time the guns were fired into them. Their bodies were blown to bits, totally destroyed, blood and bits flying everywhere.”

Hee Yeon said the horror did not end there. The musicians’ bodies were totally desecrate, with military tanks running over them on the ground repeatedly to grind the remains until nothing was left. The display left her feeling sick.

Sex slaves for the supreme leader

Kim, whom Hee Yeon described as terrifying but “nothing god-like” as she was led to believe, apparently also took teenage girls from schools and turn them into his sex slaves. Hee Yeon said officials came to their schools and picked the “prettiest” girls who had “straight, good legs.” These girls were taught to serve Kim food like caviar and other delicacies, as well as how to massage him.

“Yes, they have to sleep with him and they cannot make a mistake or object because they could very easily simply disappear,” she said. When asked what would happen if the girls become pregnant, she answered, “Maybe the same.”

When Kim has finished with the girls, they are apparently discarded. However, they get to marry a high-ranking official. Kim is married to Ri Sol-ju, and they are believed to have three children together.

Fake female soldiers

When the rest of the world are provided with rare videos of soldier marching in Pyongyang, they may not be seeing actual soldiers. The female soldier parades were just a sham. Hee Yeon was just 19 when she was ordered out of class to appear in one of Kim’s military parades. She was forced to stop studying for six months and put through military drills for 12 hours a day so they could parade at the DPRK’s Party Foundation Day in 2010. She said they could not make the slightest mistake in their routine because they would be “severely punished.”

Kim Jong Un feels cornered

Kim and US President Donald Trump are currently involved in war of words, with both threatening to nuke the other. Hee Yeon said Kim “feels cornered,” and hence he is threatening war. “He is frightened his regime will end and he has nowhere to go,” she said, adding that he had to look strong.