No Coincidences - How Michelle Found Us Twice

Michelle in South Korea,

The work of Crossing Borders often begs the question, “what are the odds?” What are the odds that we would have been able to do this work for close to two decades? What are the odds that our presence in China is still going strong, despite overwhelming constraints? What are the odds that we have been shielded from persecution as we do this highly risky and illegal work?

Last week we encountered another situation that begged this same question when we welcomed our newest Elim House resident “Michelle.”

Michelle grew up in North Korea, a daughter of a single father. Her mother passed away when she was young. After finishing fifth grade, she went to work at the local coal mine. She said that she enjoyed this work very much and remembers it as the happiest time of her life. After she got married, she left her job as a coal miner but she said her marriage was miserable because her husband was “lazy and violent.”

After years of suffering with her husband, Michelle begged him for a divorce. He did not grant it to her so she left him and fled to a nearby town where she found a job. She met another man and moved in with him and lived happily for a year. She was “caught” by the authorities after a year. Her crime was that she was living with a man to whom she was not married. She was sent to a prison camp for one year.

She was released in 2003 and soon after escaped to China. She was sold immediately after she reached the Chinese border. She lived in China for 16 years and suffered greatly while living with this man who was an alcoholic. Though a missionary introduced her to the Lord during her stay there, she found it hard to practice her faith as she dealt with the stresses of an abusive husband and her status as an illegal economic migrant.

She decided to take another chance and escape China via the Underground Railroad in 2019. Little did she know that 2019 would be the last year the Underground Railroad would function. In 2020 the pandemic would shut it down. Michelle was among the last of the 34,000 refugees who resettled to South Korea.

In 2021 she found out that she had stomach cancer. She received treatment for her cancer and is currently recovering. She lived by herself. New to the country, she didn’t have a community. Adjusting to life in a new country with new freedoms is challenging in itself; to do so during a pandemic was extremely difficult. She said that she was extremely lonely. She found out about Elim House through her local Hana Center, a place where refugees are connected to counseling and other resources to help them adjust to South Korea.

After our social workers in South Korea got Michelle’s information and story, they sent it to our missionaries along with a photograph. Our missionary Jenny saw the picture and couldn’t shake the feeling that she might have met Michelle somewhere. This nagging feeling kept Jenny up that night. The next morning Jenny scoured her photographs taken in South Korea but did not find a picture of Michelle. Then she went back in her archives to her time in China. Finally, she connected the dots. Michelle was actually under the care of Crossing Borders in China. Jenny found a picture of Michelle that was taken in 2017.

Michelle (3rd from right) in China with caretakers and other refugees.

Jenny remembers Michelle as a very energetic and happy person. They met in a rural town in China and shared times of great fellowship. They ate lots of Korean rice cake that another refugee had prepared for them. They worshiped together and played games. When they played games, Michelle couldn’t play because she was laughing so hard, Jenny said.

The lives of North Korean refugees in China are often transient. One day Michelle left without a word. We assumed she took the Underground Railroad. When refugees leave like this, it is hard to reconnect with them. We assumed we would never hear from Michelle again.

What are the odds that we would meet Michelle, one of the tens of thousands of North Korean refugees hiding in the most populous country in the world? What are the odds that she would safely leave China and then find us in the bustling urban sprawl of South Korea? We know that in life there are no real coincidences. Michelle was brought back to us for a reason. What that reason is has yet to be revealed to us or to Michelle.

All we know for sure is that God weaves his beautiful plan in our lives. We are excited to see what he has in store for Michelle.

A Make-Or-Break Presidential Election for the Two Koreas

Tension is rising as North Korea launched its second missile test in a week, days before the South Korean presidential election on March 9, 2022. Lee Sung-yoon, a North Korea expert at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, commented that North Korea has often in the past attempted military provocations to influence elections in South Korea, including launching a rocket a week before the December 2012 presidential election, thus “[now], with all eyes on the Ukraine crisis, is an opportune time for North Korea to create more problems for the U.S. and meddle in South Korea’s election.”

CURRENT POLITICAL CLIMATE

While domestic and other economic issues dominate the campaign, North Korea’s ongoing missile activities and foreign policy matters are also expected to weigh on public sentiment. After a month of missile testing in January with 10 launches and despite a series of high profile engagements with South Korean President Moon and former U.S. President Trump respectively, Kim Jong-un’s regime is reported to own around 60 nuclear bombs and intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of destroying any U.S. city.

In preparation for South Korea’s administration change, Pyongyong’s aggressive foreign policy is speculated to serve as an assurance against any possible result in the election. In particular, an aggressive policy provides a strong guarantee for North Korea’s national security in the event the conservative candidate wins and potential engagement between the two Koreas becomes highly unlikely. With an objective to strengthen national security, North Korea’s military capabilities would prove its power to overcome political and economic sanctions imposed by the international community, as well as the pandemic and natural disasters within the nation. On the other hand, if the progressive candidate wins, North Korea’s aggressive foreign policy would place it at an advantageous position with bargaining power to push the newly elected president to reduce tensions arising from the escalating inter-Korean crisis by adopting diplomacy more similar to the current Moon administration.

