The story is from Chosun Ilbo which is a notoriously unreliable (but still very prominent) conservative tabloid in South Korea. They really do just make up these kinds of stories every couple of days to rile-up old people and to export it into the Western press who publishes this shit unquestioningly. Almost always they will get an anonymous defector to act as a "source". At best these stories are an extreme exaggeration of actual NK policy but more often then not its just made up.
Previous fake stories from Chosun Ilbo (edit. and other rightwing outlets in SK) include multiple reports of Kim Jong Un's death, North Koreans are becoming zombies becuase of nuclear testing, everyone in North Korea is forced to have the same haircut, North Koreans are forced to believe Kim Jong Il invented the hamburger, North Korea executed their Olympic soccer team becuae they lost ... and so on. Just a few I can remember off the top of my head.
Most people in South Korea (except for their version of Fox News grandpas) knows this is bullshit and don't consider Chosun Ilbo a legitimate news source. But invariably the Western press will repeat these stories verbatim and source Chosun Ilbo, who their readers don't know is South Korean Breitbart.
The story is from Chosun Ilbo which is a notoriously unreliable (but still very prominent) conservative tabloid in South Korea. They really do just make up these kinds of stories every couple of days to rile-up old people and to export it into the Western press who publishes this shit unquestioningly. Almost always they will get an anonymous defector to act as a "source". At best these stories are an extreme exaggeration of actual NK policy but more often then not its just made up.
Previous fake stories from Chosun Ilbo (edit. and other rightwing outlets in SK) include multiple reports of Kim Jong Un's death, North Koreans are becoming zombies becuase of nuclear testing, everyone in North Korea is forced to have the same haircut, North Koreans are forced to believe Kim Jong Il invented the hamburger, North Korea executed their Olympic soccer team becuae they lost ... and so on. Just a few I can remember off the top of my head.
Most people in South Korea (except for their version of Fox News grandpas) knows this is bullshit and don't consider Chosun Ilbo a legitimate news source. But invariably the Western press will repeat these stories verbatim and source Chosun Ilbo, who their readers don't know is South Korean Breitbart.