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Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia's Underground Railroad
by
Melanie Kirkpatrick
3.85 · Rating details · 587 ratings · 88 reviews
From the world’s most repressive state comes rare good news: the escape to freedom of a small number of its people. It is a crime to leave North Korea. Yet increasing numbers of North Koreans dare to flee. They go first to neighboring China, which rejects them as criminals, then on to Southeast Asia or Mongolia, and finally to South Korea, the United States, and other free countries. They travel along a secret route known as the new underground railroad.
With a journalist’s grasp of events and a novelist’s ear for narrative, Melanie Kirkpatrick tells the story of the North Koreans’ quest for liberty. Travelers on the new underground railroad include women bound to Chinese men who purchased them as brides, defectors carrying state secrets, and POWs from the Korean War held captive in the North for more than half a century. Their conductors are brokers who are in it for the money as well as Christians who are in it to serve God. The Christians see their mission as the liberation of North Korea one person at a time.
Just as escaped slaves from the American South educated Americans about the evils of slavery, the North Korean fugitives are informing the world about the secretive country they fled. Escape from North Korea describes how they also are sowing the seeds for change within North Korea itself. Once they reach sanctuary, the escapees channel news back to those they left behind. In doing so, they are helping to open their information-starved homeland, exposing their countrymen to liberal ideas, and laying the intellectual groundwork for the transformation of the totalitarian regime that keeps their fellow citizens in chains. (less)
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Hardcover, 376 pages
Published September 18th 2012 by Encounter Books
ISBN
1594036330 (ISBN13: 9781594036330)
Edition Language
English
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· 587 ratings · 88 reviews
Oct 25, 2012Gaelen rated it liked it
Shelves: nonfiction
This book has a lot of new and interesting information for those following the North Korean human rights crisis, but unfortunately, it's diminished by the author's overreaching glorification of religion and its role in the humanitarian crisis. Those helping refugees are always referred to as "Christians" rather than "aid workers," etc., and the book goes into some unnecessary digressions about some workers' religious history. The fact that the author is pushing an agenda is distracting and takes away from the compelling information presented. Worth a read, though, and I think the comparison to the pre-Civil-War underground railroad is clever and appropriate. (less)
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Sep 16, 2012Elle Thornton rated it it was amazing
This book is written with the skill and heart of a story-teller and equally so with the scholar's unshakable regard for facts. A former Wall Street Journal deputy editor who has spent years living in Asia, Kirkpatrick develops solid arguments for ways to change a country that is frozen in time. Because of her credentials and the story she tells so well, her ideas are certain to command the attention of policy makers. But beyond Washington and New York, many readers may be moved to act once they've read the harrowing narratives, the descriptions of ordinary souls bravely helping others, once they've read Kirkpatrick's careful portrait of a grotesque and unimaginably cruel regime. (less)
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Nov 11, 2012Scott rated it did not like it
Of all the books I have read on North Korea, this was by far the worst. If you read only one book on North Korea, DO NOT read this one.
The idea of writing about N. Korean refugees is nothing new, what this book could have added was a detailed examination of the method and means of escape and those who help facilitate escape and transfer of refugees from North Korea/China to third countries and then onward to South Korea or elsewhere.
Unfortunately the book spends an inordinate amount of time talking about various religious and "Christian" aspects of the "new underground railroad". I cannot help but wonder if the author was motivated to write such a book based on a christian/religious ideology. (less)
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Dec 09, 2013Bernie Gourley rated it it was amazing
Escape from North Korea is the most intriguing non-fiction book I’ve read in recent months. Kirkpatrick offers a glimpse into the operations of a modern-day underground railroad, one thats stories—sadly—are often no less chilling than those associated with its US Civil War namesake from 150 years ago.
The 17 chapters of this book are arranged into six parts. The organizational logic of the book takes the reader from the germ of an idea to flee all the way to settling into life in a free country, with all the trials and tribulations that are experienced in between. It begins as a story of one person who decides to escape, and who must virtually always get across the border into China on his or her own. Once across the border, there is help to be had if the refugee can find it before he or she gets caught by the Chinese and repatriated or is exploited by nefarious individuals. Danger is ever-present, occasionally even once the individual gets to South Korea.
Chapters 3 through 7 were particularly interesting because they looked at various classes of escapee, some of which one might not realize existed. It starts with the classic defectors, similar to those one might associate with the USSR—political, military, sporting, and artistic figures. This was the main class of refugee until people began starving in the 1990’s due to nation-wide famine.
Next is a chapter on brides for sale. Many North Korean women end up forced into slave marriages. China has a dearth of eligible women due a bias against female children, particularly combined with its one-child policy. Some women are lured across the border under false pretenses, but others, finding themselves fugitives in China, end up being exploited due to their vulnerability. Each bride fetches about $1,200 to $1,500 ($500 to $800 from the wholesaler to the retailer.) There’s also a chapter devoted to the children of such marriages, and particularly the cases in which the mother is repatriated and the child ends up orphaned because children born in China will not be taken by the North Koreans and frequently the fathers want nothing to do with the children. Pregnant women repatriated to North Korea are often forced to abort pregnancies involving Chinese fathers.