President Moon Jae In at his inauguration. (Korea.net)

THE 2022 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

The front-runners for the 2022 election are Yoon Seok-youl of the Conservative People Power Party and Lee Jae-myung of the ruling Democratic Party. Polls revealed that Yoon and Lee are running neck and neck, with Lee’s public approval rating at 38 percent and Yoon’s at 37 percent in a survey of 1,000 adults conducted on February 25, 2022, and a tie at 35 percent in another survey from early February 2022.

Yoon stands firm with his conservative predecessors in demanding North Korea’s denuclearisation as a prerequisite for peace talks and economic engagements between the Koreas. In late November 2021, Yoon stated that he would consider cancelling the symbolic inter-Korean 2018 Comprehensive Military Agreement, a critical diplomatic legacy of President Moon, if North Korea does not change its attitude, as he would not seek a summit with Kim Jong-un “just for show.” In January 2022, Yoon alarmed many by advocating a pre-emptive military strike to stop North Korean hypersonic attacks. His emphasis on resuming joint military exercises with the U.S., which have been scaled down since 2018, is likely to anger Kim Jong-un. Khang X. Vu, East Asian politics specialist at Boston College, commented that Yoon’s position is “harsh enough to make North Korea abandon diplomacy altogether, as it was the case during the tenures of Lee and Park.”

In contrast, Lee supports Moon’s gentle approach in forming diplomatic relations and engaging in economic cooperation with the North as a means of initiating denuclearisation, promising to ease existing sanctions upon North Korea’s compliance. In view of Yoon’s stance on a pre-emptive strike, Lee opined that “[a] lot of wars broke out not because of national interest, but because of such heated, emotional exchanges…[it is] important that we should not have any kind of unnecessary stimulation…that could escalate military tension.” Although Lee adopts a similar stance in trying to end the long-lasting Korean war in order to bring Pyongyang back to the negotiating table, Jenny Town, senior fellow at Stimson Centre told CNBC that Yoon is unlikely to copy Moon’s policies, “[while] Moon was personally heavily invested in engineering an inter-Korean summit, and trying to build sustainable, cooperative relations with North Korea, Lee is more likely to uphold the principle of peaceful coexistence while being reluctant to expend too much political capital on trying to achieve it, especially if Pyongyang is uncooperative.”

LESSON FROM UKRAINE

It is interesting to note that Ukraine was the world’s third largest nuclear weapons state and its scientists actually helped Pyongyang develop its missiles during the fall of the Soviet Union. From North Korea’s perspective, Ukraine made a mistake of trading its opportunity to have a nuclear deterrent to ensure its national security against attacks from Russia and the West. Following the Ukrainian invasion, “[the] chance of North Korea believing in U.S.-offered security assurance in return for nuclear disarmament—lock, stock and barrel—is now close to zero,” said Cheong Seong-chang, a senior fellow at Sejong Institute think tank. Since the U.S. is siding with Ukraine and it is now extremely unlikely to seek Russia’s consent for new U.N. Security Council sanctions against Pyongyang, Cheong noted that Kim’s regime would use this time to further develop nuclear weapons.

As tensions across the demilitarised zone escalate, a conservative win for South Korea’s presidential election could potentially ignite new frictions between the two Koreas. In the meantime, North Korea, China, and the U.S. are closely watching as South Korea unfolds its geopolitical fate on March 9, 2022.

North Korean Defector Indicted for Propaganda Balloons

Since the Korean War, North Korean defector groups have sent anti-North Korea leaflets, along with food, socks, medicine, $1 bills, mini radios, and USB drives containing South Korean news and drama, into North Korea attached to helium balloons across the heavily guarded Demilitarized Zone (“DMZ”) or in bottles across border rivers. This movement is no secret to both North and South Korean governments and reports indicate that a number of North Korean defectors had in fact been inspired by messages dropped from the balloons to flee the regime.

SOUTH KOREA BANS ANTI-NORTH LEAFLETS

These balloon launches have been hotly debated for many years as to their effectiveness at the risk of escalating tensions between the South and the North. The official stance of both Korean governments has always been against the launch of propaganda balloons. It is also noteworthy that South Korea had in the past banned such activities during politically sensitive times.  

However, in 2020, the South Korean government officially passed a bill to criminalize the flying of propaganda balloons toward North Korea, despite criticisms by activists that the attempts of improving ties with the North with such a ban would suppress the freedom of expression for South Korean citizens. The 187 lawmakers who supported the bill pledged that the new legislation was passed to avoid unnecessarily provoking North Korea, to ensure the safety of people living near the border and secure stable relations with the North. Under the new law, anyone flying leaflets, auxiliary storage devices or money towards North Korea without government permission is punishable by up to three years in prison or 30 million won (approx. $27,730) in fines.

