The situation regarding religious freedom in China is complex. While the phenomenal growth experienced in China's state-sanctioned, registered (i.e. legal) churches is encouraging and truly inspiring, the regulations imposed on these churches are for many, simply unacceptable and prohibitive.
Rather than submit to what they regard as unacceptable levels of regulation, the overwhelming majority of Chinese Christians risk serious persecution in order to worship freely. Meeting and worshipping in unregistered (i.e. illegal) house churches -- without Chinese Communist Party (CCP) permission, without CCP supervision, defying CCP restrictions on movement and evangelism etc -- they risk fines and "administrative detentions" (no charge or trial required) of up to15 days in prison or up to three years in Mao's laogai (a "gulag" of more than 900 state-owned, CCP-administered slave labour camps. Of course this is one reason why "Made in China" is so cheap.)
Propaganda Alert!
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is presently engaged in a strategic global propaganda campaign. The CCP wants everyone to know that it is today a party of suits, not fatigues; advancing prosperity, security and Chinese culture, not revolution.
The CCP's aim is doubtless to bolster nationalistic zeal, delegitimise both domestic and international criticism, and obscure the fact that China remains a totalitarian state.
See: The (propaganda) empire strikes in China
By Kent Ewing, Asia Times on Line, 24 Aug 2010
Included in this propaganda campaign are efforts to present China as a land of great religious liberty where Christianity flourishes, despite regulations.
Chinese authorities recently gave the BBC "unprecedented access" to China's state-sanctioned churches and religious institutions, including Amity House where some 12 million Bibles are published each year (at least 40 percent for export).
Of course the BBC subsequently released a glowing report on the Chinese Communist Party's "commitment to supporting the development of Christianity".
See: China invests in confident Christians
By Christopher Landau BBC News, China, 23 August 2010
"Three decades ago, China's Cultural Revolution saw some of the most dramatic restrictions on the practice of religion ever seen in the modern world.
"But today's communist rulers have radically altered their views about religion and have granted substantial freedom to Christians prepared to worship within state-sanctioned churches.
"Within these boundaries, Christianity is growing in China as never before - and doing so supported by millions of dollars of government funding. . . "
ALSO:
HEART & SOUL, on BBC radio.
Christianity in China
• Episode 1
• Episode 2
The BBC report was of course picked up by others and quickly multiplied -- its message echoing many times over across the globe.
As exciting as church growth in state-sanctioned churches is, this is not the whole story, indeed, it may be little more than a facade, erected to hide totalitarian repression.
In March 2010, I a highlighted an important lecture by Richard Madsen who comments on the fact that while CCP methods of control have evolved, the CCP still demands the church accept the "government master, religion follower" formula of Imperial China's sacral hegemony.
This is indeed the sense we get from listening to the BBC radio programs. The CCP is clearly more than happy to have the church exist as a "servant" to the state, filling in gaps in social services, helping to keep the masses satiated and pacified. However, the CCP is definitely not willing to have the church to act as "prophet".
Meanwhile, along with its interest in exploiting Christian service, the money-idolising CCP is also seriously interested in seeing if it can exploit the link between Protestant Christianity and economic prosperity. Maybe they are gambling that a carefully measured and closely supervised dose of medicinal Christianity will make CCP-ruled China rich. Of course it is absolutely imperative that this medicinal Christianity be "carefully measured" and "closely supervised", for the CCP is fully aware of the problems that could be triggered by an overdose.
In August, the state-funded Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) released its Annual Report on China's Religions.
See: Academy releases report on religion
Source: Global Times, 13 August 2010
According to the CASS report, China currently has 23.05 million Protestant Christians, of which almost one-third converted since 2003. Furthermore, 60 percent said they turned to Christianity after they or family members suffered from illness, while more than half of Chinese Protestants have not received secondary schooling.
Of course many would dispute those statistics. Fan Yafeng (41) a researcher with the Zhongfu Shengshan Institute and ex-CASS researcher flatly rejects CASS's findings as "ridiculous". A house church member for 13 years, Fan asserts that there are at least 500,000 Protestants in Beijing alone -- five times the figure asserted by the CASS -- and that a lot of them are well-educated professionals and intellectuals.
The aim of the CASS report is doubtless to elevate the role of the CCP in the alleged recent explosion of Christianity -- thereby establishing the church's debt to the regime -- while diminishing the Christians themselves as needy and under-educated, i.e. weak and vulnerable, i.e. not the sort of crowd with which any strong, intelligent and influential individual might wish to identify.
Preserving the CCP
Jamestown's China Brief has published a hugely significant study (in two parts) by Arthur Waldron, in which Waldron analyses an eight-part television series in which Chinese social scientists analyse the fall of the Soviet regime. The series is called "Preparing for Danger in Times of Safety -- Historic Lessons Learned from the Demise of Soviet Communism".
