North Korean Refugees
16' 05"
"Little Korea" street scene at night. | Music | 00:00 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: The Chinese cities which border North Korea are swimming in Korean language, food and culture. | 00:08 |
| The area is home to two million ethnic Koreans, including local Chinese citizens, South Koreans and those from the North. | 00:22 |
North Korean girl band in restaurant |
| 00:35 |
| North Korean restaurants are popular in the area. The staff, as well as waiting on tables, are performers. It's a privileged job for a North Korean citizen to be allowed to work overseas. | 00:38 |
Korean Waitress | KOREAN WAITRESS: I come from the city of Pyongyang in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. I was sent here with our country's great trust. | 00:56 |
North Korean girl band in restaurant | Music | 01:01 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: These waitresses come to work in China for three years. They're watched closely. If they go shopping, the women go in groups, to make sure nobody runs off. | 01:05 |
Korean Waitress | KOREAN WAITRESS: I feel very proud to be here. I am grateful that many foreigners come here to see us perform. | 01:18 |
Korean performer plays instrument | Music | 01:26 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: This is the image the North Korean Government promotes to the outside world. The lives of ordinary citizens couldn't be more different. | 01:29 |
Archive photos. Starving children | Ten years ago these picture of starving North Korean children shocked the international community. It was the height of the famine, scenes like this were common throughout North Korea and 100s of thousands of people died. A similar number fled the country. | 01:41 |
Refugee man | REFUGEE MAN: Many people were starving during the most difficult time. Many couldn't even have one meal a day. | 02:05 |
ARCHIVE - People jumping fences, trying to run past guards |
| 02:14 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: Only four years ago foreign embassies in Beijing were being besieged by North Koreans seeking asylum. Those caught by the Chinese authorities were rounded up and sent back. | 02:19 |
Peters. Super: Tim Peters | TIM PETERS: For a North Korean to leave his country without a passport and without a visa is a capital crime. | 02:35 |
ARCHIVE - People jumping fences, trying to run past guards | It's not just travelling without a document whatever and you might have your passport revoked, | 02:42 |
Peters | this is the equivalent of a capital crime. | 02:49 |
| Music | 02:52 |
McDonnell in car to border | STEPHEN McDONELL: To find out if the lives of North Koreans are still bad enough to warrant a high-risk escape, we travelled to China's border in search of those who've crossed the frontier. | 02:58 |
Images of North Korea shot across the river | Just across the Tumen river is North Korea. The view from China reveals conditions are still very poor. | 03:13 |
Factory/ Field workers | Music | 03:20 |
McDonnell in taxi | STEPHEN McDONELL: To protect their lives, we've hidden the identities of North Koreans who were brave enough to speak out. | 03:26 |
Refugee girl in silhouette | A young woman who recently escaped says many of her neighbours and former classmates have defected. | 03:32 |
| She came to China looking for a better life. | 03:38 |
Refugee girl | REFUGEE GIRL: Many people have risked their lives to come to China for food and clothes but are captured and tortured when they're sent back. | 03:43 |
Refugee woman in silhouette | STEPHEN McDONELL: Another woman came to marry a Chinese man whose photo she'd been given. | 03:57 |
| REFUGEE WOMAN: My family's life has become difficult. We could only get mixed grains as food. | 04:02 |
Peters | TIM PETERS: The lion's share of our work is to shelter North Korean defectors who have fled to China because of malnutrition, oppression, political persecution. | 04:14 |
Tim Peters with Helping Hands group | These are the new easy to read New Testaments for the North Koreans... | 04:26 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: Christian activist Tim Peters is the founder of "Helping Hands Korea". For 10 years he's operated out of South Korea to help North Koreans escape. | 04:32 |
| TIM PETERS: We're now having these bibles shipped... TIM PETERS: And I think people in their 20s and 30s, they look around and they go | 04:42 |
