North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un

NORTH KOREA: BUSINESSMAN EXECUTED FOR REFUSING TO BUY GOV’T BONDS

May 12, 2020:

The owner of mine shafts in a suburban area of Pyongyang who refused to buy government bonds was recently arrested and quietly executed, Daily NK has learned.
“The owner, a Mr. Lee, was arrested at the Laborer Hall in the Kangdong Area Coal-mining Complex on May 6 and executed soon after,” a source in North Korea told Daily NK on May 7.
In late April, Lee was called to a meeting with other mine shaft owners by the complex’s sales department director. Lee’s open refusal to purchase government bonds at this meeting was reportedly the reason why he was punished so harshly.
North Korea began requiring organizations requiring state funds to purchase raw materials or supplies in the country to use bonds instead of cash from April 20.
The source told Daily NK that the sales department director had called the meeting to echo calls by the government to “spend their dollars and participate in the national public bond purchasing plan.” While the other mine shaft owners quietly listened, Lee reportedly asked the director what would happen if he chose to “not buy any public bonds.”
The sales department director responded that the act would be considered “reactionary” because it would mean refusal to carry out party policy.
Lee responded sarcastically, asking in what way the “state” and the “complex” had helped him build up his mining business. His response led to a war of words between the two men. 
“The sales department director immediately reported the events of that day to the complex’s party committee. The committee convened a ‘security committee meeting’ that ended up reporting Lee to the Ministry of State Security [MSS],” the source said.
Security committee meetings are convened at the provincial, municipal and county levels to discuss and make decisions on urgent matters. Participants typically include the chairman of the relevant party committee, the chairman and vice-chairman of the local people’s committee and management-level security officials.
The MSS did not immediately take action against Lee. It was not until May 6 that agents from the security agency visited the complex, forced all the complex’s workers to gather in the facility’s Laborer Hall, and then arrested Lee in front of them for “verbal reactionism”. Lee was charged with “criticizing party policy” and he was immediately executed without trial or any other due process.
It is rare in North Korea for such a punishment to be meted out so quickly – and on the same day – as an arrest. North Korean authorities may have aimed to make Lee an example of what happens when business people refuse to take part in party policy.
“[Other] mine shaft owners appear to be accepting the [government’s] plans to have enterprises buy up public bonds, but they are complaining about it nonetheless,” the source said.
The state reportedly seized Lee’s mine shafts along with large cargo trucks Lee purchased with his own money. North Korean authorities also raided Lee’s home and seized his possessions while his wife and two children were sent to a prison camp.
According to the source, the family of Lee’s wife complained that the authorities did not give the wife a choice to divorce Lee, which is usually a choice offered by officials in such criminal cases.
“The mother of the wife is being detained at a police detention facility in Kangdong County for asking the authorities to send her to the same prison camp her daughter is in,” the source said, adding, “People are saying she may receive around six months of hard labor.”