THE FOUNDING FATHER OF THE BALLOON PROPAGANDA CAMPAIGN CHARGED UNDER SOUTH KOREAN LAW

Since the new law took effect in March 2021, Park Sang-hak, an outspoken North Korean defector-turned-activist became the first person to be indicted on charges of breaking the new anti-propaganda law. Park defected in 1999 and had since been highly vocal in his public campaign to support human rights in North Korea. For many years, Park and his organization, Fighters For Free North Korea, launched balloons into the North containing leaflets which urged North Koreans to challenge Kim Jong-un's administration. In April 2021, Park launched ten balloons carrying a half million leaflets, which later led to him to be charged under the new law for “attempting” to send the leaflets as investigators lacked evidence that the balloons had actually landed in North Korea. South Korean President Moon Jae-in's response to strictly enforce the law against Park shows South Korea’s unwavering stance against such alleged crimes. 

Park’s balloon launch in April also called for criticisms from the North, where Kim Jong-un's sister and spokeswoman, Kim Yo-jong, called Park “dirty human scum” and warned of “consequences.”  However, this left Park undeterred, stating that “[if] an evil law is a law, send me to prison!  Even if they send me to prison, my colleagues will continue to send leaflets.” Meanwhile, it was reported that Park’s lawyer would challenge the case at the Constitutional Court with an aim to overturn the new law.

BALLOON PROPAGANDA CAMPAIGNS OVER THE YEARS

Although there are no officially reported figures on the number of North Koreans who received and read the propaganda leaflets, analysts are of the view that radio broadcasts and USB drives that have been smuggled across the border are more effective means to communicate with people from the North. However, Park’s balloon campaign serves as the most visible tactic, where he had often in the past invited media to his balloon-launching ceremonies and created impactful images of long, cylindrical balloons flown across the DMZ. Once the balloons enter North Korean territory, built-in timers unfasten the vinyl bundles which cause items banned in the North, such as anti-Pyongyang leaflets, dollar bills, bibles, USB drives, etc. to drop from the sky.

However, the South Korean government warned activists that the balloons endanger people living on both sides of the border.  For instance, the North Korean military had accidentally hit South Korean villages while firing shells at balloons crossing the border in 2014, which prompted the South to return fire. Naturally, citizens living close to the border feared for their own safety hence they supported the passing of the new law by a majority of 57-60 percent. Cities and provinces near the border have also called for Park’s punishment, while many fellow North Korean human rights activities further condemned his actions.

For instance, North Korean defector Lee Min-bok said that Park has jeopardized the entire balloon campaign by provoking both governments, “[the] extremely provocative language in Park Sang-hak's leaflets has nothing to do with promoting North Korean human rights, but is tailored to please conservatives and provoke progressives in the South...[he] wants to become a hero by going to prison for fighting this law”.  In contrast with Park’s attention grabbing campaigns, Lee is a low-key activist who has been sending leaflets with news from outside North Korea, rather than criticizing the Kim regime, to the North since 2006.

Despite harsh criticisms concerning Park’s campaign and the series of upcoming trials preceding the recent indictment and for breaking a law on collecting donations, Park told the media that although “Kim Jong-un wants to kill me, and President Moon wants to send me to prison...they cannot stop us from telling facts and truth”.

How God Prepared Cindy to be a Social Worker at Elim House

Cindy, our Elim House Social Worker, hard at work

Meet Cindy, our first team member in South Korea and Elim House’s social worker

Korea requires a licensed social worker to be on staff for a shelter for abused women like Elim House. We shared in February that God had brought us a candidate who was a pastor’s wife and had served North Korean refugees in her church for the past three years. She goes by “Cindy” and has been a huge blessing to both our Elim House residents and our missionaries. We had a chance to sit down with Cindy to get to know her better and ask her a few questions why she chooses to serve North Korean refugees.

What made you want to work with NK refugees?

While working with my husband at our church, I met North Korean refugee women and their children. I came to know their pain and life situations and realized that no one seemed to really understand them. But I was sure that God’s love could heal them just like God’s love did not give up on me. With that hope I was able to start working with them.

How has God prepared you for your role at Elim House?

Through serving in the children’s ministry and a ministry helping with resettlement of North Korean refugees at Onnuri Church, we got to know more about the lives of North Koreans in South Korea, including their culture and the harsh realities they face. At first it was shocking to me and I felt helpless, but I began to realize that the only thing that would give them true freedom from their suffering was the gospel.

I initially served the North Korean refugee population as a volunteer. And three years ago, I decided to formally work with them and started studying to be a social worker.

It seems that is how God has prepared me to be a social worker at Elim House today.

What has been the most challenging experience at Elim House?

The most challenging experience at Elim House has been when I served our residents with the utmost consideration and heart, only to have my efforts shunned and shot back at me like arrows. I was hurt by the actions of some of our residents and I have regrets regarding my reaction to them as well. I feel there are still many things I do not know about North Korean refugees. But because I am also a person in need of God’s love, I am able to relate to them in this way. God has been teaching me a lot through our most difficult residents.

What has been the most blessing experience at Elim House?

It is a blessing for me that God has allowed me to meet a healthy organization like Crossing Borders, a warm missionary couple with loving hearts that always respects and praises me and a women’s shelter that operates with biblical values like Elim House.

Please share some prayer requests with us.

Pray for refugee women who need healing and recovery at Elim House.

Please pray that I will be able to carry out the role of a social worker wisely and fruitfully.

