By Chung Min-uck
It is well-known that female North Korean defectors, even after successfully crossing the border, often fall victim to sex trafficking in China and live in fear of enforced repatriation back to their homeland where appalling conditions that violate human rights await.
Recently, a fresh allegation was made regarding ordeals some defectors are forced to endure in foreign countries before they head to South Korea.
Bad treatment from staff in South Korean embassies overseas surfaced as another trial they have to overcome, according to a human rights worker helping North Koreans.
“(South Korean) embassy officials’ bad treatment of North Korean defectors such as using abusive language against them, refusing them entry into embassies and hanging up on them during phone calls were reported as recently as 2008 across Southeast Asia and China,” said Peter Jung, founder and director of the Justice for North Korea, a Seoul-based activist group, Friday. “I am really shocked that those incidents still take place in overseas missions.”
The activist said he witnessed several cases while he was helping defectors in Southeast Asia. According to Jung, from 2006 to 2007, embassy officials in Laos stopped defectors entering the South Korean embassy, ordering security guards to block the entrance. On some occasions, officials hung up the phone knowing that it was a call from a North Korean defector searching for help.
“I guess the embassy officials did not regard the defectors as Korean people,” Jung said.
Defectors here say such incidents began to increase as the number of North Korean escapees rose during the early 2000s. They claim it could have made embassy officials reluctant to handle every incident carefully. As of now, the total number of North Korean defectors in South Korea is 24,000. This number rose steadily after exceeding 1,000 in 2002, especially those coming from China and Southeast Asia.
“I believe the rapid increase in the number of North Korean defectors sheltering at South Korean missions and refugee camps in the concerned countries led to the mistreatment,” said Seo Jae-pyoung, a defector and secretary-general of the Committee for the Democratization of North Korea. “No matter what the situation is, bad treatment of defectors can be regarded as another type of human rights violation.”
Baek Yo-sep, a student who defected from the North who is now a student at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul, said an official from the South Korean embassy in Vietnam refused to help him when he visited the mission in 2003 after a life-endangering escape through China where the authorities there tried to arrest him numerous times.
The issue came under the spotlight again on Wednesday when a local daily reported that officials working at the South Korean embassy in Thailand used abusive language to defectors detained at an immigration camp under the control of Thai government last year referring to them as “trash.”
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade soon dispatched officials to Bangkok, Thailand, to investigate the case.
Meanwhile, some defectors cautioned against characterizing all embassy officials as abusive.
“I have never experienced such people when I met embassy officials in Cambodia in 2003,” said Kim Chun-ae, a defector. “In my memory, the officials were really kind to me. Most of the defectors have good impressions of South Korean officials because they were there to help.”
“I was really sick when I was in Mongolia before leaving for South Korea in 2008,” said a defector surnamed Sun. “Officials there treated me very well. I never heard of abuse against defectors by embassy officials.”
Man who pushed Korean to his death on New York subway track walks free 
Korea develops super-fast Wi-Fi 
New commander 
[INTERVIEW] 'Jesus' speaks on gay pride, Christian protesters 
Disabled in North Korea killed at birth 
Foreign woman, Korean brokers face prostitution charges 
BIGBANG's T.O.P receives suspended jail term for smoking marijuana 
Discrimination in Korean law 
Summer vacation around the corner? Avoid traffic-choked roads July 29-Aug. 4 
[INTERVIEW] 'Blind hiring can be seed of hope,' says vice presidential spokesperson 
.jpg)
.jpg)
.JPG)