voice-over: this is bbc news. we will have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour, straight after this programme. north korea. for over 70 years, the country has been ruled by one family. its tyrannical leader, kim jong—un, has subjected his people to extreme hardship. the regime survives by repression, by a complete blockade on information with the security services and fear tactics. at the start of the pandemic, north korea sealed its borders.

we now know next to nothing about what's been happening inside the country. sometimes, people describe north korea as a black hole of information, and that black hole has become significantly darker over the last few years. for months, we've been communicating in secret with three people who've risked their lives to expose the disaster unfolding. we've used animations and actors to illustrate their words... these days, watching and sharing foreign videos is severely punished. one wrong move and you're facing execution. ..and a desperate struggle for survival. food supplies are so low, i people have started dying. i want to live in a society where we don't starve, where my neighbours are alive, and where we don't have to spy on each other.

i've been working as the bbc�*s correspondent in seoul forjust over a year and for all the time i've been here, north korea's borders have been shut. i knew these border closures would be having a big impact on people's lives. so, when i arrived, i wanted to find a way to hear from people inside the country. north koreans are forbidden from talking to anyone outside the country — particularlyjournalists. there are a couple of specialist news organisations

that have a network of sources in north korea. we decided to try and work with one of these organisations to speak directly to people in the country, so that we could understand what was happening. one of these news organisations is daily nk, based in seoul. hello. annyeonghaseyo. lee sang—yong is its editor in chief. i'm sorry we're a bit late. so, what happens

to our questions now? well, we will wait as long as it takes. for months, we exchanged hundreds of messages with the sources in north korea, each containing just snippets of information to protect people's identity and keep them safe until, finally, we had enough to put together.

i wake up at 5am and make breakfast for my family. then, i go and prepare my business at the market, where i sell medicine. one of the people we've been communicating with is a market trader who lives up near the border with china, and she makes her living by smuggling medicine over the borderfrom china. her earnings support her family, so her husband and her two children. before covid, life was stable. i didn't smuggle every day but my business made quite a profit. but since covid, my earnings have halved. it's become much harder to smuggle things over the border, and the crackdowns have become stricter. i tried to smuggle but i got caught. i had to bribe an official

with money i didn't have and barely got away with it. after that, i was monitored and i couldn't do anything. most of the products in the market came from china, but it's empty now. you could always find grain, but not these days. our food situation has never been this bad. recently, people have been knocking on the door, asking for food because they're so hungry. north korea has two borders. the one with south korea is closed because the two countries are technically still at war. it's the most heavily fortified border in the world,

known as the demilitarised zone. to the north is a vast 1,300km border with china. through closing its borders, north korea not only stopped people from leaving and entering the country, but it cut off trade. i work on construction projects. often, we have to work late into the night, and i sleep at the site. this person, who we're calling chan ho, lives near the chinese border with his family. i wouldn't be able to survive if my wife didn't work at the market. food supplies are so low, people have started dying. it's been so long since we received government rations.

we somehow survive on what little food there is but it's hard not knowing how much longer we will live in this pinched poverty. the future is dark. hundreds of miles away, in the relative luxury of the capital, pyongyang, lives a woman we're calling ji yeon. in the morning, i put the rice on to cook before waking the rest of the family. then, i start myjob at a food store. i used to be able to sneak some fruit and vegetables out of the store where i work to sell them at the market.

i'd use the money to buy rice. but now, they thoroughly search our bags, so we can't make a side hustle. my family doesn't have enough food. my husband and i survive by thinking, "ten more days," and then, "another ten days," thinking, "if something "happens, we might starve, but at least we'll "feed our kids." once, i didn't eat for two days. i only drank water. i think it's really interesting that we have somebody from pyongyang speaking about how hard the situation is. it's affected pyongyang, as well — which, you know, speaks volumes. there are lots of beggars now. if they're lying down, we check them and usually find they're dead. there are others who kill themselves at home or disappear into the mountains. i never used to hear of this happening. i know one family that starved to death at home.