One of the most intriguing chapters was on the North Korean lumberjacks residing in Siberia. This profit-sharing deal goes back to the Soviet days. When the Soviet Union imploded, however, the arrangement was kept with some worker rights installed on paper to appease Russia’s newly developed human rights watchdogs. One might wonder how the Kims—fearful of dissidents as they are—would let a group live outside the country on a remote site that’s hard to guard. The answer is that all the lumberjacks had to have both wives and children at home to serve as hostages. Still, some decide to make the break.
There is also a chapter about the Prisoners of War from the Korean War who were trapped on the wrong side of the border.
I’m fairly well-read on the subject of North Korea, but, like most Americans, the bulk of this has to do with Pyongyang’s nuclear program. I, therefore, found some of the stories of the regime’s depravity to be beyond the pale. A sampling of such stories includes:
-guards severely beating a prisoner and then having other prisoners bury the victim alive
-the warden in a state-run orphanage having orphans fight each other for bigger food servings
-a family that killed themselves rather than be repatriated to North Korea
-individuals, such as Ri Hyok-ok, who were executed for distributing bibles
-North Korea’s provision of family information on trans-border family members as a profit-making scheme
-Kim Jong Il pulling a Pol Pot and shutting down the universities and colleges and sending students to work on farms and in factories for months in 2011 because he was afraid that the Arab Spring might be infectious
-Kidnapping foreigners on foreign soil, which North Korea has even admitted to openly.
Sadly, the woeful tales aren’t limited to the North Koreans. Kirkpatrick devotes a considerable amount of space to chastising the Chinese for repatriating North Koreans. Under international law, which China ratified, refugees shouldn’t be sent back to their country of origin if it’s likely they will be punished. China claims that individuals are economic migrants and not political refugees, and it compares them to Mexicans crossing onto American soil—without addressing the fact that Mexicans are not sentenced to hard labor or killed when they are returned to Mexico. The Chinese might also point to Hwang Jang-yop, the author of the North Korean Juche (self-reliance) policy, as an example of a “true” political refugee that they didn’t repatriate, but allowed to migrate to South Korea (where the North Koreans tried to assassinate him in Seoul several times.)
There’s even some disappointing behavior on the side of the US. In 2006, a US consulate employee in China not only turned away several North Korea refugees, but--by speaking openly over an unsecured line--got a conductor on the Underground Railroad arrested.
The end of the book contains an interesting description of how the Kims are beginning to lose the war on keeping the information age out of North Korea. From balloon drops to radio broadcasts, North Koreans are beginning to get true information about both the outside world and their own leadership. Lest one think that no one could possibly believe the propaganda out of Pyongyang, even in the absence of information inflows, there’s a story about an immigrant to America who had a hard time coaxing his family out because they believed that America was out to kill North Koreans. This father’s story of the good life in sunny Florida didn’t entirely convince them, and ultimately they had to be coaxed to their new home in stages. It’s telling that the cellphone was only introduced in North Korea in 2008. While cellphones aren’t that useful for the railroad because they can’t call outside the country, they do allow for some spread of information inside.
One might think that once a North Korean gets to freedom, everything is hunky-dory, but Kirkpatrick discusses the problems that most North Koreans have adjusting to life in South Korea. As workers, North Koreans tend to lack initiative. They just want to be told what to do, and will do no more. It’s not that they’re inherently lazy; they come from a world in which initiative is not rewarded but is often punished.
While it may be hard to believe, most of the emigrants have trouble coping with the massive amount of choice available in their new homelands. Having an entire aisle of the market devoted to laundry detergent overwhelms them. Apparently, a few—very few—have even snuck themselves back into North Korea where all they have to do is do what they’re told, eat what they can, and maybe starve to death.
I think this is an important book that should be read by anyone interested in world affairs. North Korea is truly unique in the world. One telling line from the book was, “Even during the Communist era, Russia was more liberal and prosperous than North Korea.” The continuance of the Kim Dynasty is an unstable proposition, and it’s impossible to know when it will fall and what damage will be done internationally when it does.
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Apr 15, 2015Feisty Harriet rated it it was ok
Shelves: korea
Do not waste your time with this poorly written book. It centers on the stories of men and women who take on enormous risk to help North Korean citizens escape illegally to China and then to South Korea where they receive full citizenship, passports, and classes and funds to help them integrate into regular society. Ok, that is all fine and good. However, Kirkpatrick focuses ONLY on the work of Christian missionaries and seems confident that they are the only people who care about DPRK refugees, ...more
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Feb 05, 2013Kristie Robillard rated it did not like it
I was expecting a hard hitting overview of North Korean policy, escapees stories of their lives in North Korea and what it takes for then to adapt to life in other parts of the world. Sadly, all this book is is a really strange but of religious propaganda with bits about North Korea mixed in. I'm going to try to return it today. I have never returned a booked. DO NOT BOTHER WITH THIS BOOK AT ALL! And if you do please don't pay any money for it!!! Just awful.
