A new international survey shows that Christians in North Korea are suffering from an unprecedented level of persecution by Pyongyang. 

According to Radio Free Asia on Thursday, Open Doors, an international Christian watchdog group, announced the result of a survey conducted on 76 countries that are reportedly persecuting or monitoring Christianity between October of 2020 and September of last year. 

With 100 points assigned to the worst persecution possible against Christians, North Korea received 96 points, scoring higher than in any previous years. 

Despite worsening persecution, the Kim Jon-un regime, which had topped the list for the past 20 years, was taken over by Afghanistan in the latest ranking due to the Taliban’s takeover of the Afghan government last year. 

The survey explained the North’s persecution against Christians became more severe after the regime implemented the law in December of 2020 aimed at punishing perpetrators that disseminate or watch South Korean cultural contents. The “anti-reactionary thought and culture law” also bans the Bible as among “foreign published materials.”

Around 400-thousand North Koreans, or one-point-five percent of the population, are presumed to be Christians with up to 70-thousands of them detained in prisons or labor camps.