FULL-PAGE APPEAL: "Do You Dare Overlook The Hell Named North Korea: We Japanese ask President Barack Obama for joint actions to resolve the human rights violations of North Korea," The Group of Seven Individuals, New York Times, 28 April 2009.NATIONAL WEEKLY EDITION: "Culture Shock: Alone in the South, North Korean teens are bewildered," by Blaine Harden, Washington Post, 20-26 April 2009.
The appeal is mostly about foreigners abducted by the regime, one of its most truly bizarre practices--and that's saying something for this nut house.
The Harden story is simply heartbreaking: about teenagers left so stunted in their development that when they are able to defect to the South, they really can't function without state support and often months of psychiatric counseling.
"All I learned in school in North Korea was that Kim Jong Il was the best leader and that North Korea was the best country," says Lee [J.Y.--whose surname is being withheld out of fear of retaliation by the regime], who is in her final year at Hangyoreh and hopes to become an English teacher."Education in North Korea is useless for life in this country," says the school's principal, Gwak Jong-moon. "When you are hungry, you don't go to learn and teachers don't go to teach. Many children have been hiding in China for years with no access to schools."...
"Their drive to survive is beyond our imagination," says Chun Junghee, head nurse at Hanowan [a government-run facility].
But helping defectors is rarely easy, the staff says, for they trust no one.
"People from North Korea are very paranoid," says Kim Heekyung, a clinical psychologist at Hanowan, who supervises group therapy for defectors.
Paranoia, she adds, is a rational response to reality in North Korea . . .
When defectors arrive at Hanowan, they whisper. They are reluctant to disclose their names or dates of birth. They question the motives of people who want to help them . . .
A majority of defectors suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, according to a survey released in March by the Washington-based Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics.
Conducted among 1,300 defectors in China, the survey found that one in 10 had been confined in political detention camps, about a third had relatives who died of hunger and half owed money to brokers for assistance in escaping North Korea . . .
Defectors arrive at Hanowar with a cluster of medical and stress-related problems, including hepatitis B and drug-resistant tuberculosis. Many women have chronic gynecological infections.
I welcome any excuse to topple this evil regime.
The "never again" crowd can't take a pass on this one. We all know what's happening and history will judge our inaction harshly.
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Comments (4)
Driving home from shooting a corporate video last Friday I found myself in a bus load of young idealistic actors. The discussion turned to international security, and the usual war is never justified rhetoric came out.
We were discussing regime change, WMD’s and Iraq etc and it seemed that no one could see a reason for a Leviathan like intervention. Until I challenged the bus to seriously determine whether they thought the continued existence of a regime that starves, murders, imprisons without trial and stunts the development of its citizens while holding million dollar celebration for it deranged leader was justified.
Then it seemed they could see a justification.
This is not new news. Along with the Palestinian –Israeli issue this is one of the must do’s for any international organisation that seriously wishes to make the world a better place.
Over at Kings of War there’s a debate about the justification for state sponsored assassination. Now in the case of Jong Il , I find myself with a certain moral flexibility.
Posted by David Sutton
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May 9, 2009 3:12 PM
"The "never again" crowd can't take a pass on this one."
Hwew, glad I'm not a part of that crowd.
Posted by jason | May 9, 2009 4:52 PM
"War is never justified" is just an aphorism used most often by people who are not very familiar with the issues. If you ask someone with that default setting "what if you knew that the family in the house next door to you was being tortured and starved by a tyrant father" you get a much more nuanced discussion. But that still begs the question-- what can the average Joe on the street do about North Korea? After my share of petitions and marches for Darfur, I stopped because it really started to feel that it was about China needing Sudanese oil, and what was I supposed to do about that? Donate to research in alternative energy sources? Stop buying Chinese products?
Posted by michal shapiro | May 10, 2009 7:33 AM
I don't know why but the plight of North Korean has troubled me to a greater degree than the many other large scale horrors that can be found in this world. I guess its because, like East Germany (and unlike Burma or Sudan) you can see what North Korea could be, just by looking to the south.
On my first trip to South Korea in 1998 my South Korean was absolutely confident that the Koreas would be unified in a couple years, maybe by the millenium. On subsequent visits I chided him for losing the bet. But on my visit last year we didn't even discuss it, the possibility was too remote and depressing.
I donate to the North Korean Freedom Coalition to fund the propaganda balloons floated over the border to North Korea. But encouraging North Koreans to overthrow their government also has its own moral questions.
Posted by cogmeyer | May 11, 2009 11:35 AM