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Mar 01, 2018Marsha Altman rated it liked it · review of another edition
Shelves: china, north-korea, history
This is a more general book about the method North Koreans use to escape to China, a nd then often to a second country before reaching South Korea. The author tells many different survivor stories, and gives an overview of the various aid groups and NGOs working to get poeple out of North Korea and help them resettle elsewhere. The author spends a lot of time discussing Christian missionaries, who do rescue and aid North Koreans, but also do a lot of prosletyizing, which is uncomfortable reading to someone like me who is not Christian or thinks that the whole idea of missionizing to a distressed population is something that should have been left behind centuries ago. The book is also more hopeful for the future than I would be, especially because since it was written, Kim Jung-Un has worked with China to crack down hard on escapees. (less)
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Jun 08, 2013Liz rated it it was amazing
Shelves: finished
This book taught me so much about not just North Korea but the entire Korean Peninsula and the surrounding area. Prior to reading this book, I tended to avoid news about North Korea and it's nuclear program because the thought of nuclear war is nothing but depressing. Now I see beyond North Korea's fanatical family dictatorship to it's people and their serious oppression under the Kim Jong Un rule and being entire cut off from the modern world (and potential family members in South Korea) since the end of the Korean War. I'm very happy that there are those who are making efforts to get people out of North Korea as it sounds reform from within is nearly impossible under the oppressive regime. The book also causes me to be much more skeptical of efforts by Kim Jong Un to engage in talks with other world leaders. (less)
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Sep 08, 2012Bill Andruszkiewicz rated it liked it
Shelves: politics
Very good insight to the reckless and brutal Kim family but was too preachy advocating for Christianity. At points seemed to be preaching to the reader rather than describing the plight of North Korean refugees.
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Oct 19, 2018Kʜᴀɴ rated it really liked it
The author tried to describe the sufferings of North Koreans. But she bloated the book with some unnecessary descriptions. Plus poor writing style.
Anyway, for above those I'll give this book 3. Another star to encourage people to read this book only to learn about North Koreans sufferings. Total 4 star.
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Nov 28, 2012Sarah rated it really liked it
I was worried this book would be too gut-wrenching for me to handle. Fortunately, Kirkpatrick writes as a reporter and while there are many gruesome things mentioned (torture, being separated from family, death, concentration camps), none of it is recounted in such a way as to reduce me to a sobbing mess. She still raises compassion and concern for the North Korean people and points out what is being done and what is still undone in helping them.
Kirkpatrick does an excellent job of introducing ...more
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Oct 13, 2016Matt Tyler rated it really liked it
Shelves: 2016
Though a tad long and a bit repetitive, this book tells the fascinating story of a modern day Underground Railroad in which North Koreans are escaping their country for freedom.
I have been thinking about North Korea for a few years now, and have read a few books about the situation. Still, this book tugged on my heart driving a desire within me to pray more, to do more. One thing I can do, and which this book encourages: spread information, which, coupled with helping refugees, is very likely ...more
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Feb 18, 2014Rj rated it liked it
Writing about North Korea has become a popular subject. This weekend I picked up Melanie Kirkpatrick's Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia's Underground Railroad (New York: Encounter Books, 2012). Using the underground railroad of the 19th-century as an example and a map Kirkpatrick shows how North Korean's have escaped from North Korea through China to either South Korea or North America. The underground railroad like the 19th-century example is built primarily by Christian organizations and missionaries who operate clandestinely. Kirkpatrick interviews both refugees and those who help them to build her understanding of how the railroad works. Because Kirkpatrick focuses on the challenges to those trying to escape there is little understanding how the state itself works. Rather, this is a study of based on the narratives of refugees and those who help them, making the work celebratory in tone.
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Mar 10, 2013Becky B rated it it was amazing
Shelves: nonfiction, social-issues, asian-lit-setting-characters
This is an incredibly well-researched, well-written, informative look at the plight of modern North Korean citizens, and their current passageways to freedom. It is one of the most harrowing modern human rights issues of today, but is hardly known. Kirkpatrick explores what is going on inside North Korea, what various refugees do to escape, and how different groups and individuals are working to get those refugees to freedom despite numerous difficulties.
A must read for anyone interested in ...more
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Nov 13, 2014Sarah rated it liked it
Shelves: politics, north-korea
If you're looking for one book to read to give you a good intro to North Korea, this is not the one you should pick. Go for Nothing to Envy, Escape from Camp 14, or Aquariums of Pyongyang instead. This book is okay if you are already familiar with the atrocities going on in North Korea and want to know a little bit more about how refugees escape. Escape from North Korea wasn't as powerful as some of the other books that I have read (and mentioned previously) on the subject, but did give me more insight on the lives of North Korean refugees as they adjust to life in their new countries. While Christians undoubtedly help North Koreans escape, I would have like to known more about other non-religious groups that aid and hide refugees on the "railroad". (less)
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Feb 18, 2014Amber rated it liked it
This book give a decent history of North Korean refugees and tells many heart-wrenching stories of those fleeing the country. It opened my eyes to many of the problems people have in knowing how to leave, what to do when they decide to leave, the dangers, the political problems, the problems adapting, etc. However, the book would have you believe that the only people who help North Koreans are Christians. While I believe that a lot of Christians in China and South Korea do help people, the book pushed the issue so far it seemed like Christian propaganda instead of stories of North Korean refugees. I consider myself a Christian, I believe in God, but the book was heavy handed on the whole concept of North Koreans being completely lost unless they found Christians. (less)
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Aug 04, 2019Cindy rated it it was ok
I enjoyed hearing more of the different types of refugees and the conditions of those returned after trying to escape. It bogged down for me once she got to discussing the role of Christians, those who have converted and the push to try to get more Koreans to return to proselyte.