According to Waldron the series attributes the demise of the Soviet regime, not to openness or restructuring, but to very specific failures of the Soviet Union Communist Party (SUCP). Decade-long research has determined that the Soviet regime failed "because," reports Waldron, "it gave up the dictatorship of the proletariat, ceased to practice democratic centralism, criticized Stalin, was beguiled by western concepts such as democracy, and also tripped up by Western propaganda and other operations."
The series adulates Lenin and Stalin, while demonising Khrushchev and Gorbachev. Waldron quotes Chinese social scientists Zhou Xincheng and Guan Xueliang who maintain: "The disorders of the 1980s and 1990s in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe all have a conspicuous characteristic, which is that they were all set in motion by negation of and attacks on 'the Stalin model'." They regard Khrushchev's "secret speech" of 14 February 1956 -- "On Personal Worship and its Consequences", in which he denounced Stalin before the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union -- as the beginning of the end. Waldron notes that even today, no criticism of either Stalin or Mao is permitted in China, although Mao is the subject of considerable public criticism regardless.
The Chinese analysts firmly believe that the situation in the Soviet Union could have been salvaged had the Soviets adopted the path subsequently followed by China: adhered to Marxist-Leninist theory and paths while correctly solving its problems and conflicts, correcting mistakes with courage. They conclude that the Soviet regime fell because, in its attempts to make the system more "humane", it failed to maintain a comprehensive dictatorship. "The consensus is," writes Waldron, "that Gorbachev was beguiled by the siren song of 'humanitarian socialism'."
"Such" writes Waldron," is the Chinese official -- it must be stressed official -- diagnosis of the Soviet failure, and from the diagnosis will flow the policy solution. Perhaps it is not surprising, then, that party discipline and unity are at the top of the list of issues being stressed publicly in China today, and simple repression is regularly employed as a means of dealing with tensions, while relatively less emphasis is placed on how to cope with the vast challenges posed to any authoritarian government by a dynamic, growing, and ever-differentiating society."
Waldron regards China's "concealed history" as a ticking time bomb. "It is a good bet," he reckons, "that someone in [the next] generation of leadership will make a Chinese 'secret speech' and turn to the ideas of humanity in socialism, even though they are today officially excoriated in analyses of the disintegration of the Soviet Union."
Chinese Analyses of Soviet Failure: The Party
Publication: China Brief Volume: 9 Issue: 23
November 19, 2009 By: Arthur Waldron for Jamestown
Chinese Analyses of Soviet Failure: Humanitarian Socialism
Publication: China Brief Volume: 10 Issue: 11
May 27, 2010, By: Arthur Waldron
No matter what happens, the CCP does not have the last word on Christianity in China.
Antonio Weiss writes in the Guardian:"With the state now actively financing Christianity, China could well become the largest Christian country in the world."
Weiss' assessment is only partly correct.
For "Yes", China is set to emerge as the world's largest Christian country. Indeed, China is destined to become the greatest missionary-sending nation the world has ever seen.
But "No", it will not be on account of the Chinese Communist Party.
Rather, all the glory will be God's.
For HE alone is sovereign.
And HE is doing a great work in China.
Showing posts with label concentration camps. Show all posts
Showing posts with label concentration camps. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
North Korea: Is Kim Jong-il losing it?
Recommended reading on North Korea:
Is the Dear Leader losing his grip?
By Andrei Lankov
Asia Times 5 March 2010
As Lankov notes: "Contrary to oft-stated accusations, Pyongyang leaders are neither irrational nor ideology-driven; they are a bunch of brilliant Machiavellians, very apt at exploiting the fears and controversies of their enemies and their partners alike."
North Korea has been playing the game brilliantly for a long time: perfectly timed provocations, perfectly timed negotiations, perfectly in control. However, two recent miscalculations, which amount to real strategic errors by the regime, might indicate that it is not business as usual in Pyongyang. In fact, the serious nature of these strategic errors leads Lankov to question whether Kim Jong-il is losing his grip.
"Over the past year or so," writes Lankov, "something strange has begun to happen in Pyongyang. The North Korean leadership has taken some actions that have clearly damaged the interests of the ruling clique. It seems that the once formidable manipulators have for some reason lost their ability to judge and plan."
The two strategic errors in question are: (1) serious miscalculations in Pyongyang's currency reform, which led to unforseen (by the regime) and undesirable results – in particular, massive inflation; (2) serious miscalculations in the recent round of concession-seeking provocations, whereby unusual haste may have caused the plot to backfired and blown Pyongyang's game out of the water, possibly forever (or at least for a while).
Helpful links:
Daily NK
North Korea Economy Watch
------------------------
Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 043 | Wed 17 Feb 2010
NORTH KOREA: WORLD'S WORST PERSECUTOR
Tuesday 16 February was North Korean president 'Dear Leader' Kim Jong-il's birthday. As very little news makes it out of the 'Hermit Kingdom' to 'trigger' a prayer bulletin, we will take this opportunity to focus on the unsurpassed suffering in North Korea. The isolated state follows an ideology known as 'juche' which is essentially Stalinism mixed with the cultic, idolatrous adulation of the 'Eternal (but dead) Leader' Kim il-Sung and his son, the ruling 'Dear Leader' Kim Jong-il.