no—one came in or out for three days. water was brought around and we knocked on their door, telling them to get some. nobody answered. in our village, five people have starved to death. in one family, the wife was too ill to work, so her two children were surviving by begging. in the end, all three of them died. the official cause they were given was death from disease. in another household, the mother was sentenced to hard labour for violating quarantine rules. she and her son starved to death. recently, an acquaintance's son was released from the military because he was malnourished. suddenly, his face became bloated. he died within a week. we had heard reports and rumours that perhaps some people were starving but i had never expected that two out

of the three people we'd spoken to would know people who had actually starved. for the past ten, 15 years, we rarely heard of death by starvation — that was something that happened during the late 1990s or early 2000s. but to hear it happening again, you know, in the past two, three years, i think, you know, it is taking us back to the arduous march, which was the most difficult period for the north korean people. in the late 1990s, when kim jong—un's father, kimjong—il, was in power, as many as 3 million people died in a devastating famine known as the arduous march. newsreader: the red cross estimates that almost half i of north korean babies will die before they're five. the north korean economy had collapsed, meaning state

could no longer provide its people with food. newsreader: a succession of bad harvests and disastrous floods - mean north korea is desperately short of food. many now rely on international aid to survive. people quickly learned not to depend on the government for food. they started smuggling things in from china to sell at markets. ever since, most north koreans have depended on this unofficial trade. when the border was closed, this lifeline was severed. with the restrictions, in general, that have been increased, that is really worrying, then, for north korean people's ability to fend for themselves.

before the border closure, people would attempt to flee the country by secretly crossing into china. more than 1,000 made it out each year. but kim jong—un has spent the past three years building fences along the border, cutting off people's only escape route. people are faced with multiple layers of security if they're trying to cross. there's been, you know, widely publicised threats by the north korean regime, the north korean military, that they will shoot people on sight who are trying to cross into china.

every day, it gets harder to live. . one wrong move and you're facing execution. _ if i live according - to the rules, ifeel like i'll starve to death. but just by trying to survive, i could be arrested - by the state security, branded as a traitor and killed. - this is the hardest period i've lived through. - the famine was difficult - but the state completely lost control, so there weren't these harsh crackdownsl and punishments. if people wanted to escape to china, the government. couldn't do much. now, there are fences - and surveillance equipment. a friend's son told me - about several closed—door executions he saw. each time, three to four. people would be executed. the crime was trying to escape. people are stuck here and waiting to die. i we showed our interviews to james heenan, the un investigator for human rights in north korea. mmm, wow. 0k.

it's quite sobering. i read a lot of sobering stuff but that's very sobering. it's very eloquent as well. this information that you have secured, it's disturbing, but in terms of the things that are probably the most shocking, if that's the right word, is the emphasis on the fear in people's lives. these interviews suggest that people who've lived through different waves of repression are saying, "no, no, what's happening right now is particularly bad "and in the past, we've been able to deal with it" but this is getting even towards the edge of what they can bear. i wanted to understand why the government would be willing to push its own people so close to their limits. why does the north korean government appear to be

so indifferent to the suffering of its people? north korean government has always been indifferent to the suffering of north korean people. the north korean state is about kim family and it's all about the regime's survival. it's nothing to do with the people. to ensure his survival, kim jong—un has funnelled his country's limited finances into developing nuclear weapons, which are now so advanced they can, in theory, reach the us mainland. if you are spending billions of dollars to build up a nuclear missile programme, there's no money to be spent on the people. north korea needs to be able to justify... ..the deprivations, the suffering of the people. so, north koreans say, "we have the united states — "that's a hostile power. "we have south korea — that's hostile to us. "there's japan — that's hostile to us. "and a nuclear programme is the only thing that

"protects north koreans against the hostile powers. "we have to spend money, we have to build our nuclear "programme, and this is sort of why you are suffering." north koreans have little choice but to believe what they're told. with no access to the internet, the only way they can learn about the world outside their borders is through foreign videos smuggled into the country on usb sticks. closing the border has helped kim jong—un to keep them out. these days, watching and sharing foreign videos is severely punished, so people are more careful. a lot fewer people watch them. when you think about why a state like north korea continues to exist, and regime continues to survive, when it's one of the poorest countries on the planet, it survives by repressing their people, by a complete blockade on information with the security services and fear tactics. at the end of 2020, kim jong—un passed a law declaring those

who share foreign videos can be executed. ryu hyun—woo is one of north korea's highest—ranking defectors. until 2019, he was working as an ambassadorfor the north korean government. i was taken in for questioning under the anti—reactionary

