For North Koreans, being sent to work abroad is often seen as a precious chance to earn money for their families while getting a rare glimpse of the outside world. But workers arriving in Russia find themselves working long hours in unbearable conditions, only to owe more than they make, researchers say in a new report.
They are among more than 100,000 North Korean nationals being exploited as part of a state-sponsored labor program that operates in 40 countries, according to Global Rights Compliance, an international human rights foundation based in The Hague.
Each year the North Korean program is estimated to generate $500 million in foreign currency revenue for the reclusive, nuclear-armed state, with workers spread across construction, textiles, medicine, information technology, food service and other industries. The practice also provides an economic boost for Russia, which faces a critical labor shortage more than four years into its war with Ukraine.
“Because of the ever-growing close ties between Russia and North Korea, it is concerning that this amount of money going into the regime is funding [North Korea’s] military ambition,” Yeji Kim, North Korea adviser at Global Rights Compliance, told NBC News on Tuesday.
North Korea officially denies the existence of forced labor, though it has been widely documented by the United Nations, the U.S. State Department and others.
The researchers spoke with 21 North Korean men who have worked or are working at construction sites in three Russian cities. Under what they described as constant surveillance, they are forced to work as long as 16 hours a day with virtually no days off, earning as little as $10 a month in wages after deductions are made and often ending up in debt.
“We’re living lives worse than cattle,” the report quotes a 50-year-old worker as saying.
According to the report, North Korean workers often don’t even know whom they’re working for after they are hired by Russian companies in violation of U.N. sanctions. Their passports are immediately confiscated and held by North Korean security officials in Russia, the report said.
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“The relative ease with which DPRK workers continue to be transferred into exploitative overseas labor arrangements should be deeply alarming,” said Lara Strangways, the head of business and human rights at Global Rights Compliance, using the initialism for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
“It reveals not only the durability of the DPRK’s overseas labor model,” she said, “but also the weakness of current enforcement and accountability measures.”
Living conditions are described as dire, with workers living in unheated, overcrowded containers infested with cockroaches and bedbugs and limited to one or two showers a year.
Those working in Russia must meet an “actively rising” mandatory monthly quota — typically around $700 — which is paid directly to the North Korean state. Any shortfall is carried forward, trapping workers in a cycle of debt bondage, the report said.
Injuries and illnesses are frequently ignored or treated as obstacles to productivity.
“Abolition of state-sponsored forced labor remains the ultimate goal, but it cannot be the only answer when workers need protection today,” Kim said. “The priority is immediate, tangible relief: enforcing basic labor standards, enabling independent monitoring and building safe exit pathways that do not punish those who flee.”
