North Korea Sentences Family To Life In Prison For Bible Possession

(AmericanProsperity.com) – The US International Religious Freedom Report 2022 revealed on Monday that a 2-year-old boy and his family were jailed for life in North Korea for having a Bible. This situation highlights North Korean tyranny’s crackdown on religious freedom, which has been a common practice in most communist regimes. Political analysts have explained these regimes persecute religious people because they believe that the state and the “Supreme Leader” are the only gods.

The report states that over 70,000 Christians and people from other faiths are currently imprisoned in North Korea after suffering religious persecution. In the report, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that Pyongyang keeps denying the right to “freedom of thought” and religion. He added that the communist regime of tyrant Kim Jong Un has committed many crimes on this matter, as it fails to tolerate any belief system.

The United Nations said that COVID restrictions represented a great opportunity for the North Korean regime to increase its censorship. The intergovernmental organization added that these restrictions reduced information about religious persecution and made it impossible to verify.

As reported by the US State Department, the agency confirmed reports from the UN, along with human rights groups and even non-government organizations. Some of these reports revealed there are currently a small number of religious institutions in North Korea, almost exclusively in Pyongyang. However, the reports claim that these institutions are fully controlled by the state and only exist “as showpieces” for foreigners who visit the country.

The State Department said that North Korean defectors told some of its officials that the persecution of religious people is a common practice. Some defectors even revealed that the regime encourages people to report those who practice any religion or show religious material like the Bible.

Some of these defectors also told the department there are many Christians in North Korea. However, they said these people hide their religious activity because they fear they might get reported to authorities and face legal consequences in the country.