| there's really no future for me in North Korea. What is there for me to do? | 04:50 |
Peters. Super: Tim Peters | It's paralysis, it's people eking out something for the following day or the following month and young people who aspire to something better, many of them are going, "I'm going to risk everything to get out of here." | 04:56 |
Border shots | Music | 05:11 |
Refugee girl in silhouette | REFUGEE GIRL: Since we were kids, we collected firewood by the river, so I had a clear idea of the patrol times. When the troops weren't there, I crossed. | 05:20 |
| No matter how cold it was, I didn't feel it, because I was scared. I didn't have time to feel it. When my feet were on the ice, I closed my eyes and started to run. | 05:34 |
Refugee man lighting cigarette | STEPHEN McDONELL: A North Korean construction worker told us he came to China to make some money. | 05:58 |
Border crossing | REFUGEE MAN: I came with a friend. I followed what my friend did. | 06:04 |
Refugee man in silhouette | When suddenly my friend said to cross the river, together, I immediately jumped into the river. After crossing the river, I was running very fast. | 06:12 |
River on border | STEPHEN McDONELL: Most North Koreans who flee protect their families by not telling anyone they are going to leave. They go in winter to use the ice and many pay off the border guards. | 06:28 |
| Crossing the river has always been dangerous, but in recent months there are reports that the area is becoming even more fortified. TIM PETERS: One of the more troubling signs that we're seeing at the border on the Chinese side, is that | 06:38 |
Peters | there are cameras, a proliferation of cameras, bright floodlights, heat and motion sensors, and another very recent and gravely troubling | 06:53 |
North Korean soldiers carrying guns | development is that there are pictures of North Korean soldiers carrying sniper rifles and | 07:08 |
Peters | they're patrolling with dogs which we didn't see in the past. | 07:19 |
Border river/ Guardposts | STEPHEN McDONELL: The River between China and North Korea is the border and along its banks there are military guard posts and spotting towers. | 07:28 |
Yanbian streets | Along the border area is China's Korean autonomous region called Yanbian. Just looking like the locals here won't keep defectors safe. Most don't speak Chinese and that's essential for daily existence. The result is a life on the run from the Chinese police. | 07:45 |
| WOMAN REFUGEE: The police pay 200 yuan to each person who | 08:06 |
Refugee woman in silhouette | discloses the whereabouts of North Koreans. I'm afraid to be discovered by people here. I'm afraid the police will catch me - that's what I'm most afraid of so I'm always hiding. | 08:13 |
| I thought if I came to China, life would be better, but I was wrong. | 08:30 |
Yanji TV News report | STEPHEN McDONELL: The plight of North Koreans in China is highly sensitive, even at the local television station which broadcasts its news in Korean. | 08:40 |
Li Ying Hua reads news | Newsreader Li Ying Hua isn't comfortable talking about North Koreans. | 08:52 |
Li Ying Hua | LI YING HUA: It seems they have a really hard life in North Korea. I don't know much about the situation there. Some are here for travelling. | 09:00 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: We wondered if the station ever does stories on defectors. | 09:16 |
| LI YING HUA: We've never done any stories on this subject. STEPHEN McDONELL: Why is that? LI YING HUA: Comrade journalist, why we've never done stories? You insist on asking questions on South Korea and North Korea. These things are too sensitive, I dare not say any more. | 09:21 |
Rainy street shots |
| 09:46 |
Tumen Detention Centre | STEPHEN McDONELL: The Tumen Detention Centre has been extended to hold more North Koreans. From here the defectors are returned to North Korea with no questions asked, partly because of China's relationship with its old ideological ally. | 09:54 |
Man on bike sheltering from rain | The Chinese Government also believes this will deter other North Koreans from coming. TIM PETERS: These North Koreans are being | 10:08 |
Tumen Detention Centre | sent back by the hundreds, and some of them being killed and many being tortured and some getting thrown away to a prison camp and the key is thrown away - | 10:17 |
Peters. Super: Tim Peters | and we're going to have an Olympics in this kind of-- with these circumstances unfolding all around us, it's a strange dichotomy, if you ask me. | 10:27 |