North Korean Refugees Now – Part 3: Reunification

If you ask those around the world who work on behalf of North Korean refugees and North Korean people, there are differing opinions on what should be done in North Korea to alleviate the suffering in North Korea. Some say that all the North Korean people need is an open economy. Others say they need political freedom. Some say that reunification is the only path to lasting peace and happiness.

Reunification is an intriguing option that can bring many changes to the North Korean peninsula and even greatly benefit the 200,000 refugees in China. It can erase the border that has divided the peninsula for 70 years. It can join the vast mineral resources in North Korea with the industrial might of South Korea. It can bring the tens-of-millions of people in the North vital resources like food and medicine. It can bring the gospel into the country.

In today’s post we will explore the status of reunification and spell out how it can affect the 200,000 North Korean refugees in China, the peninsula and the region as a whole.

South Korea’s youth grows increasingly wary of their neighbors to the North and their interest in reunification is waning. This generation has only read about a united Korean peninsula in history books and have heard about it from their grandparents. They have no personal ties to cousins, aunts and uncles they may have in the Hermit Kingdom.

The chart above depicts the shifting sentiments of the Korean people. In 2011, 41 percent of South Koreans in their 20s polled said that reunification was necessary.

In 2014, the Asan Institute for Policy Studies asked South Koreans what words they would use they would associate with North Korea. The results (shown above) depict a population in South Korea that does not use the word “family” or “one nation” in their descriptions of their neighbors to the North. And why would they?

The once united Koreas are yin and yang today. One is rich. The other is poor. One is a democracy. The other is a totalitarian dictatorship. To reunite, many experts say that it will cost South Korea an estimated $2 trillion and disrupt the surging economy of South Korea.

South Korea’s president, Park, Geun-hye has made reunification a key component of her presidency. Some experts say that it’s the country’s last-ditch effort as interest in her country wanes.

In light of the decreased interest of the South Korean people to reunify, Senior Research Scholar at Columbia University, Sue Mi Terry spelled out three likely scenarios for reunification in Foreign Affairs magazine.

The first is what she describes as the “soft landing” in which North Korea improves their economy, engages with South Korea and willfully dissolves under democratic rule. The second involves an implosion of North Korea under economic pressures, in which case South Korea assumes control of the peninsula. The third is a military conflict in which the South and its allies gain control of the North by force.

The most likely, according to Terry, is the second scenario. North Korea implodes due to economic failure or political in-fighting and is absorbed into South Korea.

However, an implosion would send North Korean refugees into China and South Korea, creating an unparalleled humanitarian crisis. Such a scenario, though possible, is unlikely in the status quo as China, North Korea’s largest benefactor, will not allow this to happen for many reasons we discussed in an earlier post.

China sees North Korea as a key, strategic partner for many reasons, namely, to keep the US army far from its borders.

North Korea, on the other hand, has embraced isolationism. Its “rogue state” status has left the dictatorship no choice but to hold onto power in their failed state. They are keen to the fact that any scenario in which the regime topples would mean trials in international courts and possibly execution at the hands of its own citizenry.

The US and its allies have little time to devote to a meaningful solution to the problem of North Korea with wars in the Middle East and its dependence on Chinese imports. Reunification, to world leaders, will likely be an expensive if not bloody process and one which would require too much political will.

But this is, to many, is a short-sighted view. If there is no North Korean dictatorship, the largest destabilizing force in East Asia would be eliminated. 25 million North Korean people would be free from their imprisonment and add South Korea’s dwindling workforce. South Korea would eventually prosper with access to the rich mineral wealth North Korea cannot afford to extract on its own.

Reunification will likely mean that the 200,000 North Korean refugees caught in limbo in China can return home and will not have to live in fear of forced repatriation for the “crime” of their escape.

It sounds almost too good to be true. There are many variables in this process that can harm North Korean refugees. A simple misstep by either of the Koreas, China or the US can cause irreparable damage for this population and the millions of people living on or near the peninsula.

It is a risky and expensive proposition, which politicians do not like. But the alternative is, arguably, even riskier. North Koreans are still hungry. There are tens of thousands in political prison camps. They have no freedom. And they are at the whim of the few at the top who live in opulence and care little about those they oppress.

The real risk isn’t in doing something to free these people, it’s if the world, with all its riches and bounty, does nothing.

We are not saying reunification is the ultimate answer but, in light of the suffering, we believe that something needs to be done.

China Facts: North Korea as a Buffer Zone - North Korean Refugees

How does China's continuing political relationship with North Korea affect North Korean refugees? The Korean peninsula is still at war. No peace agreement has been signed as fighting between North and South stopped in 1953. There are about 29,000 US troops and marines currently stationed in South Korea. South Korea adds about 655,000 active troops to this force.

The Demilitarized Zone (or DMZ), which splits North and South Korea, is currently the most militarized border in the world.

For China to continue to grow economically, they must maintain stability. What this means is simple: No war.

Korean Military forces

China wants to keep this military standoff, involving not only the Koreas, but the United states, as far from its borders as possible.

"For the Chinese, stability and the avoidance of war are the top priorities," Daniel Sneider, the associate director for research at Stanford's Asia-Pacific Research Center, told the Council on Foreign Relations.