This is more of a stating the problem, giving an example, explaining the reasons behind it but not an exciting escape story. It's pretty low on details of the escapes themselves which may be to protect some helpers and ...more
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Dec 26, 2015Josiah Jost rated it liked it · review of another edition
Opened my eyes to the incredible oppression happening to the North Korean people. Horrible.
Inspiring and moving to hear of the many stories of Christians and fellow North Koreans risking their lives to help these precious people out.
Very long and informative book.
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Sep 27, 2012Mary Ann rated it it was amazing
Shelves: non-ficiton
I could not put this book down! My heart was moved by the stories of the suffering and courage of the people of North Korea and those who help them find freedom from the oppressive Kim regime.
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Nov 13, 2019Kathy rated it really liked it
I can’t imagine what it would be like to live in a repressive North Korea, and find the will to attempt escape, which is why I chose to read this book. Sadly for me, I still can’t imagine it. But I do understand a whole lot better logistics of escape; the how’s and who’s and where’s. The problems of vulnerability as a refugee, of not being free in China, or stunted and disadvantaged in South Korea. So very little personal stories, but a lot of detail about the new Underground Railroad.
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Apr 24, 2018Amanda R rated it liked it
Shelves: i-tried-unfinished-books, 2018
dnf at 66%
This book is chalk full of facts and insight into what has become the Underground Railroad out of North Korea. It was very educational for the first half but into the second half it began to fizzle out for me. The author kept revisiting issues already touched upon previously in the book. There were many other small annoyances that led to me finally giving up on it.
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Oct 17, 2019Chad Montabon rated it really liked it
Shelves: non-fiction-ranking
Enjoyable with all of the history and graphic detail you might want.
It sets a grim tone and never lets up, but there is a hopefulness there. There is a great emphasis on the Christian involvement in Aisa's Underground Railroad, which makes me wonder if Kirkpatrick is associated with a church, but it is a small quibble in an otherwise very well written book.
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Oct 07, 2018Erin Livs Livingston rated it liked it
Fascinating read on the active Underground Railroad out of North Korea. Some heart wrenching stories along with some miraculous tales of escape. Interestingly, the church play a major role in this system as they are some of the only people willing to risk their lives to help others.
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May 15, 2019Bethany rated it it was amazing
FINALLY! I'm finished. Took me awhile to read this. It was one of those books that you couldn't sit down in one read.
It was very informative and I learned a whole lot, things I didn't even know. This was a good book!
I would recommend this book!
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Apr 13, 2018Shaun Kim rated it it was amazing · review of another edition
One of the best read
One of the best I have read. Well researched , well written while interesting. One thing missing is obviously what's her finding and her view subsequent to 2012 when the book ended. Shaun
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Jul 20, 2018Kristen rated it really liked it
Shelves: nonfiction, library-owns, asia, christian, ebook, stand-alone, north-korea
Great information. A little wordy and dry at times but I found it very worthwhile.
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Jan 08, 2020David Anderson rated it it was amazing
Loved this book so much. Very detailed and a quick read. Reads like a Fiction novel.
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Feb 01, 2019Tae rated it it was amazing
Shelves: books-of-2019
Book 11 of 2019
I try my best to avoid any type of reviews before picking up a book. I had made the mistake with this book by reading someone’s review on Goodreads. It’s relatively easy to avoid reading Amazon reviews since it is at the bottom of the page but I don’t know why I ended up reading this particular review. The review I read was negative in that it had way too much church related stuff. Well, for a Christian like myself, I don’t mind that at all. So I read the book trying to decide for myself if the book did have too much church stuff.
As someone who has read almost every North Korean defector book as well as watched hundreds of defector interviews, I felt like this book sort of puts the finishing touches and gives me a good picture of what efforts are going on in China to help North Korean refugees. Though nothing was mind blowing, bits and pieces were mentioned in the past books or interviews, I really like the way the author laid it out in the book. I also love books that build my list of books Author mentioned Mike Kim and the book that he wrote and a friend of mine from church who worked with him also recommended his book as well.
I’m very grateful to see that Korean Americans are impacting the lives of North Korean refugees and I too have aspirations to do my share. The book mentions LiNK (Liberty in North Korea) which is an organization headquartered in LA that is perhaps most well known organization in providing aid to North Korean refugees and have met some people who have actually worked for LiNK. Such a small world indeed. The part that really frustrated me was the fact that Chinese government aiding North Korea in returning North Koreans back to their homeland. Is relationship between the two countries really that important? I mean North Korea is a speck in their lens compared to everybody else and couldn’t possibly have any impact to China economically or politically. I just have hard time understanding why that is the case.
