From One Circle Of Hell To The Next

Sexual Abuse Of North Korea's Women
(Part One)

For many North Koreans the life they live and that which the outside world imagines are rather different realities. A small percentage of North Koreans can be considered privileged and have access to the luxuries their South Korean neighbors enjoy daily. These lucky few are able to flaunt their wealth behind closed doors as they pretend to be serving their country's goals of a worker's paradise. For most there is the reality that many outside North Korea first think of... death, starvation, oppression, and state sponsored terror.

In North Korea everything the common Korean does is watched and monitored. Secret police can make anyone, at anytime, simply disappear. The very appearance of being an individual in state that idolizes conformity can be a fatal flaw. There just isn't any room in North Korea for self expression or individual thought. These two things alone are perceived to be the worst threats the state faces even as it's citizens continue to starve to death.

Citizens who are unlucky enough to be deemed an "enemy of the state" find themselves crossing from their current circle in North Korea's hellish existence to the next. These unfortunate souls join an estimated 200 thousand North Koreans in gulags across the country. The "great leader" (and his offspring) have operated these concentration camps for nearly 12 times as long as the Nazis had operated theirs. Yet unlike the Nazi camps, these souls, damned by the state, know that the work they will be doing will not "set them free".

Three Generations

North Koreans who are deemed to be a threat to the tyrants in Pyongyang don't just risk having themselves sent to death camps, but also have their entire families rounded up. North Korea's state policy is that three generations must pay in blood for the accused person's supposed offense. This policy is meant to stamp out the "seed" of the state's enemy.

The three generations policy creates a paralyzing fear in a society that is driven by terror. It creates within the household (a founding base for all civilization) a paranoia that never dissipates. Citizens are encouraged by this fear to monitor their family members. The fear that their brothers', sisters', or parents' mistakes could land them in a prison camp is enough encourage the worst acts of betrayal. Fathers are thus encouraged by the system itself to walk out on their families. Parents who can't provide for their children are encouraged by the system to abandon their children. It is this sense of defeat that chips away at the building blocks upon which North Korea's tyranny is balancing.

In camps the three generation policy is emphasized by a perverse system of bartering with prisoners by camp guards. Family members are told that they can receive rewards for reporting their family members for any given offense. Even though it is well known that many of these such reports will inevitably lead to the public execution of their family members, the rewards are often just enough to break the prisoner. Bribes of food and other vital necessities are the most common rewards. Other times the rewards are just lies and false promises.

This sadistic policy is also applied to the children of prisoners who are born into the concentration camps. Little is provided for the inmates in the way of medical treatment and provisions for raising a newborn. So it is hard to tell just how many children born into these conditions ever actually grow up beyond infancy. The practice of "infant executions" also culls the number of children born into the system the death camps are meant to uphold. But for those who survive their childhood the reality of life behind barbed-wire is all they may possibly know as they are slowly worked to death.

Sexualized Violence 

Once in the death camps the women of North Korea face a reality that is as close to a living death as many will ever come. Every prisoner in North Korea's concentration camps is considered to be less than human in the eyes of the state. Prison guards are trained to view them as animals with whom they can do anything they wish. For the women of North Korea this means they are openly and regularly subjected to rape and sexual molestation. No matter where they are in the camp, at any time, they are expected to subject themselves willingly to rape in all it's forms. There are no exceptions. 

Women who cooperate are raped routinely till the guard or guards move onto their next victim. Yet for many, no matter how well they managed to remain silent during the attacks, this departure of their assailant can mean a sudden execution. For those who appear to have resisted in any way, real or perceived, these victims are often immediately executed. All of them will afflicted with physical, mental, and emotional torment before they are made to "disappear" or suffer in silence. 

Women who survive rape have an added concern if they become pregnant. It is common practice in North Korea's prison camps to force rape victims to have an abortion. These abortions are done without proper medical treatment and are rarely done by a trained doctor. If the woman survives the torment of a crudely performed abortion she must endure the added insult of being refused the right to clean herself afterward. Instead of being given even a shower, forced abortion survivors are left to worry about infection or complications of the procedure itself. 

There is no mercy shown to North Korea's female inmates. They are among the most common victims of public executions, public displays of punishment, and sexualized violence. Girls are targeted for rape from the moment they are old enough to satisfy the guards' lust for virgins and new victims. From that point on the rapes and molestations are a daily threat for female prisoners. 

Infanticide

Childhood in North Korea's concentration camps is almost unimaginable. Husbands and wives who are imprisoned together know that these camps are no place to get pregnant. Yet there is no access to prevention methods of any sort. And as mentioned above, victims of rape are not given access to preventatives either. So any child conceived is at risk from the moment of conception. 