thought law. since then, i never reveal what i really think to others. i'm more afraid of people now. it's very scary, especially the way they're punishing young people. at a court in pyongyang, the local leaders were gathered tojudge a 22—year—old man in a public trial. he had gone around spreading south korean songs and films. his punishment was ten years and three months in a hard labour camp. before 2020, this would have been a quiet trial with perhaps one year in prison. people were shocked how much harsher the punishment was. you shouldn't be reprimanded, let alone jailed, or even executed, for consuming foreign media. they are very serious violations of human rights. and in fact, in the past, the commission of inquiry of the un has said that these can, in many cases, amount

to crimes against humanity. despite the government's best efforts to keep its people in the dark, there are small signs that loyalty to the regime is waning. before covid, people viewed kim jong—un positively. we hoped, perhaps, that he'd rule in a new way. but now almost everybody is full of discontent. if there's a war, the people will turn their backs on the government. that's the reality. after our supreme leader met with the us, people were filled with hope and laughter that perhaps we would be able to go to foreign countries. we were tricked. this border closure has taken our lives back 20 years. we feel hugely betrayed. the people never wanted this endless weapons development that brings hardship

to generation after generation. my child doesn't have food. i just want my family to have three meals of rice a day. i want to live in a society where we don't starve, where my neighbours are alive, and where we don't have to spy on each other. nobody believes- the propaganda on tv. the state says we are nestling in our mother's bosom, - but what kind of motherl would execute their child in broad daylight i for running to china because they were starving? people, including me... ..openly say that they hope there is a war here - as soon as possible. only by getting rid - of the entire leadership can the people live. let's end this one

way or another. l i think that what these three north korean people are sharing through these interviews does support the idea that north korea is even more repressive, even more, you know, totalitarian than it's ever been before. sadly, these interviews may be a preview ofjust how difficult things are for north korean people today. the covid pandemic has provided kim jong—un with an opportunity to tighten his grip over his people. when he does finally reopen the border, it's unlikely their old freedoms will be returned. the fear is that this new era of repression could last for decades.

hello. some of us will be pleased to hear that rain is on the way, but be warned — the thunderstorms could be quite severe, so a lot of rain in a short space of time almost certainly leading to flash flooding in places, hail, gusty winds as well, butjust down the road you might escape the worst of it and it will be predominantly dry,

bright or even sunny. a low pressure is just to the west and south—west of us right now. this is where it's going to stay over the next few days and that pattern basically means that a moisture, clouds and warmth will be rotating around this area of low pressure and the air will be predominantly be coming from the south so it will stay on the warm side. but no real heat on the way, at least in the short—term. the rainfall accumulation map so the darker the blue colours the greater the chance of encountering a fair amount of rain, but some parts of the country will still get very little. so let's have a look at the forecast then in the short—term and it is relatively quiet at the moment. yes, there are a few showers around and we will have had some showers and thunderstorms across parts of northern ireland, but on the whole i think it's a generally quiet start to sunday. and a warm one, too, this is muggy air coming

in from the south, temperatures of around 1a to 16 degrees in the warmer spots early if in the morning on sunday. when will the showers start to brew? i think from late morning into the afternoon, there's that risk of thunder increasing across the uk and by the middle of the afternoon, certainly storms will be rumbling across the country and some areas 30mm within an hour, and again that's certainly means flash flooding in some areas. now, i think the greatest risk of the heavy rain, the thundery rain, will be later in the day on sunday across some of these eastern and more northern areas of the country and thunderstorms will have a tendency to drift northwards as we go through the course of the day. the met office warns anywhere across england and wales could see a lot of rainfall. here it is, monday, then, the worst of the rain will have cleared to the north. early in the day it will be very wet in parts of eastern scotland and then the afternoon on monday is a mixture of sunshine and also showers and staying quite warm temperatures will be

in the mid—20s in a number of areas. u that low pressure is still with us so essentially the warm atmosphere is coming in from the south and with the moisture, the humidity in the air, and also the strength of the sun will see showers popping off inland during the course. in fact, if you don't get the thunderstorms on sunday, there's a chance you might encounter some showers on monday, tuesday and, indeed, into wednesday as well. you can see a cluster of showers there across other parts of the country. so the nature of showers is very difficult to pinpoint exactly which areas will get them, just pretty confident that there will be around the uk and stays on the warm side. look at that whole 2a degrees celsius around 20 or so expected in belfast. u beyond that, this is wednesday next week onwards, you can see stays on the warm side, if anything there is a chance that the temperatures will start creeping up a little bit as we head to the weekend.

but you can see quite an unsettled picture but on the warm side. bye, bye.

hello, i'm helena humphrey. great to have you with us.