University student group Liberty in North Korea hosted an event Monday titled How to Stop Genocide in North Korea. Four North Korean refugees attended the meeting and spoke about their experiences living in and escaping from North Korea, as well as how to effect change among a totalitarian regime.
LiNK works to promote awareness surrounding — and fundraising to combat — the plight of North Koreans by hosting speakers and reaching out to refugees in the Charlottesville community. The CIO has raised $2,136, which has been used to provide for a North Korean refugee who was living in China.
LiNK President Jasmine Cha, a third-year Engineering student, said the organization also works to support refugees present in the community.
“Being able to reach out to them and help them with translation services or other things they need, we try to do that or try to meet up with them and remind them that even though they think they relocated here, their journey is over and we still care for their wellbeing,” Cha said.
Cha said one of LiNK’s members first approached her about a North Korean woman traveling the United States telling her story, but her manager was ultimately able to bring three additional refugees to visit the University to share their experiences.
Roughly 70 attendees listened to the refugees’ stories, and though the speakers addressed the crowd in their native Korean, Hyun S. Song — their translator — related the stories in English. The first speaker, Hyeon aJi, described the brutality of North Korean prison camps established for those who had escaped and had been repatriated.
“The women who come back to North Korea from China often come back pregnant because they are sold into human trafficking, so there are forced to have an abortion,” Ji said. “I was forced to have an abortion and there was no anesthesia used on me to dull the pain.”
A second speaker, Johan Kim, described his life in North Korea as a singer, as well as his conversion to Christianity once he escaped to China. After growing up in North Korea where propaganda condemned Christianity, he said he was surprised by the scenes he encountered at Christian churches.
“This man who I had never seen in my life was feeding me and clothing me,” Kim said. “He was kneeling before the cross in the sanctuary, praying out loud, and that scene was very shocking to me.”
Kim said the underground Church in North Korea is an old but continually growing movement, though believers painstakingly work to keep their faith underground.
“Once I returned after becoming a Christian, I was able to meet my mother and I found out that my relatives on my mother’s side had been secret Christians all along,” Kim said. “Even a mother cannot reveal to her own children that she is a believer.”
Kim said the North Korean government officially sanctions three religions — Confucianism, Buddhism and Christianity — but in a disingenuous and state-controlled setup.
“These three organizations are all fake and all for show,” Kim said. “The chairpersons of these three organizations are basically members of the Workers’ Party that show loyalty not to their respective gods or religious leaders, but to Kim Jong-un.”
The four speakers also discussed the heavy propaganda the North Korean government exposes its citizens to. A third refugee, Praise Ju, said the experience of listening to radio programming not sanctioned by the North Korean government was thrilling.
“Every night my family listened to the radio secretly under the blanket,” Ju said. “We were listening to South Korea’s voice on the radio and it was so amazing.”
However, she also said the totalitarian regime does successfully control the nation’s media and has firmly established loyalty among many citizens.
“When Kim Jong-il and Kim Il-sung died, the tears shed by all the people was a genuine emotion by those people,” Ji said. “The reason why I say this is because so many North Koreans have been brainwashed to have that emotional response when those two leaders died.”
The three refugees who spoke to the audience discussed the importance of informing themselves about the North Korean regime and spreading this knowledge to others, saying this represents a way to effect change in the country and help its people.
“We can all work together to continue to fight the regime and bring information to North Korea and find ways to really stop genocide in North Korea,” Kim said.
A number of event attendees said they found the talk to be inspiring and eye-opening. First-year Engineering student Tushar Maharishi said he thought the refugees’ stories were authentic and moving.
“I thought it was really amazing how honest and open they were with their stories, how they talked about what they experienced in China and going back to the prison camps,” Maharishi said.
First-year Engineering student Carolina Chung thought it was important for students to understand the situation in North Korea because of the younger generation’s ability to learn more and take action in the future.
“We’re young enough that we have an influence,” Chung said. “We’re more open to taking their stories and experiences and spreading them to other people so they’re aware.”
Cha said she was pleased with the event’s turnout and the audience reception of the speakers.
“It was great to see that all the work the officers put in and all the work the defectors and their translator put in really created an event that meant a lot to everyone,” Cha said. “It was just great to hear their stories and hear what they think the next step will be.”
Cha said the speakers may return to speak with students again in the future due to the success of the event.
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