Treat North Korean refugees as ‘humanitarian issue’, former US prisoner Kenneth Bae urges China
- It is a mistake to treat North Koreans who cross the border into China as part of a political issue, he says
- He spent two years imprisoned in a labour camp in the North before founding his NGO
Beijing needs to treat the exodus of North Korean refugees into China as a “humanitarian issue” as Pyongyang intensifies its punishment of defectors, according to an American aid worker imprisoned for two years in a labour camp in the North.
Kenneth Bae, who had been the longest-held American prisoner in North Korea – and now runs the Nehemiah Global Initiative, a Seoul-based NGO that helps refugees from the isolated state – said it would be a mistake for the Chinese government to treat the refugees’ situation politically.
“It’s a matter of separated families, and human lives,” Bae said on Tuesday of the refugee controversy.
“I sincerely hope that China lets them stay in the country or at least allows them to go to third countries [legally], and provides protection to these people.”
Bae, who spent 735 days in a North Korean labour camp after being accused of planning to overthrow the regime,said the number of defectors sent back to the North to face harsh punishment had increased recently.
Beijing, wary of allowing the flow of North Korean refugees into northeast China to undermine either the struggling region’s security or the regime of the North’s leader, Kim Jong-un, has stuck to a policy of sending back defectors.