Pyongyang
All baby triplets in North Korea are forcibly taken from their families and raised in orphanages because dictator Kim Jong Il fears that a triplet could one day topple his regime, the London Sunday Times reported. The number three is considered lucky in North Korea, and triplets are believed to be lucky people who can easily rise to positions of power. The official government explanation for taking triplets into state care is to relieve their parents of the burden of providing for so many children. But international aid workers doubt that rationale, noting that even rich families lose custody of their triplet children. Triplets aren’t the only children who are taken, though. Children of the elite are usually taken from their parents by the age of 2 and placed in party-controlled schools to break family bonds. They are raised to revere Kim above all others.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
-
The biggest climate records in the last yearIn Depth The number of records set in the past year is a stark reminder of the destructiveness of climate change
-
'The future of abortion access in many states may come down to who has the final say'Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Supreme Court rejects challenge to CFPBSpeed Read The court rejected a conservative-backed challenge to the way the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is funded