Carrying a child to full term is near impossible. Expecting mothers have to endure severe malnutrition and starvation on a daily basis. Hard labor adds to the stresses of being pregnant in one of North Korea's death camps. Rape and barbaric molestation brings on even more trauma with which the pregnant mother must endure. Then there are the beatings guards use to cause miscarriages in pregnant women.

If a woman under these horrific conditions does manage to give birth to a living child they then face yet another form of perverse barbarism: infant executions.

It was the first time I had seen a newborn baby and I felt happy. But suddenly there were footsteps and a security guard came in and told the mother to turn the baby upside down into a bowl of water. The mother begged the guard to spare her, but he kept beating her. So the mother, her hands shaking, put the baby face down in the water. The crying stopped and a bubble rose up as it died,” 

~ 34 year-old Jee Heon-a.

This story is just one of the tales of such barbaric acts committed by North Korea's prison guards. Not only did this guard attack the mother but then forced the woman to kill her own child. This sort of sadistic hedonism is a long standing undertone to the tales of barbarism carried out by guards who are rewarded for their savagery. The more grotesque they behave, the greater status they achieve in the eyes of a government that values loyalty to it over the lives of it's own citizens.

Ethnic Cleansing 

(Culling Of "Racial Impurities")

Forced abortions are a common treatment in North Korea (both inside and outside prison camps) for the state's policy of riding it's society of "racial impurities". Women are detained upon even the most remote suspicion of having an "impure fetus". At times the forced abortion are ordered by doctors while at other times they are demanded by guards and other agents of the state. In every case they are painful and risk the death of the victimized woman. 

One account of this was given to the United States Human Rights Council and tells of women who were detained for the purpose of causing forced abortions:

"A drug that in diluted form is used to treat skin wounds was injected into pregnant women’s wombs, inducing labor within hours. As there had not been the normal widening of the hipbones during the advance stages of pregnancy to enlarge the birth canal, the labor pains were the same as when delivering a fully grown baby. When the women moaned or cried out in pain as they lay on wooden and cement cell floors, they were hit with wooden stoves and cursed as "bitches who got Chinese sperm and brought this on themselves."'

via Women Under Siege Project

The added insult in many cases is the brutal abuses committed against the victims while and after they are being forced to have brutal abortions. Physical assault is often applied along with verbal abuse as the women are being put through the agony of painful abortions. Yet at times physical assault is also the very tool used to cause the abortions themselves: 

"Mrs. Bang Mi-sun observed ten pregnant women in early 2002 taken to a hospital from the Musan An-jeon-bu detention facility for the purpose of aborting their "half-Chinese babies." Another seven-month pregnant woman adamantly refused to go to the hospital and guards compelled male prisoners to jump on her stomach until the woman aborted on the floor. The woman was then taken to the hospital where she died."

via Women Under Siege Project

The children who do manage to survive are not afforded the basic dignity that any human life merits. Instead of being treated as a human being, these newborn babies are wrapped up in newspaper or bags and tossed into the garbage to die. In a state that supposedly values the worker and all his potential, entire generations of potential lives are discarded callously by an authoritative state.

While officially the state does not recognize the procedure of forced abortions (like all other abuses it commits), North Korea's obsession with racial purity helps to propagate this atrocious act. It's desire to create a society in which an "ideal Korean" worker exists only serves as a prop for the barbarism of it's corrupt military and political upper-class. In the end it is the upon the backs of North Korea's women that the burden of these disillusions falls. And it is the mother and child that pay in blood for a government that lust after the unachievable. 

Survival Sex

The act of forcing women to have sex for supplies of basic nourishment is an act so perverse that it's name alone seems lacking in it's ability to crudely fit it... survival sex. 

Taking advantage of women who are desperate to provide for their families or find that ever illusive next meal is abhorrent. It would be inconceivable if it wasn't such a defining trait across the spectrum of similar events to that of North Korea's prison camps. Survival sex was present in Nazi death camps during the Holocaust. It showed up during the genocide in Bosnia. And has been seen in Sri Lanka's ethnic cleansing of the Tamils. So it is sadly of little surprise that survival sex can be found in the accounts of North Korean refugees. 

In camp inmates the use of survival sex is often applied when a woman or girl becomes the target of a guard's intent to rape. The victim knows that they have a greater chance at surviving if they cooperate with their assailant. Through not fighting back the victim hopes they will not be killed by their attacker. In addition there comes the hope that they will be shown some "mercy" and given access to food and/or clean water. It is a perverse "game" (as referred to by a camp survivor) that guards use to keep a rape victim under their control (since all rape is about violent domination more so than it is about sex).

The gaining of food or water through rape is not assured for North Korean rape victims. Survival sex for them is something that they don't always know they are being subjected to. Instead they are only treated to just enough resources to keep them alive as their assailants see fit. This highlights the brutality of their plight since it best demonstrates the absolute minimal value the state (and the guards themselves) place upon the lives of these female captives.