The reality is that escape from North Korea is harder than ever. They are installing CCTV cameras all across the border. A recent interview I saw stated that it now costs $20,000 to pay a broker to cross into China from North Korea which is a significant price increase from $3,000 back in early 2000s. The numbers aren’t out yet but to give you an idea, in 2017 1,127 North Koreans made it to South Korea and I would assume that number is much smaller for 2018. Sorry if I digressed but I couldn’t help but thinking about these things while I was reading this book. And yes, there are Christian organization do play significant role in aiding North Korea refugees and I’m not sure why the reader had an issue with a matter of fact statement and I thought the coverage was adequate. Do read the book if you have any interest in the North Korean refugees and what they have to endure to escape and the people behind who is orchestrating the aid.
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Aug 02, 2013Dimitar rated it liked it
This book is very insightful with regards to the realities in North Korea - particularly how repressive it is toward its people. Discussions seem to be very accurate, and though I have already been acquainted with most of the stories and realities in North Korea and in China with regards to North Koreans there, I still learned some new stories, perspectives, and realities. For example, I have never examined the allegedly positive relationship between length of stay in China and adaptability to the new life in South Korea, though the author's findings were not surprising to me.
On the other hand, as some of the readers have noted below, the author seems to give too much credit to the Christian missionaries and Christianity as a whole as opposed to simply joined efforts between human rights activists to help North Koreans escape the iron fist that is North Korea.
Also, I somewhat disagree with most of what Mrs. Kirkpatrick wrote in her last chapter. Although I absolutely agree with her suggestion that Kim Jon-un will be the last dictator, and the people will end up rising up against him thus toppling the regime, her discussion as to how this will happen seems a bit too naive. Until the regime is toppled, North Koreans will always fear sharing opinions - especially negative ones - toward the regime because it takes only one "rat" to let the government know about any intention to bring the regime down, and it's over with any small group of people who share their negative sentiments toward the central government. In other words, as dissenting groups grow, they become more unstable because the likelihood of having one "rat" in any such group grows at a higher rate than its own growth.
I also couldn't help but notice how Mrs. Kirkpatrick failed to discuss why China really abides by its repatriation policy. As with every regime, including that of the current one in Bulgaria (a country that is far more democratic than China and North Korea combined and squared), the Chinese regime has one sole goal - its survival. A democratized, free North Korea - all the more unified with South Korea - despite any economic gains to China, is very likely to mobilize people in China to stand against their government, and this time Tiananmen Square will likely be child's play compared to what will probably await the communist government in China.
The book is also a little too repetitive in certain aspects but that does not devalue it. As John Bolton put it, it should be a must read for policymakers, analysts and other people interested in public policy. (less)
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Jun 25, 2013W. Don rated it really liked it
As an American citizen, though I have had the privilege of travel a little (years ago) and catching a glimpse of how some in the rest of the world are forced to live, this book was a stark reminder that I am blessed indeed to have been born and raised in the United States. For me this is a sobering reminder of how fortunate I am, and how unfortunate far too many others in our world are. I have a renewed appreciation for the freedoms I far too often take for granted. I also have a strengthened and humbling thankfulness for so many of my American ancestors who have fought, and in some cases died, both to win and protect the freedoms that I now enjoy, as well as in sincere attempts to provide an opportunity for other peoples around the world to also enjoy them.
Ms. Kirkpatrick does an outstanding job of linking a shining example of the best of the American people during one of the most shameful periods in our history - the pre-civil war Underground Railroad that helped black slaves escape from the Antebellum South - with a current phenomena taking place daily in Northeast Asia under the radar of 24/7/365 world news and headlines. She describes a modern Underground Railroad that exists and is successfully leading desperate North Koreans to their first taste of freedom via China, Mongolia, Southeast Asia, and South Korea.
The suffering, horror, and repression of the North Korean people under the Kim family regime are hard to imagine to one as blessed as I have been, even after they are described in stark and heartbreaking clarity by the author. She pulls no punches in her criticisms, not only of the Kim family, but also of the blind eye and inaction demonstrated by too many nations that should know and do better for the North Korean people - China, Russia, the United States, and even South Korea.
The true stories and real examples are set in modern times. As I read many of the dates and years of significant parts of the narrative I could recall exactly where I was and what I was doing at that time of my life. Yet completely unbeknownst to me, real people on the other side of the world were experiencing hardshps and struggles and risks like to those I had previously only heard about in Amercan history books.
The flyleaf captures it well: "Just as escaped slaves from the American South educated Americans about the evils of slavery, the North Korean fugitives are informing the world about the secretive country they fled...they also are sowing the seeds for change within North Korea itself." (less)
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Amazon review
Reviewed in the United States on March 24, 2016
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
“Escape from North Korea” is the most intriguing non-fiction book I’ve read in recent months. Kirkpatrick offers a glimpse into the operations of a modern-day underground railroad, one thats stories—sadly—are often no less chilling than those associated with its US Civil War namesake from 150 years ago.
The 17 chapters of this book are arranged into six parts. The organizational logic of the book takes the reader from the germ of an idea to flee all the way to settling into life in a free country, with all the trials and tribulations that are experienced in between. It begins as a story of one person who decides to escape, and who must virtually always get across the border into China on his or her own. Once across the border, there is help to be had if the refugee can find it before he or she gets caught by the Chinese and repatriated or is exploited by nefarious individuals. Danger is ever-present, occasionally even once the individual gets to South Korea.