Like his father before him, Kim Jong-il has perfected the art of maintaining power. According to a recent report in the Guardian (4 February) up to 40 percent of the State's income is derived from illegal activities such as drug-trafficking, sales of weapons and missile technology, and the production of counterfeit US dollar bills. Much of that income is spent buying the loyalty of party officials and the military. Meanwhile the masses are kept isolated, ignorant, brainwashed, impoverished, dependent, starving, weak and terrorised. So any effort to stir up a popular uprising would be doomed, as those with power have too much to lose and those with everything to gain are powerless.
The State runs a gulag of concentration camps / penal labour colonies. Built according to the Stalinist model and housing some 200,000 prisoners, they rival anything the Soviets or the Nazis ever ran. Christianity is a political crime because it recognises an authority greater than Kim and advocates the worship of Someone other than Kim. Merely possessing a Bible risks public execution. Open Doors estimates that as many as 70,000 Christians may be incarcerated. To ensure that the contaminant of a political criminal is totally expunged, their whole family to three generations will also be incarcerated. Many don't survive more than a few years as prisoners are worked, tortured and starved to death. Prisoners, including family units, are even used as guinea pigs in chemical weapons testing. (Click here for the 2004 BBC documentary on North Korea, Access of Evil)
In 2002 famine, the result of regime mismanagement, led to the spontaneous rise of markets. Whilst illegal, the markets flourished because of corruption. By 2004, the regime had given up trying to control the markets and so it announced it would be moving to a market economy. However, it didn't take them long to realise that the openness and independence that came with market activity could undo decades of myth-making and propaganda. By 2006 the regime was clamping down and re-Stalinising the State, closing markets, shutting down communications and forcing people back into totally unprofitable mines and industries solely for the purpose of control and indoctrination. By 2008 North Korea had returned to deep isolation. Starvation loomed in 2009 and markets sprang up again. So this time they changed the currency. North Korea expert Kim Young Hwan told Daily NK (20 January) that he sees the re-denomination as the regime's attempt to 'deal a blow to people's thinking', lest they think they can act spontaneously, solve their own problems, and not be dependent on Kim Jong-il.
Kim Jong-il is presented to the North Koreans as a divine, Messiah-like figure. Whilst he was actually born in the former Soviet Union in 1941 during his father's exile there, the myth is that he was born in 1942 in a log cabin on the top of North Korea's highest mountain, Mt Paektu, under a double rainbow and a bright star. There is (supposedly) nothing this 1.57m (5ft 3in) god-man cannot do. Though Western media frequently portray Kim as a crazy, vain, spoilt playboy (which he is) he is also an exceptionally cruel, master manipulator who knows exactly what he needs to do to stay in power and is prepared to do it.
When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 the Soviet regime was spread wafer-thin, while the people had been enlightened, strengthened and emboldened through glastnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring). In the end, the Wall fell because, due to prayer -- not just circumstances, the Soviets knew it was over and the guns fell silent (no massacre). Pyongyang 2010 is the opposite: the regime is concentrated, fortified and confident, while the people are physically weak and without options or hope. But despite the apparent hopelessness of the situation, there can be no doubt that divine power is capable of anything the divine imagination determines. 'What is impossible with men is possible with God.' (Jesus in Luke 18:27 ESV.)
PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY THAT:
On behalf of the Church in North Korea we pray: 'So now, O Lord our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone are the LORD.' (Isaiah 37:20) -- the prayer of Hezekiah king of Judah, right before the Lord, in answer to his prayer, defended and saved Jerusalem (v33-37).
---
This RLPB was written for the Australian Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission (AEA RLC) by Elizabeth Kendal, an international religious liberty analyst and advocate, and a member of the AEA RLC team.
You may receive future weekly issues direct by sending a blank email to join-rlpb@hub.xc.org
Is the Dear Leader losing his grip?
By Andrei Lankov
Asia Times 5 March 2010
As Lankov notes: "Contrary to oft-stated accusations, Pyongyang leaders are neither irrational nor ideology-driven; they are a bunch of brilliant Machiavellians, very apt at exploiting the fears and controversies of their enemies and their partners alike."
North Korea has been playing the game brilliantly for a long time: perfectly timed provocations, perfectly timed negotiations, perfectly in control. However, two recent miscalculations, which amount to real strategic errors by the regime, might indicate that it is not business as usual in Pyongyang. In fact, the serious nature of these strategic errors leads Lankov to question whether Kim Jong-il is losing his grip.
"Over the past year or so," writes Lankov, "something strange has begun to happen in Pyongyang. The North Korean leadership has taken some actions that have clearly damaged the interests of the ruling clique. It seems that the once formidable manipulators have for some reason lost their ability to judge and plan."
The two strategic errors in question are: (1) serious miscalculations in Pyongyang's currency reform, which led to unforseen (by the regime) and undesirable results – in particular, massive inflation; (2) serious miscalculations in the recent round of concession-seeking provocations, whereby unusual haste may have caused the plot to backfired and blown Pyongyang's game out of the water, possibly forever (or at least for a while).
