Chinese distant-water fishing vessels employed North Korean crews between 2019 and 2024, violating UN sanctions, a report has revealed.
The Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) report also alleges the workers were subjected to human rights abuses, including being trapped at sea for years.
The London-based group, which focuses on environmental and human rights issues, identified North Korean workers on 12 Chinese tuna long-liners operating in the southwest Indian Ocean.
The report was based on interviews with 19 Indonesian and Filipino crew members who worked alongside the North Koreans.
The report stated that there were “concerted efforts to hide the presence of North Koreans on these vessels”.
It also said that “North Koreans on board were forced to work for as many as 10 years at sea – in some instances without ever stepping foot on land”.
“This would constitute forced labour of a magnitude that surpasses much of that witnessed in a global fishing industry already replete with abuse.”
The EJF said the North Koreans were transferred between vessels to prevent them from returning to land, and that they were not allowed to use mobile phones or leave their ships during port visits.
EJF said it wasn’t able to estimate the number of North Koreans aboard the Chinese vessels because they were all transferred to sister vessels.
The use of North Korean crew is a breach of a 2017 UN Security Council resolution that required member states not to issue work permits to North Koreans and repatriate all remaining North Korean workers from their territories by the end of 2019.
The sanctions were adopted after North Korea tested a long-range missile in violation of other UN Security Council resolutions.
EJF said the use of North Korean crew also appears to have bypassed legal frameworks in the US and the European Union designed to prevent goods produced by North Koreans from entering their supply chains.
Along with Russia, China is suspected of not fully enforcing UN sanctions on North Korea and has vetoed US-led efforts to toughen UN sanctions on North Korea despite its banned weapons tests.
China's Foreign Ministry did not comment immediately.
Before the 2019 UN deadline, tens of thousands of North Koreans were working abroad, mostly at factories and restaurants in China and logging camps and construction sites in Russia, to bring in much-needed foreign currency.
EJF said it’s the first time that North Korean labour has been publicly documented on a distant-water fishing vessel.
North Korean workers abroad were in general under the constant surveillance of their country’s security agents, toiled more than 12 hours a day and took home only a fraction of their salaries, with the rest going to their government, according to defectors and experts.
Despite the UN ban, South Korean officials and experts believe that a large number of North Korean workers remain engaged in economic activities around the world and transmit money that is used in the North’s nuclear weapons programs.
