Ji Ho* vividly remembers the moment she saw her father for the last time. North Korean security agents had ransacked their house – and dragged him away when they found his ‘secret book’ buried in the garden. “My father and I both sobbed,” she remembers. “In that moment, we knew we’d never see each other again.”

At the time, Ji Ho didn’t realise her father was a Christian, or that the book was the Bible. To her, it was just a book of stories ‘about a wise man who sat on a mountain and began to teach’. But she did know about his hidden radio, and started listening to it in the hopes of finding a source of food. Instead, she heard stories about the man from the secret book: Jesus. 

“As I listened, I became more and more convinced,” she says. “This Jesus was the great teacher that my father had been trying to tell me about. Jesus wanted to be my Lord and Saviour – and I wanted to follow Him, in the same way my father had.” 

Ji Ho loves hearing the radio broadcasts, but knows she has to keep her faith secret from people she knows. “I know that it would be dangerous to tell anyone about Jesus,” says Ji Ho. “Our leaders don’t want us to worship anyone or anything besides them. I’ve realised that’s why my father was taken – they saw he had a Lord that was bigger than our country’s leaders.” 

Every Christian here faces extreme persecution. The border area with China has previously been seen as a particularly dangerous area due to Christians crossing back and forth, but it is harder to escape than it used to be due to security around the border being strengthened.

• North Korea remains number one on the World Watch List – a position it has held almost every year since 2002.
• There has been a marginal drop in violence compared to last year, with fewer reports of police raids against Christians. However, given the difficulty in obtaining reports from labour camps, this does not mean an improvement for believers in the country.
• The regime has strengthened its military capabilities, engaged in selective diplomatic interactions, and implemented internal policy changes. Meanwhile, the everyday life of its citizens remains intensely hard, including the devastating impact of its ongoing humanitarian crisis. The agenda behind all this is what it’s always been: to strengthen the country’s self-reliance as well as its strategic positioning on the world stage. For the country’s secret believers, that means continued repression and ongoing, extreme danger.
• In early 2025, South Korea requested the return of missionary Choi Chun-gil, who has been in prison in North Korea for ten years. At the time of writing, the request has not been granted.

Open Doors seeks to strengthen secret believers in North Korea through networks outside the country. This includes emergency relief aid, Christian materials, Christian radio broadcasts, and shelter and training for those who have fled the country.