there had always been rumours of concentration camp style prisons in the old north korea , where not just enemies of the state , but people convicted of minor offences against the regime , and also the families of such so-called undesirables , were kept in appalling conditions against their will and in some cases subjected to torture , but it had been a proud boast of new korea that all of these camps had been disbanded and the inmates returned to their old villages and their old lives .