No Escape

In the days following nuclear disarmament negotiations with North Korea on February 29, 2012, the United States was busy publicizing its “diplomatic breakthrough.” Meanwhile, 31 North Koreans who had crossed the border into China were captured by Chinese authorities, detained amid protests from the international community, and eventually repatriated back to the D.P.R.K. This received unprecedented press coverage in South Korea as North Korean defectors living in Seoul spoke out against China’s treatment of North Korean refugees.
While concerns over North Korea’s nuclear program dominate the news media, China’s repatriation policy deserves more attention. Such inquiry would provide insight into the diplomatic difficulties of the Korean peninsula, particularly regarding human rights. Indeed, China’s rhetoric defending its longstanding repatriation policy, as well as the views of North Korean defectors, can provide a better understanding of life inside the world’s most closed-off country and what should be done for those who escape.
Against All Odds: The Journey to China
The U.S. State Department estimates that there are currently tens of thousands of escaped North Koreans hiding in China. Food shortages, deteriorating humanitarian conditions, and human rights violations are all factors that drive North Koreans to cross the Sino-D.P.R.K. border. To escape, they have to swim across the Tumen River while avoiding detection by both D.P.R.K. and Chinese border security. This can involve bribing border guards, sneaking between patrols, and maneuvering through barbed electric fences. Once across the border, criminal organizations often exploit these vulnerable North Korean refugees. Estimates suggest that over half of the North Korean women who cross into China are sexually trafficked as brides to rural Chinese men.
In China, many North Korean migrants take on menial, low-paying jobs. Some hope to make money to bring back to their families in North Korea. Others hope to eventually gain asylum in South Korea or the United States by traveling through an “underground railroad” to Southeast Asia or Mongolia. All of these migrants live in fear of detection by the Chinese authorities with the possibility of severe punishment looming if sent back to the D.P.R.K.
Repatriated North Koreans are sent to temporary labor camps where they are often interrogated and tortured to glean information about their time in China. If found guilty of having associated with Christian NGO workers while in China, these repatriates face harsher punishments, such as execution or long sentences in a labor camp. Several reports indicate that trafficked pregnant women are forced to abort their half-Chinese babies when sent back to North Korea. Those who risk escaping into China also risk the lives of their families, as three generations of a North Korean’s family are punished for such behavior.
More than 20,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the 1990s and approximately 130 defectors have permanently settled in the United States. The information available about the situation on the Sino-D.P.R.K. border largely comes from personal accounts told by North Korean defectors who make it out of China.
The Chinese repatriation policy of North Korean refugees exacerbates human rights problems on the Korean peninsula by preventing defectors from seeking political asylum and by preventing the United Nations Refugee Agency from accessing the border region. The policy also allows North Korea to commit additional human rights violations against those who are returned.
Human Rights Perspective
The protests surrounding the repatriation of the 31 refugees in March 2012 brought greater awareness to the plight faced by those who seek to escape North Korea. Those protesting outside of the Chinese Embassy in Seoul assert that North Koreans who cross the border into China should be given official refugee status. Human rights activists point to China’s membership in the UN, which obligates them to abide by the 1951 Refugee Convention agreement of “non-refoulement” in which “no contracting State shall expel or return a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened.”
Many North Korean defectors were present at the protests in March, sharing their stories and calling upon South Koreans to object to China’s current practices. One anonymous North Korean defector told HPR about his hope to raise awareness in South Korea through music and film.
Human rights advocates hope that China will give in to international pressure and disband their repatriation policy or at least allow the UNHCR to provide humanitarian assistance in the region. Kyung-Seo Park, former South Korean Ambassador for Human Rights, told the HPR that he believes Chinese policies towards North Korean migrants will not last if pressure from the international community continues to build. He cautioned, “In pressuring the Chinese on this issue, we should not take an aggressive stance, but should try to understand the Chinese difficulties.” Indeed, the international human rights community needs to understand China’s point of view if it hopes to seriously pressure China to change its longstanding policy.
China’s Repatriation Policy
Chinese officials have long rejected the assertion that North Koreans who cross the border into China meet the definition of “refugees.” Instead, they refer to the border-crossers as “economic migrants,” which allows them to avoid abiding by the UN’s principle of non-refoulement. Yet, regardless of why these North Koreans cross the border, many fit the definition of refugee sur place due to the harsh punishments they face when sent back to North Korea.
China has enforced its repatriation policy since the 1990s, when the flow of North Korean refugees increased due to the North Korean famine, which killed an estimated one million people. This constancy in the Chinese policy contrasts with South Korea’s delayed articulation of their views on this issue. During the Sunshine Policy years of South Korean President Kim Dae Jung (1998-2003) and President Roh Moo-hyn (2003-2008), South Koreans remained silent regarding the repatriation of North Koreans. Up until the recent protests, South Koreans have not shown major objection to this policy.
Chinese policies towards North Korean migrants are characteristic of the Chinese Communist Party’s continual struggle to control internal and external migration, population growth, and ethnic minorities along China’s borders. In addition, nationalist complications shape China’s refusal to admit Koreans into its border area, the Yanbian Autonomous Zone. An estimated one million ethnic Koreans already live in this area, which some Korean nationalists in South Korea claim as their own.
Many speculate that the Chinese are reluctant to support reunification of the Korean peninsula, as they would prefer to keep North Korea as a buffer zone separating China from the U.S.-influenced South Korea. Likewise, China wants to avoid a large inflow of refugees, which it believes could lead to regional instability. Indeed, the CCP’s People’s Daily, has written that “attempting to ‘refugee-ize,’ internationalize or politicize this problem” of North Korean refugees would be futile.
North Korean Defectors and the Future of the Korean Peninsula
Some had hoped that current leader Kim Jong Un, exposed to the outside world while studying in Switzerland, would have more concern for the North Korean people than his father. However, Kim Jong Un’s order that guards should shoot-to-kill when patrolling the border, as well as his crackdown on the possession of illegal Chinese cell phones, does not forebode well.
China has also responded by tightening its own border-security. According to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, China has recently installed silent alarm systems in the houses of a Chinese border town to encourage residents to inform the police if they encounter North Korean escapees.
Nevertheless, the South Koreans’ recent protest of China’s repatriation policy has brought more attention to the people who can play an important role in the shaping of the future of the Korean peninsula. North Korean defectors are the ones currently standing up for the oppressed still living in North Korea. Their insights into a very secretive country are valuable in improving outside knowledge of what goes on inside the D.P.R.K. Even more, their experience living in both North Korea and South Korea is essential to hopes for future Korean unification.