Chapters 3 through 7 were particularly interesting because they looked at various classes of escapee, some of which one might not realize existed. It starts with the classic defectors, similar to those one might associate with the USSR—political, military, sporting, and artistic figures. This was the main class of refugee until people began starving in the 1990’s due to nation-wide famine.
Next is a chapter on brides for sale. Many North Korean women end up forced into slave marriages. China has a dearth of eligible women due a bias against female children, particularly combined with its one-child policy. Some women are lured across the border under false pretenses, but others, finding themselves fugitives in China, end up being exploited due to their vulnerability. Each bride fetches about $1,200 to $1,500 ($500 to $800 from the wholesaler to the retailer.) There’s also a chapter devoted to the children of such marriages, and particularly the cases in which the mother is repatriated and the child ends up orphaned because children born in China will not be taken by the North Koreans and frequently the fathers want nothing to do with the children. Pregnant women repatriated to North Korea are often forced to abort pregnancies involving Chinese fathers.
One of the most intriguing chapters was on the North Korean lumberjacks residing in Siberia. This profit-sharing deal goes back to the Soviet days. When the Soviet Union imploded, however, the arrangement was kept with some worker rights installed on paper to appease Russia’s newly developed human rights watchdogs. One might wonder how the Kims—fearful of dissidents as they are—would let a group live outside the country on a remote site that’s hard to guard. The answer is that all the lumberjacks had to have both wives and children at home to serve as hostages. Still, some decide to make the break.
There is also a chapter about the Prisoners of War from the Korean War who were trapped on the wrong side of the border.
I’m fairly well-read on the subject of North Korea, but, like most Americans, the bulk of this has to do with Pyongyang’s nuclear program. I, therefore, found some of the stories of the regime’s depravity to be beyond the pale. A sampling of such stories includes:
- guards severely beating a prisoner and then having other prisoners bury the victim alive
- the warden in a state-run orphanage having orphans fight each other for bigger food servings
- a family that killed themselves rather than be repatriated to North Korea
- individuals, such as Ri Hyok-ok, who were executed for distributing bibles
- North Korea’s provision of family information on trans-border family members as a profit-making scheme
- Kim Jong Il pulling a Pol Pot and shutting down the universities and colleges and sending students to work on farms and in factories for months in 2011 because he was afraid that the Arab Spring might be infectious
- Kidnapping foreigners on foreign soil, which North Korea has even admitted to openly.
Sadly, the woeful tales aren’t limited to the North Koreans. Kirkpatrick devotes a considerable amount of space to chastising the Chinese for repatriating North Koreans. Under international law, which China ratified, refugees shouldn’t be sent back to their country of origin if it’s likely they will be punished. China claims that individuals are economic migrants and not political refugees, and it compares them to Mexicans crossing onto American soil—without addressing the fact that Mexicans are not sentenced to hard labor or killed when they are returned to Mexico. The Chinese might also point to Hwang Jang-yop, the author of the North Korean Juche (self-reliance) policy, as an example of a “true” political refugee that they didn’t repatriate, but allowed to migrate to South Korea (where the North Koreans tried to assassinate him in Seoul several times.)
There’s even some disappointing behavior on the side of the US. In 2006, a US consulate employee in China not only turned away several North Korea refugees, but--by speaking openly over an unsecured line--got a conductor on the Underground Railroad arrested.
The end of the book contains an interesting description of how the Kims are beginning to lose the war on keeping the information age out of North Korea. From balloon drops to radio broadcasts, North Koreans are beginning to get true information about both the outside world and their own leadership. Lest one think that no one could possibly believe the propaganda out of Pyongyang, even in the absence of information inflows, there’s a story about an immigrant to America who had a hard time coaxing his family out because they believed that America was out to kill North Koreans. This father’s story of the good life in sunny Florida didn’t entirely convince them, and ultimately they had to be coaxed to their new home in stages. It’s telling that the cellphone was only introduced in North Korea in 2008. While cellphones aren’t that useful for the railroad because they can’t call outside the country, they do allow for some spread of information inside.
One might think that once a North Korean gets to freedom, everything is hunky-dory, but Kirkpatrick discusses the problems that most North Koreans have adjusting to life in South Korea. As workers, North Koreans tend to lack initiative. They just want to be told what to do, and will do no more. It’s not that they’re inherently lazy; they come from a world in which initiative is not rewarded but is often punished.
While it may be hard to believe, most of the emigrants have trouble coping with the massive amount of choice available in their new homelands. Having an entire aisle of the market devoted to laundry detergent overwhelms them. Apparently, a few—very few—have even snuck themselves back into North Korea where all they have to do is do what they’re told, eat what they can, and maybe starve to death.
I think this is an important book that should be read by anyone interested in world affairs. North Korea is truly unique in the world. One telling line from the book was, “Even during the Communist era, Russia was more liberal and prosperous than North Korea.” The continuance of the Kim Dynasty is an unstable proposition, and it’s impossible to know when it will fall and what damage will be done internationally when it does.
