From seeking refuge to slavery: how North Koreans become victims of human trafficking
North Korean refugee women have been trafficked as soon as they cross into China, often sold as brides to poor farmers or forced into cyber pornography
The great famine that struck North Korea during the 1990s triggered a mass exodus from the reclusive country. An untold number of people have since fled to China and more than 30,000 have defected to a third country such as South Korea.
But North Korean refugee women have been trafficked as soon as they cross into China, often sold as brides to poor farmers or forced into cyber pornography that caters to South Korean men, according to frontline workers.
Dan Chung of Crossing Borders, a non-governmental organisation that provides humanitarian support for trafficked North Korean women and their children of forced marriages, says there’s not enough resources to help care for traumatised children born to North Korean refugees with a Chinese father. Many do not have citizenship and, as a result, are unable to attend school even though China gave identification cards to some children of North Korean refugees in 2009.
“They’re all born into poverty,” Chung said. “Most of them have witnessed their mom abandoning or disappearing or getting arrested by Chinese police and never to be heard again. [There’s] immense trauma from losing your mother. They also hear how ruthless North Korea is.”
One girl in the NGO’s care was told by her mother not to tell the police of her hiding place, a hole in the ground. When the police came looking for her mother, the girl pointed to the hole and her mother was taken away. She never saw her mother again.