Helpful links:
Daily NK
North Korea Economy Watch
------------------------
Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 043 | Wed 17 Feb 2010
NORTH KOREA: WORLD'S WORST PERSECUTOR
Tuesday 16 February was North Korean president 'Dear Leader' Kim Jong-il's birthday. As very little news makes it out of the 'Hermit Kingdom' to 'trigger' a prayer bulletin, we will take this opportunity to focus on the unsurpassed suffering in North Korea. The isolated state follows an ideology known as 'juche' which is essentially Stalinism mixed with the cultic, idolatrous adulation of the 'Eternal (but dead) Leader' Kim il-Sung and his son, the ruling 'Dear Leader' Kim Jong-il.
Like his father before him, Kim Jong-il has perfected the art of maintaining power. According to a recent report in the Guardian (4 February) up to 40 percent of the State's income is derived from illegal activities such as drug-trafficking, sales of weapons and missile technology, and the production of counterfeit US dollar bills. Much of that income is spent buying the loyalty of party officials and the military. Meanwhile the masses are kept isolated, ignorant, brainwashed, impoverished, dependent, starving, weak and terrorised. So any effort to stir up a popular uprising would be doomed, as those with power have too much to lose and those with everything to gain are powerless.
The State runs a gulag of concentration camps / penal labour colonies. Built according to the Stalinist model and housing some 200,000 prisoners, they rival anything the Soviets or the Nazis ever ran. Christianity is a political crime because it recognises an authority greater than Kim and advocates the worship of Someone other than Kim. Merely possessing a Bible risks public execution. Open Doors estimates that as many as 70,000 Christians may be incarcerated. To ensure that the contaminant of a political criminal is totally expunged, their whole family to three generations will also be incarcerated. Many don't survive more than a few years as prisoners are worked, tortured and starved to death. Prisoners, including family units, are even used as guinea pigs in chemical weapons testing. (Click here for the 2004 BBC documentary on North Korea, Access of Evil)
In 2002 famine, the result of regime mismanagement, led to the spontaneous rise of markets. Whilst illegal, the markets flourished because of corruption. By 2004, the regime had given up trying to control the markets and so it announced it would be moving to a market economy. However, it didn't take them long to realise that the openness and independence that came with market activity could undo decades of myth-making and propaganda. By 2006 the regime was clamping down and re-Stalinising the State, closing markets, shutting down communications and forcing people back into totally unprofitable mines and industries solely for the purpose of control and indoctrination. By 2008 North Korea had returned to deep isolation. Starvation loomed in 2009 and markets sprang up again. So this time they changed the currency. North Korea expert Kim Young Hwan told Daily NK (20 January) that he sees the re-denomination as the regime's attempt to 'deal a blow to people's thinking', lest they think they can act spontaneously, solve their own problems, and not be dependent on Kim Jong-il.
Kim Jong-il is presented to the North Koreans as a divine, Messiah-like figure. Whilst he was actually born in the former Soviet Union in 1941 during his father's exile there, the myth is that he was born in 1942 in a log cabin on the top of North Korea's highest mountain, Mt Paektu, under a double rainbow and a bright star. There is (supposedly) nothing this 1.57m (5ft 3in) god-man cannot do. Though Western media frequently portray Kim as a crazy, vain, spoilt playboy (which he is) he is also an exceptionally cruel, master manipulator who knows exactly what he needs to do to stay in power and is prepared to do it.
When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 the Soviet regime was spread wafer-thin, while the people had been enlightened, strengthened and emboldened through glastnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring). In the end, the Wall fell because, due to prayer -- not just circumstances, the Soviets knew it was over and the guns fell silent (no massacre). Pyongyang 2010 is the opposite: the regime is concentrated, fortified and confident, while the people are physically weak and without options or hope. But despite the apparent hopelessness of the situation, there can be no doubt that divine power is capable of anything the divine imagination determines. 'What is impossible with men is possible with God.' (Jesus in Luke 18:27 ESV.)
PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY THAT:
- God's unrestrained mercy will spill over North Korea, frustrating the wicked (Psalm 146:9b) and delivering the oppressed. (Psalm 40:11-13)
- Jesus Christ will build (Matthew 16:18) sustain (1 Corinthians 1:8) and perfect (Hebrews 12:2) his Church in North Korea.
On behalf of the Church in North Korea we pray: 'So now, O Lord our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone are the LORD.' (Isaiah 37:20) -- the prayer of Hezekiah king of Judah, right before the Lord, in answer to his prayer, defended and saved Jerusalem (v33-37).
---
This RLPB was written for the Australian Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission (AEA RLC) by Elizabeth Kendal, an international religious liberty analyst and advocate, and a member of the AEA RLC team.
You may receive future weekly issues direct by sending a blank email to join-rlpb@hub.xc.org
Thursday, December 5, 2002
North Korea: Christians suffer as political prisoners.