The 17 chapters of this book are arranged into six parts. The organizational logic of the book takes the reader from the germ of an idea to flee all the way to settling into life in a free country, with all the trials and tribulations that are experienced in between. It begins as a story of one person who decides to escape, and who must virtually always get across the border into China on his or her own. Once across the border, there is help to be had if the refugee can find it before he or she gets caught by the Chinese and repatriated or is exploited by nefarious individuals. Danger is ever-present, occasionally even once the individual gets to South Korea.
Chapters 3 through 7 were particularly interesting because they looked at various classes of escapee, some of which one might not realize existed. It starts with the classic defectors, similar to those one might associate with the USSR—political, military, sporting, and artistic figures. This was the main class of refugee until people began starving in the 1990’s due to nation-wide famine.
Next is a chapter on brides for sale. Many North Korean women end up forced into slave marriages. China has a dearth of eligible women due a bias against female children, particularly combined with its one-child policy. Some women are lured across the border under false pretenses, but others, finding themselves fugitives in China, end up being exploited due to their vulnerability. Each bride fetches about $1,200 to $1,500 ($500 to $800 from the wholesaler to the retailer.) There’s also a chapter devoted to the children of such marriages, and particularly the cases in which the mother is repatriated and the child ends up orphaned because children born in China will not be taken by the North Koreans and frequently the fathers want nothing to do with the children. Pregnant women repatriated to North Korea are often forced to abort pregnancies involving Chinese fathers.
One of the most intriguing chapters was on the North Korean lumberjacks residing in Siberia. This profit-sharing deal goes back to the Soviet days. When the Soviet Union imploded, however, the arrangement was kept with some worker rights installed on paper to appease Russia’s newly developed human rights watchdogs. One might wonder how the Kims—fearful of dissidents as they are—would let a group live outside the country on a remote site that’s hard to guard. The answer is that all the lumberjacks had to have both wives and children at home to serve as hostages. Still, some decide to make the break.
There is also a chapter about the Prisoners of War from the Korean War who were trapped on the wrong side of the border.
I’m fairly well-read on the subject of North Korea, but, like most Americans, the bulk of this has to do with Pyongyang’s nuclear program. I, therefore, found some of the stories of the regime’s depravity to be beyond the pale. A sampling of such stories includes:
- guards severely beating a prisoner and then having other prisoners bury the victim alive
- the warden in a state-run orphanage having orphans fight each other for bigger food servings
- a family that killed themselves rather than be repatriated to North Korea
- individuals, such as Ri Hyok-ok, who were executed for distributing bibles
- North Korea’s provision of family information on trans-border family members as a profit-making scheme
- Kim Jong Il pulling a Pol Pot and shutting down the universities and colleges and sending students to work on farms and in factories for months in 2011 because he was afraid that the Arab Spring might be infectious
- Kidnapping foreigners on foreign soil, which North Korea has even admitted to openly.
Sadly, the woeful tales aren’t limited to the North Koreans. Kirkpatrick devotes a considerable amount of space to chastising the Chinese for repatriating North Koreans. Under international law, which China ratified, refugees shouldn’t be sent back to their country of origin if it’s likely they will be punished. China claims that individuals are economic migrants and not political refugees, and it compares them to Mexicans crossing onto American soil—without addressing the fact that Mexicans are not sentenced to hard labor or killed when they are returned to Mexico. The Chinese might also point to Hwang Jang-yop, the author of the North Korean Juche (self-reliance) policy, as an example of a “true” political refugee that they didn’t repatriate, but allowed to migrate to South Korea (where the North Koreans tried to assassinate him in Seoul several times.)
There’s even some disappointing behavior on the side of the US. In 2006, a US consulate employee in China not only turned away several North Korea refugees, but--by speaking openly over an unsecured line--got a conductor on the Underground Railroad arrested.
The end of the book contains an interesting description of how the Kims are beginning to lose the war on keeping the information age out of North Korea. From balloon drops to radio broadcasts, North Koreans are beginning to get true information about both the outside world and their own leadership. Lest one think that no one could possibly believe the propaganda out of Pyongyang, even in the absence of information inflows, there’s a story about an immigrant to America who had a hard time coaxing his family out because they believed that America was out to kill North Koreans. This father’s story of the good life in sunny Florida didn’t entirely convince them, and ultimately they had to be coaxed to their new home in stages. It’s telling that the cellphone was only introduced in North Korea in 2008. While cellphones aren’t that useful for the railroad because they can’t call outside the country, they do allow for some spread of information inside.
One might think that once a North Korean gets to freedom, everything is hunky-dory, but Kirkpatrick discusses the problems that most North Koreans have adjusting to life in South Korea. As workers, North Koreans tend to lack initiative. They just want to be told what to do, and will do no more. It’s not that they’re inherently lazy; they come from a world in which initiative is not rewarded but is often punished.
While it may be hard to believe, most of the emigrants have trouble coping with the massive amount of choice available in their new homelands. Having an entire aisle of the market devoted to laundry detergent overwhelms them. Apparently, a few—very few—have even snuck themselves back into North Korea where all they have to do is do what they’re told, eat what they can, and maybe starve to death.
