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Category: Defectors

October 11, 2010

Hwang Jang Yop Dies at 87

Hwang Jang Yop survived multiple purges and power struggles, a defection, at least one assassination attempt, and 87 years in some especially cruel places and times. I was ambivalent about Hwang, who became Kim Jong Il’s strongest critic, but who still defended the juche ideology as misunderstood and misinterpreted by its more recent oracles. We can appreciate what Hwang did to expose the system’s ruthlessness, even as we must recognize that he probably stepped on plenty of skulls to ascend...
Categories Defectors
October 10, 2010

Of Conferences and Reports … and Reports from Conferences

10-10-10 has been another busy day for North Korea watchers, what with the military parade being broadcast live from Pyongyang and the passing of Hwang Jang-yop. But I want to mention several things I’ve spotted over the last weeks and months and the upcoming NKnet conference in Washington, D.C., on October 21st.  This will be in no particular order. _______________________________ In the beginning of September Tim Peters chaired a panel and other OFK favorites (e.g., Chuck Downs) spoke at a...
Categories Activism/Defectors/Human Rights/Refugees
August 14, 2010

Toronto: 10th International Conference on North Korean Human Rights and Refugees; Seoul: Beautiful Dream Concert

On August 19-22 Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights in Seoul is partnering with this year’s host HanVoice in Toronto for their 10th International Conference on North Korean Human Rights and Refugees.  This will be the first time the conference has been held in North America; to date the ICNKHRR has been in Seoul (3x), Tokyo, Prague, Warsaw, Bergen (Norway), London, and Melbourne. The main session this year is Saturday, August 21st, from 9 – 6.  Events open to...
Categories Books & Films/Defectors/Human Rights/Refugees
April 21, 2010

If North Korea’s Attempt to Kill Hwang Jang Yop Isn’t the State Sponsorship of Terrorism, I Don’t Know What Is

Two North Korean agents sent to South Korea to assassinate Hwang Jang-yop, the highest-ranking official ever to defect from Pyongyang, have been arrested, intelligence and law enforcement authorities announced yesterday. According to the National Intelligence Service and prosecutors, Kim Yong-ho, 36, and Dong Myong-gwan, 36, have been arrested. Both men were majors of the North Korean Army’s reconnaissance bureau, the authorities said. The two agents were ordered in November by the bureau’s chief, Colonel General Kim Yong-chol, to assassinate Hwang,...
Categories Defectors/Terrorism (NK)
April 1, 2010

Hwang Jang Yop Calls for Ideological Warfare Against Kim Jong Il

I was too busy to see Hwang Jang Yop speak in D.C. the other day, but a few news services picked up his remarks: North Korea’s highest-ranking defector said “ideological warfare,” not military action, would help topple the regime of Kim Jong Il. “We don’t need to resort to force,” Hwang Jang-yop told a small audience Wednesday at the Center for Strategic International Studies, a Washington-based think tank. “We need to use ideology and markets and diplomacy. We need to...
Categories Defectors/Propaganda/Subversion
March 17, 2010

We Regret to Inform You That Your One-Way Ticket to Paradise is Non-Refundable

Back in late January, North Korea claimed that an American who feared becoming “cannon fodder in the capitalist [all-volunteer] military” had crossed over to the loving embrace of the relevant organ. Despite my own growing doubts about the story, the fact that the Swedes have since had two consular visits with him does suggest that he exists after all. The U.S. State Department says North Korea has allowed Swedish diplomats to meet a U.S. citizen who has been detained for...
Categories Defectors/WTF?
March 11, 2010

Claudia Rosett on North Korean Loggers in Russia

The defection of those two loggers at the South Korean consulate in Vladivostok inspires further thought from Claudia Rosett: I’ve seen those North Korean lumberjacks–or at least their predecessors. In 1994 I was working as a reporter for The Wall Street Journal in Moscow when a story turned up in the Russian press, saying that North Korea was running lumber camps in remote areas of Russia. In Moscow, Russian officials confirmed to me that they had two big logging operations...
Categories Defectors/Russia/Russia & Korea
March 4, 2010

North Korean Soldier Defects Via Kumgang Crossing (Updated: He Wasn’t Alone)

Update, 4 Mar 2010: According to this article (link in Korean), he didn’t come alone. There were originally four. Of the other three, one was killed while trying to escape, and two more are still missing. The greatest significance is the personal tragedy for the three who didn’t make it, and for the families of all four of the soldiers, who will almost certainly become objects of the regime’s collective retribution. Keep them in your thoughts and prayers. [Satellite images...
Categories Appeasement/Defectors/NK Military
February 22, 2010