Date: Thursday 5 December 2002
Subj: North Korea: Christians suffer as political prisoners.
To: World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty E-mail Conference
From: Elizabeth Kendal, Conference Moderator
Hwang Jang-yop was once a spokesman for late North Korean leader Kim Il Sung and his son and successor, Kim Jong Il. He has lived under the protection of South Korean intelligence since becoming the most senior defector from the North in 1997. AFP quotes Hwang as saying, "The suffering and pain of the North Korean people under the current dictatorial regime are much more severe and tragic than what we experienced during the 36 year colonial rule by the Japanese or what we went through during the Korean War." (Link 1)
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has released a report entitled "The Invisible Exodus: North Koreans in the People's Republic of China," November 2002. (Link 2) The HRW report makes no mention of religious freedom or religious persecution. Presumably HRW assumes that all
readers understand that religious belief and expression is a serious political crime in North Korea.
The HRW report, particularly sections II. "The Migrant's Story: Contours of Human Rights Abuse," and III. "A Well-founded Fear: Punishment and Labor Camps in North Korea," is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the suffering of Christians in North Korea. It is estimated that some 100,000 Christians are political prisoners in this nation that was once a land of revival, whose capital, Pyongyang, was once known as "the Jerusalem of the East."
-----------------------------------------------
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) report covers all areas of experience, from escaped prisoners, defecting guards, and starving economic migrants. Through testimonies, it exposes the intolerable oppression and suffering in North Korea, the horrific, inhumane conditions in prison camps, the dangers involved in escape (such as the trafficking of women), the risks involved in assisting escapees (such as imprisonment), and the consequences for escapees who are caught and returned (imprisonment, torture and death). The report also looks at the responsibilities of China and the International community and offers recommendations.
When North Korean refugee Soon-Ok Lee testified before the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom on 24 January 2002, she made it very clear that Christians were regarded as "political criminals". Soon-Ok Lee said that hundreds of the 6,000 inmates in the prison camp in which she was held were there because they were Christians. She said that guards would tell the Christians they could save their lives and be freed if they would refuse to worship God and instead worship Kim Il Sung, the deceased founder of the Marxist regime. She also said that Christians were regularly singled out for the most extreme treatment and toughest punishments. It was the love, grace and steadfast faith of North Korean Christian prisoners in the midst of the most extreme suffering that drew Soon-Ok Lee to Jesus.
(Soon-Ok Lee's prison memoir:
Eyes of the Tailless Animals: Prison Memoirs of a North Korean Woman )
-----------------------------------------------------
A FEW EXCERPTS FROM THE HRW REPORT
Page numbers are from the printer-friendly version (pdf)
-----------------------------------------------------
* From the testimony of a former prison guard: (page 22)
"They investigated whether the repatriated people had any relationship with South Korea. If a person met South Koreans or reporters or wrote articles, or attended church or escaped after committing a crime in North Korea, they would be secretly killed, without even God knowing."
--------------
* From the testimony of a refugee: (page 24)
"When we (HRW) asked if he had learned anything (about China or South Korea) from broadcasts, he denied watching foreign programs: 'Even watching Chinese television can be punished if discovered. If a person is found listening to South Korean broadcasting, he could be punished in a political prison or executed.' He recalled that such an execution had happened to a worker in his prefecture."
---------------
* From the testimony of a former prison guard in a political prison:
(pages 24,25)
"The basic diet was soy sauce, a little fat, cornmeal, some salt water, and perhaps some kimchee (fermented cabbage). Men and women are separated, sometimes with 300 to 400 people sleeping crowded into one room, unable to stretch their legs.
"Those who attempted to escape were held in a separate place. They were often hung on the wall all day long. Sometimes their hands were tied behind their back and they were hung on the wall for three to seven days.
"If it was a political prisoner, his hands would be broken right after he was sent to the prison of the National Security Office. They would then be interrogated. During this, they would not be able to move at all. I witnessed these types of atrocities quite often."
---------------
* From the testimony of a former prisoner: (page 25)
"It was a savage's life, even though people there still had the minds of human beings. I cannot tell vividly enough how it was to be beaten. When our family moved there (prison), we were surrounded by one hundred people and beaten. The police led people to beat us -- newcomers must be broken in spirit this way. There are also professional 'beaters' at the town hall. They bring people there to be beaten who disobeyed the rules. Officials beat so harshly that many of those people became disabled, or their legs were paralysed, or they died.
"In these places, there are no human rights at all for women. What they call sexual harassment in South Korea is nothing. What was going on was beyond description. Everything is exposed; it was nothing to have sex openly. It may be better when a man is married, but as for women, they can't protect themselves in that situation."
----------------
* From the testimony of a former imprisoned official: (page 27)
"The 606 camp was designated for officials charged with economic and political crimes. Conditions were harsh and inmates were treated much like to political prisoners, with no visitors allowed. He gave the following chilling account:
'During my stay there, 1,200 people were sent to the facility and I saw only seven people who left without physical injury or harm. Many people died because of an epidemic, and many others were shot to death. The facility generally released people when they believed that the person would no longer survive. Many of the detainees suffered from pulmonary tuberculosis or other diseases.
