North Korean defectors stunned by Southern Society

By Jeff Gimm

"Everyone who defects has adjustment problems, said Ko Gyoung-bin, director-general of a settlement center called Hanowan." This quote from a recent Washington Post article may in face be an understatement about North Korean defectors living in South Korea. The article writes that teenagers usually have the hardest time with junk food giving them indigestion and believing that when the lights go out in a theater that someone may kidnap them. The South now holds about 14,000 former North Koreans. That being said, the South does not encourage Northerners to defect for the sake of keeping the peace. However when defectors make it to the South the government "quietly grants them citizenship, gives them an apartment and tries to teach them how not to sink in an education-obsessed capitalist culture."

All of this should remind the West of several things. First, that despite the North's progress in the field of ballistic missiles, their society is that of an impoverished country. Many of these defectors arrive malnourished and their growth stunted as evidence of this condition. Second, many of these people come alone or in small groups. This is because of the Northern governments harsh security measures. "The state practices extensive surveillance of its inhabitants. . . . Authorities have bred a culture of pervasive mistrust." says the Washington Post article. These defectors, more often than not, did not cross the 38th parallel to get to South Korea but rather took detours through China, Burma and Thailand that took many years.
The last thing that this story should remind the West of is that while the focus of foreign policy, for the moment, is focused on Kim Jong Il and his nuclear ambitions, we cannot forget that there is a large population of people being held captive and starving, under his rule. So the next time you envision North Korea, don't merely think of "Team America" or Kim Jong Il, remember that a country is made up of people as well as leaders.