China has many interests in North Korea as a strategic partner, none of these interests are in the people who have been suffering since the mid-1990s, many of whom have, as North Korean refugees, come into their borders in search for help. It is, in fact, in the best interests of the Chinese government to reject the North Korean refugees who cross into China, as its desire to appease North Korea as their buffer zone is greater than its desire to harbor North Korean immigrants.

Twice a North Korean Refugee

“We never had enough firewood in the winter,” Yae Rin, a North Korean refugee in Crossing Borders' care told us. “My dad and I would go very early in the morning to the mountain and cut down a pine tree to bring home. We would have been in such big trouble if we were caught. When there was enough snow on the ground, we could take a big tree and slide it down the mountain.” Yae Rin is a young woman. She is less than five-feet-tall. She has a bright disposition and innocence about her. It’s hard to tell that she is a North Korean refugee in hiding in China. It is shocking to learn of the hardship she endured growing up in North Korea. Yae Rin crossed the border into China with nothing and subsequently had to live for years with the fear of repatriation by the Chinese government.

In North Korea, Yae Rin and her family shared a house with four other families and struggled to find enough work to eat on a regular basis. “I had to get out, so I planned to cross the border into China. I went to my friend’s house to prepare to leave but somehow my father found out and stopped me. We cried together and I went back home.” But a few days later, Yae Rin crossed the river into China. She hasn’t seen her family since she escaped.

Soon after crossing over into China, Yae Rin was found by a local Christian who took her to an underground church for safety. Countless other North Korean refugee women are trafficked into China from North Korea or found by wrongdoers and sold as wives or prostitutes. Experts estimate the number of North Korean refugees to be in the hundreds-of-thousands, those who have crossed illegally into China since the Great North Korean of the 1990s.

Yae Rin found work in China and Crossing Borders was able to help her with rent and obtain an ID so she could apply for jobs. She would find work at different restaurants, often working 7 days a week. The field staff at Crossing Borders would meet her regularly during this time for encouragement and prayer. Our missionary couple shared many hours during Yae Rin’s time off talking about her past as well as hopes for her future.

After a few years of struggle and weariness, Yae Rin felt ready to go to South Korea. The trip along the Modern Day Underground Railroad to freedom can take weeks. In addition, South Korea requires each North Korean refugee to take several months of reeducation courses before entering mainstream society. Yae Rin made the trip safely and took all the required coursework in South Korea.

This past year, our field staff who shared time caring for Yae Rin in China were able to meet her just outside a subway station soon after she got her own apartment in Seoul. They hugged and wept for a long time out on the street. They went to her new home and prayed to thank God and cried together again.

Yae Rin, now 26 and a North Korean refugee twice over, through the dangers of China and now in the modern day rush of South Korea, shared one of her first thoughts landing at Incheon airport in South Korea. “I’m finally in Korea. I don’t have to worry about hiding.”

Then while on the bus crossing the long bridge into the city in mid-winter she thought, “I wish my family could be with me now.”

Adjusting to a new life provides many challenges for North Korean refugees but Yae Rin shares that she is happy and now she finally has the freedom to fulfill some of her hopes and dreams. Today, Yae Rin is studying hard and has plans to become a nurse. She may never escape the memories of her past but maybe she feels it’s now her turn to do some healing.

North Korean Defectors: Update on Bo-ah

We informed you earlier this year that a North Korean refugee, “Bo-ah,” was sent off on the Underground Railroad and was well on her way to freedom. Recently, she contacted Crossing Borders and said that she made it to South Korea. She has been through re-education training at South Korea’s school for refugees, Hanawon. Now she is living in Seoul with another North Korean defector. Bo-ah crossed several borders, traversed rivers, climbed mountains and traveled in danger to make it to South Korea. She said that she felt our prayers as she fought her way to freedom.

Bo-ah’s struggles aren’t complete, though she has made it to South Korea. South Korea is now home to more than 25,000 North Korean defectors and many find it difficult to adjust to the modern lifestyle and capitalist society.

Seoul can be overwhelming for the former people of North Korea, people from a country that lives in relative simplicity compared to their southern counterpart. Some North Koreans even share that they are startled by their appliances, which can speak to them. Others are disoriented by the lights. North Korea, with its lack of electricity, becomes pitch black at night.

Though Bo-ah tells us that she is doing fine, she has shared some significant barriers she now has in South Korea. First, because her education in North Korea was only through the third grade. Second, she still longs to reunite with her family.

Just ten years ago, when a North Korean moved to South Korea, it was like they were saying goodbye to your family forever. Today, this is not the case. Through couriers that operate in China and North Korea, defectors like Bo-ah can send messages, money and other items to their remaining relatives.

Andrei Lankov, one of the world’s most respected scholars on North Korea, wrote that 49 percent of all North Korean defectors send money back home through illegal channels. Many send money to get their families out of the country.

Though Bo-ah would like to purchase freedom for her family, she doesn’t have the means nor does she have the education to get a higher-paying job to pay for it.

Until then, she chips away at her studies hoping that one day she will be reunited with her family. Please pray for Bo-ah and the thousands of other refugees who long to see their loved-ones again. Pray for her as she goes to school and church that she would find hope in Christ, despite the sadness of missing her family.

