14th December, 2006

Refugees fleeing North Korea say their countrymen are voicing concerns about chronic food shortages in the country with most adding that the food shortage problem in the northern Asian nation had not improved in the past two years, according to a report from the US Committee for Human Rights in North Korea.

More than 1,300 North Korean refugees hiding in China were interviewed for the report, North Korean Refugee Crisis: Human Rights and International Response.

The report found that in violation of international agreements, the Chinese Government is forcibly returning North Korean refugees with as many as two thirds of those interviewed citing “fear of arrest” as their principal source of distress in China.

Nearly 10 per cent of those interviewed indicated they had been imprisoned in gulags in North Korean where they attested to witnessing beatings, hunger and the killing of children.

As many as 97 per cent of those interviewed said they had no intention of returning home with most wanting to settle in South Korea and one in five wanting to live in the US.

Three quarters of those interviewed said the food shortage situation in North Korea had not improved in the past two years while five out of six said North Koreans were now voicing their concerns about the shortages which the report’s editors believe to be a very large number given the oppressiveness of the North Korean regime.

Amazingly more than 40 per cent of interviewees were unaware of international food aid which had been provided to North Korea over the past decade.

The report can be downloaded from www.hrnk.org.

- DAVID ADAMS