'There were about three hundred people in the camp, with a group of thirty in each room. About one hundred people were sent each month, and about ten people were dead every day. If someone didn't receive one meal per day, he would be so weak from starvation that he could not move properly. Since there were no coffins, they put the bodies on a plank and carried them to a hill and buried them.
'I cannot describe the situation properly. Can you imagine expecting the person next to you to die, and when the person dies, taking the corpse's clothing off and wearing it? Since the roof leaks on rainy days, the mattress is always wet. Lice are crawling all over the corpses, but the inmates use the blankets of dead people as soon as they die.'"
----------------
* From the testimony of a woman who escaped North Korea, became a Christian in China, and then returned to North Korea to find her daughter in order to bring her out. According to HRW she "broke down several times as she related the ordeal": (page 10)
"I knew that after leaving North Korea and living in China, every step was dangerous. I was almost captured several times while staying at the hotel, being assisted by the church. I came to realize that God or some divine power existed after experiencing life [in China], even though it was not a very long period. So without that belief, I could not have gone back. When I crossed (the Tuman River), the water came up to my neck! I don't swim very well, and I was scared -- the water was black from flooding. Miraculously, someone came up in front of me and helped me across."
-----------------
- Elizabeth Kendal
Links
1) "North Korean defector savages Kim Jong Il regime" AFP
4 December 2002
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/021204/1/35dpa.html
2) Human Rights Watch
"The Invisible Exodus: North Koreans in the People's Republic of China,"
November 2002, Vol.14, No. 8 (C)
Subj: North Korea: Christians suffer as political prisoners.
To: World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty E-mail Conference
From: Elizabeth Kendal, Conference Moderator
Hwang Jang-yop was once a spokesman for late North Korean leader Kim Il Sung and his son and successor, Kim Jong Il. He has lived under the protection of South Korean intelligence since becoming the most senior defector from the North in 1997. AFP quotes Hwang as saying, "The suffering and pain of the North Korean people under the current dictatorial regime are much more severe and tragic than what we experienced during the 36 year colonial rule by the Japanese or what we went through during the Korean War." (Link 1)
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has released a report entitled "The Invisible Exodus: North Koreans in the People's Republic of China," November 2002. (Link 2) The HRW report makes no mention of religious freedom or religious persecution. Presumably HRW assumes that all
readers understand that religious belief and expression is a serious political crime in North Korea.
The HRW report, particularly sections II. "The Migrant's Story: Contours of Human Rights Abuse," and III. "A Well-founded Fear: Punishment and Labor Camps in North Korea," is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the suffering of Christians in North Korea. It is estimated that some 100,000 Christians are political prisoners in this nation that was once a land of revival, whose capital, Pyongyang, was once known as "the Jerusalem of the East."
-----------------------------------------------
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) report covers all areas of experience, from escaped prisoners, defecting guards, and starving economic migrants. Through testimonies, it exposes the intolerable oppression and suffering in North Korea, the horrific, inhumane conditions in prison camps, the dangers involved in escape (such as the trafficking of women), the risks involved in assisting escapees (such as imprisonment), and the consequences for escapees who are caught and returned (imprisonment, torture and death). The report also looks at the responsibilities of China and the International community and offers recommendations.
When North Korean refugee Soon-Ok Lee testified before the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom on 24 January 2002, she made it very clear that Christians were regarded as "political criminals". Soon-Ok Lee said that hundreds of the 6,000 inmates in the prison camp in which she was held were there because they were Christians. She said that guards would tell the Christians they could save their lives and be freed if they would refuse to worship God and instead worship Kim Il Sung, the deceased founder of the Marxist regime. She also said that Christians were regularly singled out for the most extreme treatment and toughest punishments. It was the love, grace and steadfast faith of North Korean Christian prisoners in the midst of the most extreme suffering that drew Soon-Ok Lee to Jesus.
(Soon-Ok Lee's prison memoir:
Eyes of the Tailless Animals: Prison Memoirs of a North Korean Woman )
-----------------------------------------------------
A FEW EXCERPTS FROM THE HRW REPORT
Page numbers are from the printer-friendly version (pdf)
-----------------------------------------------------
* From the testimony of a former prison guard: (page 22)
"They investigated whether the repatriated people had any relationship with South Korea. If a person met South Koreans or reporters or wrote articles, or attended church or escaped after committing a crime in North Korea, they would be secretly killed, without even God knowing."
--------------
* From the testimony of a refugee: (page 24)
"When we (HRW) asked if he had learned anything (about China or South Korea) from broadcasts, he denied watching foreign programs: 'Even watching Chinese television can be punished if discovered. If a person is found listening to South Korean broadcasting, he could be punished in a political prison or executed.' He recalled that such an execution had happened to a worker in his prefecture."