The Outer Circle Of Hell

In our next post on this subject we will be taking the journey out of North Korea's inner hell and venturing over the border into China. For many North Korean women this is a journey from one circle of hell to the next. It is plagued by human traffickers, forced marriages, and the ever constant threat of forcible repatriation to North Korea. Even with the hope of crossing over into a better life, many will find this journey a living hell as they are transformed into the walking dead.

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Source Documents
(note: not all sources listed)

A Safe World For Women
http://www.asafeworldforwomen.org/trafficking/ht-asia-pacific/ht-china/821-escaping-north-korea-to-slavery-in-china.html

Women Under Siege Project
http://www.womenundersiegeproject.org/conflicts/profile/north-korea
http://www.womenundersiegeproject.org/blog/entry/the-fine-line-between-obedience-and-rape-in-north-korea

Russian Times
http://rt.com/news/un-north-korea-torture-732/

Hungry And Desperate

Refugees Face Death While Seeking Freedom
(Footsteps In The Dark series)

(North Korea denies "death camps" yet satellite images show the camps clearly.)

Defection from North Korea is simply defined as crossing the border without expressed permission by the state. Those who are treated as second class citizens in the system are not allowed to ever leave the country. The fear that they might not return isn't really exaggerated in a country where mass starvation is a persistent threat to the underclass. Given the chance these abuses peasants would rush the borders in a heart beat. Yet the North Koreans making it out aren't from the lowest cast of North Korea's communists system. Instead the defectors are coming from the youth of all classes (with the exception of the elites). 

Young Koreans in the North have some idea of what awaits just beyond the fortified borders. The lies they have been fed all their lives cause reasonable doubts. Yet these young North Koreans compose the bulk of refugees attempting to illegally flee the country. And given the challenges that face them on the other side they are either just naive to believe freedom is possible or desperate enough to die for it. 

Regardless of what brings them out of the country that has kept them as slaves from birth, the first steps these young Korean defectors face are terrifying. In just moments they go from being disenchanted North Koreans to being stateless. The country they find themselves in, China, is hostile toward them. The people they are suddenly surrounded by can't really be trusted. And the bribes, the lies, the danger that got them out of North Korea are all just the beginning of what they now face. 

On the other side they are met by a country of wolves. Citizens of China have been bribed with rewards for spotting and turning in Korean refugees. The police in China are ruthless in their attempts to root out any North Koreans attempting to make their way to safety. This all further complicated by the presence of North Korean agents sent over into China to spot and capture North Koreans on the run.

Hiding, Starving, And Desperate.

“If these refugees are found in China, the Chinese government sends them back to North Korea, where they will face imprisonment or death,” ~ Yoon Sun Na

The only thing refugees from North Korea have is their ability to go unnoticed. Anything, any little minor detail, can out them as a defector from the dreaded North. A loose word, a misspoken statement, can raise the suspicions of an eavesdropper. Anyone and everyone they come across is therefore met with suspicion. Every smile is a mask and every handshake a possible handcuff.

When North Koreans flee they are often in search of food. Hunger is a major motivator for those who dare to cross the border into China. They take to desperate measures to find anything that they can use as food. For the nine recently returned youth who were captured in Laos this had meant digging through discarded food. They were reported to have mixed fish bones and rice into porridge just to have something to eat. Then they would consume toothpaste in an effort to help digest what food they had managed to scavenge.

These stories seem hard to believe in a world where we have a McDonalds on every block and a Starbucks in every spare corner. Food surrounds those of us in the West. And for the developing economy in China this is starting to become more normal. The constant presence food becomes a luxury for us as we take every spare moment to indulge in some form of it. So much so that we don't often pay attention to the food itself.

For the North Koreans, especially those outside Pyongyang, life is rarely defined by food in the aspect of what they recently ate. Rather food becomes a milestone that they struggle to reach as the days pass without it. Children who have been abandoned or made orphans are even worse off as they take to eating whatever they can find. Grass, tree bark, and at times clay become sources of material with which to fill their stomachs. This is in spite of the fact that North Korea claims to be prospering.

Once outside North Korea these young refugees use their life long experience with hunger to keep themselves moving. They know that the food they find is not free. There is always a price for scavenging whether it is social or physical punishment. Then there is the reality that being seen scavenging can be a red flag for the ever-prying eyes of a hostile world.

For 70-80% of the North Korean girls and women that flee the threat of hunger and forced repatriation is further complicated by human trafficking. When these desperate girls are over the border they become targets for traffickers that are more than willing to exploit the victims illegal status in China. These numbers are also added to by traffickers that lure North Korean women over the border in the first place; promising freedom, safety, food, and shelter all as ploys to enslave the would be refugee.

For those who manage to evade forced repatriation to the North, trafficking by criminals, and starvation as they run... the journey has only begun.

