North Korea renovated its biggest political prison in the country’s remote northeast in recent years, NK News analysis shows, underscoring the DPRK’s continuing efforts to expand and maintain concentration camps that it officially denies exist.

New high-resolution Google Earth satellite imagery reveals that North Korea constructed a half dozen new buildings and renovated housing structures at Kwalliso No. 16 between 2022 and 2024.

Concentration camp No. 16 is one of North Korea’s four known kwalliso, penal facilities where the regime holds prisoners for political and religious reasons and the highest category of prison camp in the DPRK system.

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