Yanbian streets | STEPHEN McDONELL: China says the North Koreans are economic migrants and it denies the United Nations refugee agency access to them. This puts the refugees in a perilous position. There are possibly hundreds of thousands of people who are easy prey for the unscrupulous. They're forced to do dirty and dangerous work for little money. | 10:41 |
Peters | TIM PETERS: Roughly 70% of all North Korean refugees are women and most of these women, one way or the other, fall into the hands of human traffickers, whether they're being sold by fellow North Koreans and deceived or caught by ethnic Korean Chinese citizens and sold. STEPHEN McDONELL: Sold as brides or something like that? TIM PETERS: Sold as brides, or they could be sold into the prostitution night life situation in some of the bigger cities. | 11:07 |
Church sequence | Music | 11:41 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: Church groups may be the best hope for North Koreans who want to be hidden and not exploited. However, involvement with the church can also mean retribution if you're caught and returned to North Korea | 11:48 |
Refugee girl in silhouette/ Church | REFUGEE GIRL: Since I've been to church in China and I'm a citizen of North Korea, if I'm captured and sent back, I will be shot for sure. | 12:05 |
Refugee Man's cigarettes | STEPHEN McDONELL: And it's not only Christians who're in big trouble if they're sent back | 12:23 |
Refugee man in silhouette | REFUGEE MAN: In North Korea, people running away to China are considered as rebels and traitors. | 12:28 |
Kim Jong Il at military parade | STEPHEN McDONELL: These so-called traitors aren't plotting the downfall of North Korea's leader. They seem to think resistance is useless. | 12:38 |
Refugee girl in silhouette | REFUGEE GIRL: Kim Jong Il is the law. Whatever he says it is right. If he says a tiger is a cat, then it's a cat. | 12:53 |
Kim Jong Il at military parade | STEPHEN McDONELL: Many see Kim Jong Il as not only a greater tyrant than his father was, but also as an utterly hopeless leader. | 13:02 |
Refugee girl in silhouette | REFUGEE GIRL: Life was good when Kim Il Sung was alive, but life has not been good since Kim Jong Il came to power. People are saying behind his back that North Korea would develop only after Kim Jong Il dies. | 13:12 |
Yanji streets | STEPHEN McDONELL: You'd think the obvious choice for fleeing North Koreans would be to head for South Korea. But in the five decades since the end of the Korean War, only 9,000 North Koreans have made it all the way. Most won't risk it. | 13: |
Woman performing in restaurant | Despite the threat of severe punishment some even take the option of returning home. | 14:01 |
Refugee man smoking | The construction worker we met plans to sneak back into North Korea soon and says he's promised to pay off the border guards - on the way through. | 14:11 |
| REFUGEE MAN: Every moment I miss my hometown. I miss my family, my parents, | 14:23 |
Refugee man in silhouette shrouded by cigarette smoke | my brothers and sisters. I really want to go back immediately, but since I'm already here I must make some money before I leave. | 14:27 |
Refugee woman in silhouette | STEPHEN McDONELL: The woman who married a local Chinese man has already gone back and forth to give money to her family. | 14:36 |
| REFUGEE WOMAN: After it snowed in winter, I crossed the river by covering my head with white cloth. I know the way back. I gave some money to the guard on the other side and then went home. | 14:41 |
Refugee girl in silhouette | STEPHEN McDONELL: The young woman has big plans which might take a little longer. | 15:00 |
| REFUGEE WOMAN: What I want to do is to study. I want to be a leader of a church and go back to North Korea. | 15:06 |
City lights | Music | 15:16 |
| STEPHEN McDONELL: There's no-one with any real power prepared to help North Korean defectors. | 15:26 |
Freeze frames. Defectors | They're China's responsibility but the only pressure it feels is from North Korea to send them back. | 15:35 |
Walking along border |
| 15:38 |
Town streets | With the Olympic Games next year, China is receiving a good deal of international scrutiny. Yet no-one is asking about this group of people. | 15:43 |
| The North Koreans don't expect their situation to improve one little bit. | 15:52 |
Credits: | Reporter: Stephen McDonell Camera: Rob Hill Editor: Garth Thomas Producer: Mary Ann Jolley | 16:05 |