북한 예심제도의 변화와 의미 - 실행 조직과 적용 실태를 중심으로

Abstract

The criminal procedure of North Korea is consisted of four parts;investigation, preliminary examination, prosecution, judgment. The preliminary examination among them is important enough to determine the result of trial in realty. This article noted the changes and the meanings of the system. In early days of founding a country, North Korea almost mimicked the laws of the Soviet Union. The preliminary examination was not the exception. Crimes were divided into two categories; the ordinary crimes and the preliminary examination required crimes. The preliminary examiners belonging to the prosecutors’ office were in charge of the criminal cases needed preliminary examination. The ordinary criminal cases were treated in the social safety agencies. In 1970’s, the code of criminal of North Korea was amended that each investigative agency including the social safety organization took charge of the preliminary examination for each crime. After several years, the criminal proceedings were changed that the Party Safety Committee determined whether the criminal cases should be brought to the preliminary examination process or not. However, the code of criminal procedure of North Korea did not reflect this change. In this paper, author tried to analyze its historical significance about such changes of organization of the preliminary examination in the criminal proceedings of North Korea through literature reviews and interviews on the North Korean defectors who had worked in the Ministry of People’s Security until relatively recently. Since 1960s, when Kim Il Sung dictatorship was virtually completed, North Korea had been partly influenced by China in the field of law, not by the Soviet Union. However, the excessive forces of the State Political Security Department of North Korea resulted in the changes in the criminal procedure; the Party Safety Committee started to exercise the authority to decide whether the criminal cases should be brought to the preliminary examination process or not. In recent years, the new leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un, has shown some changes in the relationship between the Party and the military. It is time to see what influences in the preliminary examination system and the criminal proceedings of North Korea will be led by those changes in the future.