---------------
* From the testimony of a former prison guard in a political prison:
(pages 24,25)
"The basic diet was soy sauce, a little fat, cornmeal, some salt water, and perhaps some kimchee (fermented cabbage). Men and women are separated, sometimes with 300 to 400 people sleeping crowded into one room, unable to stretch their legs.
"Those who attempted to escape were held in a separate place. They were often hung on the wall all day long. Sometimes their hands were tied behind their back and they were hung on the wall for three to seven days.
"If it was a political prisoner, his hands would be broken right after he was sent to the prison of the National Security Office. They would then be interrogated. During this, they would not be able to move at all. I witnessed these types of atrocities quite often."
---------------
* From the testimony of a former prisoner: (page 25)
"It was a savage's life, even though people there still had the minds of human beings. I cannot tell vividly enough how it was to be beaten. When our family moved there (prison), we were surrounded by one hundred people and beaten. The police led people to beat us -- newcomers must be broken in spirit this way. There are also professional 'beaters' at the town hall. They bring people there to be beaten who disobeyed the rules. Officials beat so harshly that many of those people became disabled, or their legs were paralysed, or they died.
"In these places, there are no human rights at all for women. What they call sexual harassment in South Korea is nothing. What was going on was beyond description. Everything is exposed; it was nothing to have sex openly. It may be better when a man is married, but as for women, they can't protect themselves in that situation."
----------------
* From the testimony of a former imprisoned official: (page 27)
"The 606 camp was designated for officials charged with economic and political crimes. Conditions were harsh and inmates were treated much like to political prisoners, with no visitors allowed. He gave the following chilling account:
'During my stay there, 1,200 people were sent to the facility and I saw only seven people who left without physical injury or harm. Many people died because of an epidemic, and many others were shot to death. The facility generally released people when they believed that the person would no longer survive. Many of the detainees suffered from pulmonary tuberculosis or other diseases.
'There were about three hundred people in the camp, with a group of thirty in each room. About one hundred people were sent each month, and about ten people were dead every day. If someone didn't receive one meal per day, he would be so weak from starvation that he could not move properly. Since there were no coffins, they put the bodies on a plank and carried them to a hill and buried them.
'I cannot describe the situation properly. Can you imagine expecting the person next to you to die, and when the person dies, taking the corpse's clothing off and wearing it? Since the roof leaks on rainy days, the mattress is always wet. Lice are crawling all over the corpses, but the inmates use the blankets of dead people as soon as they die.'"
----------------
* From the testimony of a woman who escaped North Korea, became a Christian in China, and then returned to North Korea to find her daughter in order to bring her out. According to HRW she "broke down several times as she related the ordeal": (page 10)
"I knew that after leaving North Korea and living in China, every step was dangerous. I was almost captured several times while staying at the hotel, being assisted by the church. I came to realize that God or some divine power existed after experiencing life [in China], even though it was not a very long period. So without that belief, I could not have gone back. When I crossed (the Tuman River), the water came up to my neck! I don't swim very well, and I was scared -- the water was black from flooding. Miraculously, someone came up in front of me and helped me across."
-----------------
- Elizabeth Kendal
Links
1) "North Korean defector savages Kim Jong Il regime" AFP
4 December 2002
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/021204/1/35dpa.html
2) Human Rights Watch
"The Invisible Exodus: North Koreans in the People's Republic of China,"
November 2002, Vol.14, No. 8 (C)
Wednesday, July 31, 2002
North Korea: Reassessing self-reliance?
Date: Wednesday 31 July 2002
Subj: North Korea: Reassessing self-reliance?
To: World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty E-mail Conference
From: Elizabeth Kendal, Conference Moderator
North Korea is one of the world's most severe abusers of religious liberty and cruelest persecutors of Christians. The Reunification Talks that commenced in Pyongyang, North Korea, in June 2002, opened a window of hope that change may be possible in the previously impenetrable "Hermit Kingdom". However, the talks have constantly been frustrated and beset with difficulties.
In these testing times we should not forget that many believers, especially South Korean believers, have prayed consistently; even daily for some fifty years, for God to liberate North Korea.
Famine is the primary factor forcing North Korea to once again return to the negotiating table, and to reassess its policy of "Juche" or "self-reliance". While none of the diplomatic or economic changes outlined below relate directly to any religious liberty issues, they do however, give grounds for optimism that North Korea may truly be seeking to end its isolation and commence real engagement with the outside world - in which case, real opportunities to exert influence and leverage regarding religious freedom should also open up.
------------------------------------
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, who recently visited North Korea and met with Kim Jong-il, reports that North Korea is seeking constructive dialogue with Japan and the US to talk unconditionally about lessening its international isolation.
On 25 July 02, only days after Mr. Ivanov's visit, North Korea expressed "regret" to South Korea over the naval clash that occurred on 29 June in which five South Korean sailors were killed. What makes this so significant is that it is so out of character - it is only the third time North Korea has ever expressed remorse in a long history of attacks on South Korea. In this same message, North Korea also proposed the resumption of reunification talks between the North and South - an offer South Korea has accepted. South Korea's Unification Ministry has now offered to send a working-level team to North Korea's Mount Kumgang resort from 2 - 4 August to prepare for a ministerial meeting in Seoul.