North Korean Orphans: Hae Na

One of the North Korean orphans in our care through Second Wave, “Hae Na,” has gone through a dark period like many of us have in high school or college. Her face seems to be permanently downcast. She shows little emotion. It’s hard for her to talk. She excels at penmanship, arts and crafts, things she can do in silence, alone. At the age of 14 she has seen so much. Hae Na’s mother - who was originally from North Korea - escaped to South Korea when Hae Na was a child. Her mother promised her and her father before she left that she would send for the two of them after she was granted citizenship in South Korea. Years went by without a word until finally, Hae Na's mother called and said she was doing well. But there was no invitation for Hae Na or her father to join her in South Korea.

Hae Na’s father did some digging and heard that his wife was with another man. Ablaze with jealousy, he traveled to South Korea, found her, and murdered her. He was imprisoned and Hae Na hasn’t heard from him since.

Hae Na's caretakers say that they have seen the most change in Hae Na compared to anyone else in their home. This is surprising to hear because from our staff's experience, she is always so quiet.

But every once in a while we will catch her smiling whether it’s while she is playing a game or off thinking on her own. This is the “change” her caretaker was talking about.

Change comes slowly for the North Korean orphans in our group homes. People from the West like to make action plans, formulas and schedules. We see the world as a place we can manicure on our timeline. We are reminded by the foolishness of these plans through people like Hae Na.

On a cool summer evening this year, Crossing Borders' volunteer missionaries took Hae Na and the other North Korean orphans in her group home on a creaky old carnival ride in her town. It was shaped like a boat and it rocked back and forth for what seemed like 20 minutes, much longer than a similar ride in the US would go. She was looking up at the stars. Her hands clenched tightly on the bars in front of her, smiling as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

It is moments like these that remind us that all we can give is our best but ultimately heart change is God’s work - that though there is a darkness that seems unquenchable, ultimately there is light.

Please pray for the deep wounds in Hae Na’s heart and the hearts of all the North Korean orphans and refugees in our care. Pray for healing and, by God's love, for something beautiful to come from the many difficulties they have faced in their lives.

“He makes all things beautiful in his time.” - Diane Ball

Prayer for North Korea and North Korean Refugees: Peace

This week’s prayer topic is simple: Please pray for peace for North Korean refugees and North Korea's people. However, as we pray for peace for North Korea and its people, we understand that the nation is always on the brink of violence. Though war seems unlikely, it is unclear how far North Korea’s new, unseasoned leader may escalate tensions and fear.

In our many conversations with North Korean refugees along the border, defectors in South Korea and South Koreans, nobody wants war – not one person. Nobody thinks it would be good for the Korean people. We pray for peace through God's protection and provision.

In the face of anxiety for the things we cannot control, for the things that are out of our power, we at Crossing Borders ask that you would help us to place North Korean refugees and the people of North Korea into the hands of the Lord.

“O Almighty God, the Father of all humanity, turn, we pray, the hearts of all peoples and their rulers, that by the power of your Holy Spirit peace may be established among the nations on the foundation of justice, righteousness and truth; through him who was lifted up on the cross to draw all people to himself, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” – William Temple, “Prayer for Peace Among Nations”

“O Christ Jesus, when all is darkness and we feel our weakness and helplessness, give us the sense of Your presence, Your love, and Your strength. Help us to have perfect trust in Your protecting love and strengthening power, so that nothing may frighten or worry us, for, living close to You, we shall see Your hand, Your purpose, Your will through all things.” - Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Prayer for North Korean Orphans: Repeated Rejection

It’s a typical story. A North Korean refugee woman flees from China for South Korea. She works, saves and sends for her half-North Korean, half-Chinese child and her Chinese husband. The story should end happily but it often doesn’t. Many North Korean refugees who escape to South Korea and are changed by the fast and glamorous lifestyle. Women soon view their husbands in China as backwards and provincial and begin relationships with South Korean men who have a decided economic advantage over their Chinese counterparts.

“Sang” is an North Korean orphan in our Second Wave program. His mother fled China about four years ago. She, like so many North Korean refugees, sent for her son and husband who purchased her in the early 2000s. But it didn’t end up well for Sang. When Sang and her father arrived in South Korea, her mother was transformed into a busy Seoulite. She had a new life with more money and more opportunity. According to Sang’s father, they were both ignored in South Korea and eventually the father and son moved back to their simple life in China. Sang’s mother hasn’t called or sent money in years.

One of the contributing factors to this trend has been South Korea’s gender imbalance. In the 1980s, when ultrasound technology was more common, South Korea’s gender balance was one of the worst in Asia, according to a study by the World Bank. So egregious was this imbalance that the South Korean government banned doctors from revealing the gender of babies in 1987, according to this article by the New York Times.

Haneul, another one of our North Korean orphans, experienced a similar fate. Her mother, a North Korean refugee, went to Seoul and sent for her father. They planned to send for Haneul but, while her father was in South Korea, her mother was wooed by a South Korean man. Her father returned to China in shame and returned to work on his farm in Northeast China.