South Korean Leftists Should Take a Tip from Oh Kil-Nam

To Oh, a left-leaning South Korean economist, defecting to North Korea with his entire family seemed like a peachy idea at the time (1985). Today, Oh is one of a very few people who has a souvenir photograph of his family standing in the snow at Camp 15, the infamous Yodok Camp described by Kang Chol-Hwan in “The Aquariums of Pyongyang.” As it turns out, “the relevant organ” means the large intestine. His activism attracted the attention of North Korean...
Categories Defectors/Human Rights/Propaganda/The Camps
January 30, 2010

WTF? American Who Crossed Into North Korea May Have Defected

That latest American who crossed into North Korea looks more likely to be a Spartacist than Spartacus: South Korea’s Dong-a Ilbo newspaper said the man crossed into North Korea from China on Monday. It said an unidentified source in North Korea told the newspaper the 28-year-old man said he came to the country because he did not “want to become a cannon fodder in the capitalist military,” and “wants to serve in the North Korean military” instead. [Washington Post, via...
Categories Defectors/WTF?
January 27, 2010

North Korean Defects from Embassy in Ethiopia

Yonhap and AFP are both reporting that a 40 year-old North Korean “medic” at the embassy in Addis Ababa defected to South Korea last October. The man is now safely in Seoul. Yonhap said the communist state’s embassy protested strongly, making a threatening call to the South Korean mission. President Bush removed North Korea from the list of state sponsors of terrorism on October 11, 2008. Discuss among yourselves. North Korean officials used cars to stage protests outside the building...
Categories Africa/Defectors/Sanctions
October 28, 2009

“Under the Warm Care of a Relevant Organ?”

A South Korean man who worked at Samsung Electronics’ semiconductor unit and more recently at a pig farm has defected to the North by walking across the heavily mined border, the communist state’s media said on Tuesday. [Reuters] Something tells me he’ll be dreaming of those little piggies soon enough. “He is beside himself with joy for having accomplished this heroic deed,” the North’s KCNA news agency said. It identified the defector as Kang Dong-rim, 30. “He is now under...
Categories Defectors/Useful Idiocy
October 14, 2009

Interview with Kim Young-il, Executive Director of PSCORE

People for Successful COrean REunification (PSCORE; 성공적인 통일ìâ€ž ë§Å’들어ê°â‚¬Ã«Å ” 사람들, aka 성통ë§Å’사) is a small NGO that works on “democratization, human rights and social issues. [They] hope to bridge the gap between South Korea, North Korea and the international community.” They mostly aim their programs, such as essay contests, a one-on-one tutoring program, a summer English camp, and cultural outings, at students, but they’ve held at least one seminar for the public at large (last Spring).  Mark your calendars for...
Categories Defectors/Democracy/Human Rights/Reconstruction
August 3, 2009

The Damning of Kim Dae-Jung and Roh Moo-hyun

Video presentations from May’s Oslo Freedom Forum are now online with North Korea represented by Park San-Hak, a North Korean defector who currently works as a democracy activist. It takes a while for Park’s presentation to gain momentum, but it’s well worth watching in its entirety if you can get through the introduction because his talk eventually heats up. About midway through his presentation, Park embarks on a crusade of stinging criticism directed toward former South Korea presidents Kim Dae-jung...
Categories Activism/Defectors/Human Rights/North-South/Sunshine
July 21, 2009

An Inside Look at Hanawon

It is rare to be granted a look inside Hanawon, the first stop for North Korean defectors arriving in the South, but this summer the center opened its doors to international media in recognition of its 10 year anniversary, allowing journalists (and readers/viewers) a rare glimpse into the facility. As a result of the media invite, the L.A. Times ran a story about the rehabilitation center earlier this month and just recently VOA released a video story about Hanawon and...
Categories Defectors/Refugees
June 23, 2009

Someone Will Face a Firing Squad for This

Some of Hwang Jang Yop‘s family members have escaped from North Korea: Three relatives of Hwang Jang-yop, a former North Korean Workers’ Party secretary who defected to South Korea over a decade ago, fled the North last month and are now in a third country en route to the South, sources said Tuesday. The defectors are members of Hwang’s extended family, one of the sources who is also a North Korean defector and frequently communicates with defectors abroad, said on...
Categories Defectors
June 6, 2009

Former North Korean Spy Becomes South Korean Filmmaker

Chae Myong-Min, who works for the L.A. Times’s Seoul bureau, is trying to engineer a third dramatic career change: “Choice” tells the tale of a North Korean government agent whose lover is caught trying to defect and is sent to prison. The agent finds himself at a crossroads: Should he rescue his lover and flee North Korea, or remain loyal to leader Kim Jong Il? Chae appears distracted when asked about his project. He says little about his role as...
Categories Defectors/Refugees