Donga Ilbo reported today that China has already repatriated 31 North Korean defectors who were arrested last month in and around Shenyang, and whose safety had become a big domestic issue both in South Korea and abroad.
Sadly, the news was not shocking. Daily NK had been hearing from inside North Korea that some of the defectors in Shenyang had been returned, and was monitoring the situation. Within North Korea, they started working to engender fear with lectures about how the “defectors who had sullied the reputation of the socialist system finally got arrested by the Chinese security forces, were handed over to us and have received severe punishment by the Republic” as early as the end of February.
Nevertheless, there had and has been no official confirmation of the repatriations. The Chinese government will not say anything given its fear of international criticism, while the South Korea government is presumably weighing its response. North Korea never talks of such things.
But if the repatriation of the defectors by China is true, China must first and foremost be criticized for acting inhumanely and ignoring the opposition of the South Korean government, people and international community. The group of North Korean defectors included minors and the elderly. One can see how uncivilized China’s attitude to human rights can be when discovering that they wouldn’t even exempt vulnerable groups such as these.
In practical terms, the international movement that has built around this issue must now come to involve other actions that can help save the lives of repatriated defectors. The South Korean government must urge respect for their human rights. The U.S. government must demand improvement during its own talks with Pyongyang. North Korean human rights envoy Robert King must be made fully aware that he is uniquely placed to help save lives.
We need to show the Chinese government that they have made an error. We must mobilize the U.N. and third country governments to work more energetically, so that the Chinese government feels the heavy burden of having repatriated the refugees and is eventually forced to request a more favorable arrangement with North Korea. All they have left is that which we do next.
* Note: Through the course of March 9th, it has become clear that ten repatriated individuals cited in a Donga Ilbo article this morning are unrelated to the group held at Tumen. However, the Tumen group does also appear to have been repatriated by the Chinese government.
