The North Korean Government reported some 70,000 ROK Army POWs; 8,000 were repatriated. South Korea repatriated 76,000 Korean People's Army POWs. Besides the 12,000 UN Command forces POWs dead in captivity, the KPA might have press-ganged some 50,000 ROK POWs into the North Korean military. Per the South Korean Ministry of Defense, there remained some 560 Korean POWs detained in North Korea in 2008; from 1994 until 2009, some 79 ROK POWs escaped the North.
The North Korean Government denied having POWs from the Korean War, and, via the Korean Central News Agency, reported that the UN forces killed some 33,600 KPA POWs; that on 19 July 1951, in POW Camp No. 62, some 100 POWs were killed as machine-gunnery targets; that on 27 May 1952, in the 77th Camp, Koje Island (now in Geoje), the ROK Army incinerated with flamethrowers some 800 KPA POWs who rejected "voluntary repatriation" south, and instead demanded repatriation north.
In December 1950, National Defense Corps was founded, the soldiers were 406,000 drafted citizens. In the winter of 1951, 50,000 to 90,000 South Korean National Defense Corps soldiers starved to death while marching southward under the Chinese offensive when their commanding officers embezzled funds earmarked for their food. This event is called the National Defense Corps Incident.
COMMENT
There have been some recent comments repeating Communist false propaganda claiming the North Koreans or Chinese were not committing war crimes or atrocities against the American prisoners of war (POWs). Here is some of the too graphic evidence to the contrary.
I wrote several interviews with Korean War vets for our local paper’s Nov 11 edition.
One fellow had been a Crew Chief on a B-26 medium bomber, shot down over NK.
He told me that one particular North Korean had worked for the US Army in Japan and spoke English. The guy would force the man to dig a fresh grave and then get in it and recite the Lord’s Prayer.
He was told that when he said, “Amen,” he would be shot in the head.
This happened dozens of times in his nearly 3 years in the prison but he said “I never broke.”
I’d love to post this story...
And somebody may wonder why I get a little incensed with the ungrateful snots movement on campuses these days. Those ungrateful snot wouldn’t last 5 minutes. Not just ROK’s, US G.I’s suffered a crap load and continue to today. Tough living conditions? Go back to your dorms asshats, and clean up your rooms.
Later
I had a relative who was in the war there. He said that the Chinese would round up whole villages and march the civilians in front of their troops as they advanced, using them as a human shield.