I think this is an important book that should be read by anyone interested in world affairs. North Korea is truly unique in the world. One telling line from the book was, “Even during the Communist era, Russia was more liberal and prosperous than North Korea.” The continuance of the Kim Dynasty is an unstable proposition, and it’s impossible to know when it will fall and what damage will be done internationally when it does.
Reviewed in the United States on November 4, 2012
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
The 20th Century birthed many mad and cruel regimes, mixing and matching a familiar litany of horrors -- barbed wire, torture, war-mongering, official hatreds and paranoias, stale economic and political creeds in lieu of transcendent faith, hungry bellies, ugly buildings, concrete grey statues of monomaniacs, weapons of mass destruction -- in varying patterns and degrees of ferocity. For my money, the worst of the worst were the Nazis, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, both of which lasted a few years, and the Kim Family House of Horrors, which has lasted half as long as hell, from whence it springs.
That is the background to this book. Escape from North Korea tells the story of those who try to escape from many different angles: the escape itself, hiding (mostly in China), the role Christians play in helping North Koreans get away, political escapees, South Korea's changing attitudes about its brothers and sisters, the difficulties of adjusting to freedom, the impact individual liberation may have on what is to be hoped with be a freer North Korea in the future. Kirkpatrick is not naive about any of this, recognizing the difficulty, for instance, of ill-educated slaves adjusting to a modern, free, technological society. She has done a thorough job of investigation, and while she chimes certain bells repeatedly -- such as the Christian connection, and her dislike of the South Korean "Sunshine Policy" -- all in all this is a richly informative and thoughtful account. Among other interesting scraps, one escapee noted that something she (he?) missed after leaving North Korea, was the dark sky at night.
As someone who has spent quite a bit of time in China, I am particularly happy to learn more about the role churches in China are playing in helping these lost souls. I can't imagine that even the most hard-boiled western atheist would deny that if anyone needs a little hope in their lives, its the people of North Korea.
One wonders about the wisdom of writing books like this, though. (Like David Aikman's equally skillful journalism in Jesus in Beijing, which I reviewed some years ago for Christianity Today.) Will the North Koreans get ahold of the information here, and use it to go after the good guys? Most likely Kirkpatrick wrote this book on the calculation that the good it may do, in encouraging China to treat its neighbors more humanely, and in encouraging westerners to support the efforts of those who help the North Koreans, will outweigh the dangers. I hope she's right.
That is the background to this book. Escape from North Korea tells the story of those who try to escape from many different angles: the escape itself, hiding (mostly in China), the role Christians play in helping North Koreans get away, political escapees, South Korea's changing attitudes about its brothers and sisters, the difficulties of adjusting to freedom, the impact individual liberation may have on what is to be hoped with be a freer North Korea in the future. Kirkpatrick is not naive about any of this, recognizing the difficulty, for instance, of ill-educated slaves adjusting to a modern, free, technological society. She has done a thorough job of investigation, and while she chimes certain bells repeatedly -- such as the Christian connection, and her dislike of the South Korean "Sunshine Policy" -- all in all this is a richly informative and thoughtful account. Among other interesting scraps, one escapee noted that something she (he?) missed after leaving North Korea, was the dark sky at night.
As someone who has spent quite a bit of time in China, I am particularly happy to learn more about the role churches in China are playing in helping these lost souls. I can't imagine that even the most hard-boiled western atheist would deny that if anyone needs a little hope in their lives, its the people of North Korea.
One wonders about the wisdom of writing books like this, though. (Like David Aikman's equally skillful journalism in Jesus in Beijing, which I reviewed some years ago for Christianity Today.) Will the North Koreans get ahold of the information here, and use it to go after the good guys? Most likely Kirkpatrick wrote this book on the calculation that the good it may do, in encouraging China to treat its neighbors more humanely, and in encouraging westerners to support the efforts of those who help the North Koreans, will outweigh the dangers. I hope she's right.
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Reviewed in the United States on November 30, 2014
This was a horribly written book, that does nothing to inform people about North Korea, or really the struggles of people that flee. All is does it casually reinforce stereotypes - North Koreans and Chinese are godless, ruthless and uncaring. Americans are wealthy, christian and generous. All this books does is push emotional buttons so people in the comforts of their 1st world American living room can pitty the rest of the world, and sleep soundly at night that they live in such a wonderful place.
This book trivializes the lives of Koreans to promote a Churchy religious narrative.
There are much better books out there, like Camp 14, Dear Leader, etc. I read this book after those ones, and I feel dumber, for it, where as the other books I came away more informed. There is nothing to learn about North Korea from a rich white journalist woman's perspective sitting back in America on her laptop.
This book trivializes the lives of Koreans to promote a Churchy religious narrative.
There are much better books out there, like Camp 14, Dear Leader, etc. I read this book after those ones, and I feel dumber, for it, where as the other books I came away more informed. There is nothing to learn about North Korea from a rich white journalist woman's perspective sitting back in America on her laptop.
Reviewed in the United States on July 29, 2013
This book was chosen because it was voted the "Book of the Year" by World Magazine. It has lived up to that acclaim.
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