Chinese men who purchase North Korean refugee women are often the lowest on the economic spectrum. These men have little to offer Chinese women as far as looks and money. This is why many have to go to the human trafficking market to purchase a North Korean woman. So for these men to compete with rich South Korean men for the affections of their wives is challenging.

For the North Korean orphans under Crossing Borders’ care, this is a second forced separation from their mothers and a second rejection. Many of them feel rejected and abandoned twice over.

Please pray this week for North Korean orphans, who often bare the brunt of the emotional wounds from this situation. Also pray for these families to somehow reunite and become whole again. Until they do, Crossing Borders will continue to fill the gap and nurture them.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: A Quiet Migration

North Korean refugees have been making their way through China to South Korea for about 15 years. About 27,000 of them have made it through the Modern Day Underground Railroad through Southeast Asia to freedom in South Korea and the rest of the world. But there has been another migration from China to South Korea that has been impacting North Korean refugees in the area. Koreans in China have been migrating to South Korea in droves over the past few years. The Chosun Ilbo recently reported that more than 600,000 Korean Chinese have migrated from China to Korea in 2011. And Bloomberg News reported in 2009 the beginnings of a mass migration of South Korean citizens from China back to their homeland.

This secondary migration has made it even harder for North Korean refugees to hide in the region. There are fewer people who are sympathetic to their needs and fewer members of the underground church to aid them as they seek refuge from the world’s most repressive regime.

Recently, Crossing Borders took in a young girl named “Sunnah”. Sunnah's mother is a North Korean refugee who fled to South Korea through the Underground Railroad. Sunnah and her father were beckoned by her mother to South Korea, where they lived until 2010. In a new country with new possibilities, her mother began to ignore Sunnah and her father. Sunnah's parents began to fight and eventually Sunnah's father returned to a life of poverty in Northeast China, bringing his daughter with him.

To make things worse, Sunnah’s father has a degenerative bone disease. He can no longer walk. They stayed with Sunnah's uncle, who also lived in abject poverty.

Their local underground church was poorly equipped to help because many of their members had moved to South Korea in search of economic opportunities. Our missionaries report rapidly diminishing numbers in congregations of underground churches. Many are left with only the elderly in their congregation.

It was by God’s providence that we met Sunnah and her father through friends of friends. She is being put into a boarding school and is doing better.

Please pray for North Korean refugees in this rapidly changing landscape, many of whom are finding it harder and harder to find help.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: Imprisonment

The topic of imprisonment comes up a lot in our work with North Korean refugees. One refugee woman we helped reported to us that she was imprisoned in a gulag in North Korea for illegally trading in minerals with Chinese businessmen because her family didn’t have enough to eat. She subsisted on 24 kernels of corn each day in prison. When they let her out she immediately fled to China. Through God's grace in circumstances, she was later placed under our care.

Another North Korean refugee escaped her abusive husband and family after she was sold to them in the mid-2000s. Her husband’s family beat her for not knowing how to speak Mandarin. They beat her if she didn’t cook Chinese food right. She was raped repeatedly by her husband and her husband’s teenage son. Upon escape, she was also taken in by Crossing Borders.

Many refugees found daily life in North Korea stifling. They were always being watched, monitored by their neighbors, family members and even their own children (children are taught at school to report their parents if they speak ill of the regime). North Koreans are denied freedom of thought, movement and speech.

The North Korean refugees we’ve spoken with in South Korea have more money than they have ever seen in their whole lives. The government helps them with housing, education and job training. And yet there is a profound emptiness in the North Korean refugee community in South Korea. Some report discrimination. Some say they are depressed from the trauma of what they have endured in China and North Korea. Other North Korean refugees say they just miss their families in North Korea. Whatever it is, they too are in a prison of grief and distress.

There is an even greater imprisonment that all North Koreans feel whether they are in a gulag in North Korea, whether they are in China and afraid of being captures, or whether they are free in South Korea. We believe this is a spiritual imprisonment. They in bondage to sin and it is our job as believers to pray for their spiritual freedom in Christ.

As we pray this week, let us remember the prison that North Koreans all over the world are trapped in. Let's pray for light to overtake the darkness.

The Story of Joon, A North Korean Orphan

"Joon" was a North Korean orphan in the care of Crossing Borders. From the stories of our staff and volunteers who met her on the field in China, their lasting impressions speak of her bright smile and energy. They also tell of her surprisingly small stature and the shock that many on the field had when they first met her, learning that she was a young woman of 16 years, not a six-year-old child. Stunted the growth is one of the lasting effects of malnutrition during the Great North Korean Famine. The national impact of starvation and suffering resulted in a population of undersized people who are, even today, noticeably smaller in stature than their counterparts in South Korea. This is an equally, if not more pronounced, attribute of the North Korean orphans and refugees supported by Crossing Borders.

When Joon was 15-years-old, her mother abandoned her and her father in North Korea. Where she was headed, where she is now, remains unknown. Following her mother's departure, Joon lived alone with her chronically ill and alcoholic father who physically abused her.

Joon and her father had crossed over the border from North Korea into China not long after her mother left. Joon's father was captured as an illegal North Korean refugee and died in a Chinese prison, possibly from alcohol poisoning.

