Saturday night, I watched the film Crossing, about a North Korean man who crosses the border into China in search of food and medicine for his pregnant wife. I bought the DVD at an event hosted at Stanford where the guest of honor was Shin Dong Hyuk, the only person to have escaped from Camp Number 14, a political concentration camp (Thanks Glennia for the heads up about the event!). He was born and raised there and saw his mother and brother executed in front of his eyes for attempting to escape.
Through Google Earth, he showed us where the camp was, and the barbed fencing that encloses the entire camp. He pointed out the prisoners' housing, the pig farm, the guards' housing, and the execution grounds. He pointed also to the school where children are taught to read and write, and basic math skills that are necessary for labor, nothing more.
In a news article about him, I read that his mother never hugged him. Ever. He said that he hated his mother and brother, for trying to escape and making him suffer the consequences (being tortured for information about their escape). He has more affection for the elderly man who took care of him and shared his food rations with him when he was recovering from his torture.
The two graduate students who spoke after him emphasized the need for us to look at North Korea's human rights violations in the context of history and not to just label the North Korean regime as "evil" in an attempt to simply the issues.
I am so blessed to be able to feed my child, give him medical care, and to be able to clothe him and provide him with shelter. I mean, how heart breaking, gut-wrenching, and just plain SAD it is that so many North Korean parents are not able to give their children enough food to survive. And the government is so closed that many don't even want to give them food aid anymore in an effort to topple Kim Jong Il's regime... and I guess to prevent more of the same from happening in the future. If it weren't for the government, so many NGOs could go in and provide some sort of long term support and help.
I read one article that said that 10% of North Korea's population are orphans. And 200,000 persons are held in these labor camps (there are 22). Who knows how many have died there? Children are born and raised there. Mr. Shin said that the laws of North Korea don't apply there. He never even heard of Kim Jong Il until he got out. Girls are often raped and Mr. Shin said in an article that he saw his own mother offer sex to the guards for their favor.
The North Korean government denies the existence of these labor camps. A tragedy of Holocaust proportions is happening right now... and I have been so unaware of it. I knew a little about the famine but not much about these concentration camps.
It's so easy to turn our eyes away from these kinds of things... or to think "What can I do?" and then do nothing at all. For me, the first step is to know the truth. Be aware of what's going on and get informed. The LiNK website on the blog roll has a lot of great information.
After reading up on some of this, I think one thing America can do better is to majorly pressure China to stop sending North Korean refugees back to North Korea to face death, torture, and/or imprisonment for life. Hm... I wonder if there is a petition to sign for that... maybe I can ask the one.org folks to include this in their efforts if it's not included already.
In 50 years, when the concentration camps will hopefully be history, who will emerge as the Corrie Ten Boom for North Korean refugees?
These issues are still brewing inside my head and I have a feeling that they'll be brewing there for a while... even this post took me days to write and then to hit the "publish" button. But I'm glad that I went to the event and that I know a little more about Korean history and the state of North Korea. After all, they are "my people."
-Mary
