North Korean soldiers pick up another soldier at a makeshift pontoon dock on the banks of the Yalu River near Sinuiju, across the Yalu River from Dandong, China. North Korean government officials have been warned by Kim Jong Un against forming "gangs" that lead to corruption. File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI | License Photo

SEOUL, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- Kim Jong Un called for an end to "gang culture" that is reportedly prevalent among regional divisions of North Korea's Workers' Party and judicial authorities, a source in the country said.

The North Korean government source in Yanggang said Kim had issued a statement instructing the state's cadres to "not make gangs," Radio Free Asia reported Thursday.


"Last September, directives from Kim Jong Un were delivered at the Yanggang provincial party committee meeting," the source said. "The core of the directive stated that through strong ideological struggle local party members and judicial authorities must overcome 'gang culture'."

The source also said Ri Sang Won, chairman of the Korean Workers Party in Yanggang Province had delivered the unusual instructions.

In his statement Kim reportedly said, "The current widespread corruption is due to the culture of gangs," a possible reference to the rise in bribery among officials who in turn give citizens lighter sentences for nonpolitical crimes.

The Workers' Party also came under fire from a foreign critic in Pyongyang.

Britain's foreign office posted a video on its official Facebook page on Human Rights Day on Saturday, featuring the British Ambassador to North Korea Alastair Morgan.

In the video, Morgan says, "The Workers' Party of Korea is in complete control and has a monolithic system of leadership under Kim Jong Un and every aspect of life in the country is controlled and regulated by the party."

"The entire public space is given over to propaganda for the regime. All authorized media is state-controlled, party-controlled," Morgan states in the video.

Outside information rarely reaches the country and the country engages in relatively low trade, according to the most recent data from South Korea's National Statistical Office released Thursday.

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According to Seoul data, North Korea's population of 24.8 million live in a country with a trade volume that is less than 1 percent of the South's.

Gross national income in the North was also estimated to be $29 billion in 2015, while South Korea's GNI was about $1.3 trillion, Seoul said.