Death penalty for saying ‘oppa’?: It’s possible in N. Korea – Seoul

People walk on a street outside a department store in Pyongyang on May 29.PHOTO: AFP

PYONGYANG – North Korea has strengthened its law to control foreign cultural influences by increasing the severity of criminal punishments against the spread of “anti-socialist culture”, going so far as to impose the death penalty, South Korea’s Ministry of Justice said on May 30.

According to the ministry, which recently analyzed North Korea’s revised Criminal Act, North Korea expanded the scope of the death penalty to special criminal laws regarding drug crimes, reactionary ideology and culture, including from South Korea, dubbed Hallyu, or the Korean Wave.

Seoul explained that North Korea’s recent revision stemmed from the view that it perceives the influx of South Korean culture, like popular use of the term “oppa”, as a possible threat to the regime.

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“Oppa” is a term used by South Korean women when they address not only an older male sibling, but also an older male who belongs to the same community or one’s romantic partner.

While North Korea restricts the usage of “oppa” to its original usage meaning older brother, a growing number of North Korean people in their 20s and 30s have started using “oppa” in the South Korean way, according to the Justice Ministry.

The explanation was part of the government’s comprehensive commentaries on North Korea’s Criminal Act revisions in December 2023, analyzing all 329 articles of the law.

While increasing the number of criminal offenses eligible for the death penalty from 11 to 16, North Korea removed articles that previously included references to national reunification to reflect the changed nature of inter-Korean relations as “two hostile states”.

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Additional provisions have been introduced to strengthen the protection of national symbols by creating a new offense for damaging the national flag or emblem, according to the Justice Ministry.

It claimed that the revised criminal law included articles reflecting sanctions imposed by the international community as well.

“We hope that the analysis will serve as a foundation for future research, which is aimed to effectively address the integration of South and North Korea’s legal systems. The ministry will continue to make efforts to prepare for the unification of legal and institutional frameworks on the Korean Peninsula,” said the ministry.

The ministry stated that it did not only make explanations to the legal elements outlined in each article of North Korean Criminal Act, but also created comparative legal studies with the criminal laws of South Korea, Russia, China and Vietnam. /dl