All North Korean refugee are considered illegal trespassers and denied human rights in China. The only country that can compare in such abuses with China is Joon’s home, North Korea.

As a young North Korean orphan, a girl without the protection of the law or caretaker, Joon was incredibly vulnerable. She was not only in danger from forces within Chinese law, but outside of the law as well. Human trafficking is prevalent in Northeast China due to a massive gender imbalance produced by the One-Child Policy. Many North Korean refugee women are captured and sold to Chinese men who purchase illegal wives. It was in this dire situation that Crossing Borders was able to step in and place Joon into the home of a local caretaker and staff member.

Our US staff were able to speak with Joon at our missionary’s home after sharing lunch with her. She reminisced about the her home across the border. She told us stories of harsh North Korean winters, times when she endured the abuse of her father. She shared that, even in the cold snow, she collected grass for a living. She was paid less than a quarter per day.

Joon remembered springtime in North Korea as well. Warmth would return to the rural region where Joon lived. The snow would melt to reveal the cold, frozen bodies of those who had died of starvation. Her school days were spent working for her schoolteacher, who made students collect various food scraps during the day, using them as free labor.

It was during our US staff's visit that our missionaries realized that Joon's safety and welfare had been compromised under our caretaker, and that she was in potential danger of being trafficked. Though Crossing Borders could not guarantee that she would be perfectly safe with her caretaker and immediately moved her to live and hide with our field missionaries. Our staff and missionaries spoke with Joon, and it was decided that she would be safest in South Korea. We began developing a plan and considering the steps necessary.

In the following months Joon was secretly and steadily moved from one city to another under the care of our missionaries, evading Chinese authorities from checkpoint to checkpoint. In 2009 we snuck her into the Korean cultural program with hopes she would soon be granted exit out of China and entrance into South Korea. This did not happen.

Our communication with her dropped into complete darkness. For two years, it was unclear if Joon was somehow caught by traffickers or sold as an illegal, 18-year-old bride to a poor Chinese farmer. At worst, we wondered if Joon was even alive.

We later learned that the Korean program into which Joon had been placed imposed a extreme restrictions on Joon. She was not allowed to leave the building, was denied any communication or information on the progress of her movement to South Korea. Joon felt like a prisoner, trapped and desperate. Refusing to cooperate she demanded to be released, but was forced to stay. It was only when Joon began to harm herself to gain their attention that the officials a part of the cultural program agree to let her go.

Joon took matters into her own hands and found a broker to escort her out of China into Southeast Asia. She traveled with a group of five North Korean refugees through the Modern Day Underground Railroad in Laos and made it into Thailand to seek refugee status. She was admitted into South Korea in 2012.

Joon spent three months in Hanawon, a re-education program designed to help North Koreans enter modern society. She received a funds to help her begin building a life for the next year, along with a small apartment furnished with basic supplies that would last her about three months.

Our staff is now in touch with Joon, and has met with her in South Korea. She is finally free.

Joon's story reminds us that even as Crossing Borders works to provide the utmost care and safety for every North Korean orphan and refugee in our care, only God's sovereign and powerful protection can make way to transform their lives. As we work carefully to mitigate risks and keep our refugees from harm, we understand that danger lies all around. All the wisdom in this world cannot perfectly evade the unforeseen circumstances, abuses of power and constant presence of watchful and oppressive authorities. Only God's guidance and care can allow our work to prevail.

We are thankful to Christ for His compassion and love for Joon and for the North Korean orphan. We thank him also for our field missionaries who risk their lives in China to share His message of hope. Please continue to pray with us for Joon and the future of Crossing Borders as we work to bring His compassion to others like her in their pursuit to find salvation.

Prayer for North Korean Refugees: A Homeless People

One of the first North Koreans to come to the U.S. committed suicide in April of 2010. Last year a North Korean refugee and his wife were found dead in their Rochester N.Y. apartment in an apparent murder suicide. Many of the more than 20,000 defectors to make it to South Korea find it hard to adjust to a market-based, modern economy. Such stories might not make sense if you don’t know the context. Why would North Korean refugees who escape from the suffering and poverty of North Korea and China, North Korean refugees who make the dangerous and impossible journey through the modern-day Underground Railroad lose hope once they finally reach their prosperous destination?

I have met North Koreans refugees in China, defectors in South Korea and in the U.S. The story of struggle is almost always the same. They are a people without a nation, a displaced people who cannot find home.

The world they leave behind in North Korea is a place of hunger and oppression. In China they are hunted by the police or captured and trafficked as sex slaves. In South Korea, though they speak the language, they find themselves lost in the frenetic pace of the highly developed country. In the U.S. where only 200 North Koreans have decided to make their home, they are given very little support by the government.

In addition to the adversity of the foreign countries in which they choose to settle, many North Korean refugees long to see their husbands, wives or children who they have left behind, loved ones they may never see again.

As we emerge from our homes this week and live our lives of plenty, let us remember those whose hearts will never be satisfied anywhere except in Jesus Christ. Let us pray for the North Korean refugees whose hearts are yet homeless.