Dogs cannot be kept as pets in North Korea; they can only be raised for their meat and fur.
A source in the northern province of South Pyongan states that the ban was declared by the Socialist Women’s Union of Korea.
Speaking with Daily NK, a publication in South Korea’s neighbor, the source enumerated the transgressions that might put dog owners at odds with the communist values upheld by the government.
They said ‘Treating a dog as a family member, who eats and sleeps with the family, is incompatible with the socialist lifestyle and should be strictly avoided.’
The practice of dressing up pets, as demonstrated by Western celebrities such as Paris Hilton, was also specifically called out and condemned.
The source went on: ‘The practice of dressing up dogs as if they were humans, putting pretty ribbons in their hair, wrapping them in a blanket, and burying them when they die is a bourgeois activity.
‘It’s one of the ways wealthy people waste money in a capitalist society.’
The source described the mindset of the government as follows:: ‘Dogs are basically meat that’s raised outside in accordance with their nature and then eaten when they die.
‘Therefore, such behaviour is totally unsocialist and must be strictly eliminated.’
According to the source, the government further emphasized that “the purpose of raising dogs is to collect more furs.”
The new regulation is said to have been driven by an increase in dog ownership, which the authorities have described as conveying “the stench of the bourgeoisie.”
Additionally, the source stated that although residents were being given the opportunity to handle the situation “quietly,” non-compliance may lead to a “mass movement” to “eliminate” the practice.
Members of the union were cautioned that the tradition of owning pet dogs must eventually end.
The revelation brought one dog owner, as reported by Daily NK, to tears.
“What should I do with my very beloved dog?” She allegedly remarked, “I can’t just kill it, and I can’t just abandon it.”
It is a ‘ludicrous’ regulation, according to Greg Scarlatoiu, executive director of the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea (HRNK), which records the horrors committed by the Kim dictatorship.
“The Kim regime criminalizes normal behavior,” he stated. Examples of such behavior include carrying a religious book, crossing the border without permission, or visiting a relative in a nearby hamlet without a travel permit.This attempt to sever the multi-generational human-dog link by ideological decree—the continuous assault on pet dog ownership as non-socialist behavior—is the height of absurd interdiction.
The South Pyongan source claims that dogs were mostly used as security dogs when the trend of owning pets first emerged in North Korea in the early 2000s.
They stated: “There weren’t many families with dogs, but there have always been families with cats to catch mice.”However, that number has steadily grown, and lately, foreign dog breeds like Pomeranians and Shih Tzus—which were once uncommon in North Korea—have become more and more prevalent.