But most remarkable, is the news that North Korea has scrapped its centralised state rationing system and is replacing it with public markets that have been operating since 1 July 02. Wages have been increased accordingly to accommodate the change. Factories and companies will also end their reliance on state subsidies and become self-supporting with profits linked to productivity.
A BBC correspondent in Seoul, Kevin Kim, says that recently the North's leader, Kim Jong-il, called for a new way of thinking, suggesting he was more open-minded about adopting capitalist systems in his country. (see link 1) Some observers have compared the steps to those China took in the late 1970s as China gradually opened up its economy.
BACKGROUND
Christians in North Korea have long suffered severe Communist oppression, firstly under the Soviets who controlled North Korea after WWII, and then under Stalin's handpicked successor, Kim Il-sung. It is estimated that some 2,300 North Korean Christian congregations with around 300,000 members have disappeared since the border closed in 1953 at the end of the Korean War. An estimated 100,000 Christians are amongst the one million North Koreans currently suffering as prisoners of conscience in North Korea's gulag of some 200 concentration camps where torture and starvation are commonplace.
It has been reported that in the camps and prisons, Christians are especially despised and singled out for the most severe treatment. Hundreds of North Korean believers found with Bibles have been executed. The government insists that the dead but "Eternal President" Kim Il-sung be worshiped as a god, and his son, the present ruler Kim Jong-il, to whom all manner of supernatural phenomena are attributed, be the object of "ardent worship".
Links
1) BBC "North Korea 'moves to market economy'" 19 July 2000
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/world/asia-pacific/2137826.stm
Subj: North Korea: Reassessing self-reliance?
To: World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty E-mail Conference
From: Elizabeth Kendal, Conference Moderator
North Korea is one of the world's most severe abusers of religious liberty and cruelest persecutors of Christians. The Reunification Talks that commenced in Pyongyang, North Korea, in June 2002, opened a window of hope that change may be possible in the previously impenetrable "Hermit Kingdom". However, the talks have constantly been frustrated and beset with difficulties.
In these testing times we should not forget that many believers, especially South Korean believers, have prayed consistently; even daily for some fifty years, for God to liberate North Korea.
Famine is the primary factor forcing North Korea to once again return to the negotiating table, and to reassess its policy of "Juche" or "self-reliance". While none of the diplomatic or economic changes outlined below relate directly to any religious liberty issues, they do however, give grounds for optimism that North Korea may truly be seeking to end its isolation and commence real engagement with the outside world - in which case, real opportunities to exert influence and leverage regarding religious freedom should also open up.
------------------------------------
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, who recently visited North Korea and met with Kim Jong-il, reports that North Korea is seeking constructive dialogue with Japan and the US to talk unconditionally about lessening its international isolation.
On 25 July 02, only days after Mr. Ivanov's visit, North Korea expressed "regret" to South Korea over the naval clash that occurred on 29 June in which five South Korean sailors were killed. What makes this so significant is that it is so out of character - it is only the third time North Korea has ever expressed remorse in a long history of attacks on South Korea. In this same message, North Korea also proposed the resumption of reunification talks between the North and South - an offer South Korea has accepted. South Korea's Unification Ministry has now offered to send a working-level team to North Korea's Mount Kumgang resort from 2 - 4 August to prepare for a ministerial meeting in Seoul.
But most remarkable, is the news that North Korea has scrapped its centralised state rationing system and is replacing it with public markets that have been operating since 1 July 02. Wages have been increased accordingly to accommodate the change. Factories and companies will also end their reliance on state subsidies and become self-supporting with profits linked to productivity.
A BBC correspondent in Seoul, Kevin Kim, says that recently the North's leader, Kim Jong-il, called for a new way of thinking, suggesting he was more open-minded about adopting capitalist systems in his country. (see link 1) Some observers have compared the steps to those China took in the late 1970s as China gradually opened up its economy.
BACKGROUND
Christians in North Korea have long suffered severe Communist oppression, firstly under the Soviets who controlled North Korea after WWII, and then under Stalin's handpicked successor, Kim Il-sung. It is estimated that some 2,300 North Korean Christian congregations with around 300,000 members have disappeared since the border closed in 1953 at the end of the Korean War. An estimated 100,000 Christians are amongst the one million North Koreans currently suffering as prisoners of conscience in North Korea's gulag of some 200 concentration camps where torture and starvation are commonplace.
It has been reported that in the camps and prisons, Christians are especially despised and singled out for the most severe treatment. Hundreds of North Korean believers found with Bibles have been executed. The government insists that the dead but "Eternal President" Kim Il-sung be worshiped as a god, and his son, the present ruler Kim Jong-il, to whom all manner of supernatural phenomena are attributed, be the object of "ardent worship".
Links
1) BBC "North Korea 'moves to market economy'" 19 July 2000
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/world/asia-pacific/2137826.stm