There is no safe harbor in China for North Koreans on the run. Once over the border these refugees must continue moving toward Mongolia, Laos, Thailand, Russia, or find ways over the border elsewhere. The path they choose is often decided shortly after fleeing North Korea or is determined by what networks they can find after arrival. This short window of deciding whether to hide where they are at or run further is the most dangerous time these refugees face. It is in this window that they risk all the dangers of being exposed, captured, or trafficked.

The Railroad System

Over the years of isolation North Koreans have endured there has been progress made in alleviating there suffering. Networks across the border have been forged as countless organizations strive to establish routes upon which to smuggle refugees out of China. These organizations play constant games of cat and mouse with authorities who remain determined to stem the flow of Korean refugees. Every move they make not only risk the safety of the refugees but also the security of the network they have forged. 

The most notable case as of recently where the system has failed was in Laos where the Laotian government agreed to forcibly repatriate 9 young Korean refugees. This illustrated to the world that China's long held agreement with the North goes well beyond it's borders. When refugees begin to feel safe they are often still well within reach of the red states' grasp. Meaning for most that they must either reach South Korea or get as far away from China as possible. 

For organizations that can manage to cart refugees out of China's reach this is an expensive endeavor. For the organization Liberty in North Korea (LiNK) this can cost 2,500 dollars to get a refugee to safety. That is a price that is almost comparable to the average cost a trafficked person is sold for in Cambodia or Thailand. And yet in this case it is the cost of freedom for these North Korean individuals.

With the help of donations and private funding LiNK is able to do amazing things for refugees that have faced a living nightmare while escaping what some call "hell on earth".

A simple donation of 100 dollars can provide shelter for refugees and refugee rescue teams along the journey to safety. 

A donation of 250 dollars can provide the basic necessities to refugees needed by North Korean refugees; including food, water, clothing, and medical attention. 

A larger donation of 500 dollars can give refugees safe transportation to countries where they can be safe from forced repatriation (including cars and buses). 

And for those who are able, a donation of 2,500 can provide all the funds needed to bring a refugee to safety and liberty. 

This is just one of the organizations helping North Koreans reach a better life and escape from a regime that has denied them so much. Through there work they contribute to an extensive underground railroad system that is bringing desperate refugees to safety. And you can help...

By visiting, promoting, and donating to LiNK you can help scream on behalf of the North Korean people. Using your voice you can help to fight the dehumanization that North Koreans have had to live with in their homeland and the prejudices they face outside it. You can echo their voices to a world that knows so very little about their struggle. And you can put your money and time to use by helping to give hope where it is most needed. 

Please visit LiNK today and watch how you can support the #BridgeToNorthKorea.

This is the second article on this subject. We will continue to highlight the struggle of North Koreans and what you can do to help them in future articles. If you would like to learn more please read our source documents, contacts us on Twitter (@alders_ledge), or follow us on Facebook (key words: Alder's Ledge). And most of all, to learn more about the organization highlighted above, visit: http://libertyinnorthkorea.org/bridge/

Source Documents

*Note: not all sources listed.

Washington Times

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/1/9-north-korean-defectors-may-have-been-executed-up/

National Post
http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/09/27/we-were-slave-owners-ex-prison-guard-taught-to-view-north-korean-inmates-as-sub-human-enemies/

Pipe Dream
http://www.bupipedream.com/news/22956/n-korean-refugee-recounts-escape-seo-recalls-starvation-journey-to-america/

Daily Mail
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2440178/Did-North-Korea-execute-children-defecting.html

Telegraph UK
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10349298/Fears-over-fate-of-young-defectors-sent-back-to-North-Korea.html

Liberty in North Korea
http://libertyinnorthkorea.org/bridge/

Sacrificial Lambs

Children Used As Gifts To Appease A Fanatical Tyrant
(Footsteps In The Dark series)

(From My Personal Visit To South Korea)

If the wire came down tomorrow and the DMZ was dissolved overnight South Korea would be overrun. Without the landmines and hostile armies guarding the gate to hell on earth the prisoners of the world's largest open air prison would rush toward freedom. This is the fact that most of the world ignores or denies. We claim that we don't know what happens behind the darkness of North Korea's veil. We pretend that we don't see the torment in which the North Koreans have lived for over 60 years. In this aspect we believe the propaganda that the Kims have dictated to us. We, a world of so called humanitarians, swallow the lies willingly so as to avoid the fight that would come with the fall of a tyrannical dictatorship.

Every since I became aware of the fact that there were two Koreas I have been told how evil the North is. This wasn't entirely false in the sense that the ruling class of North Korea is in fact evil. However the generalization has always been that All of North Korea is evil. It has been fed to me over the course of 15 years or so that if the wire came down the North Koreans would grab their guns and sweep over Seoul. It never occurred to anyone that told me these things what might happen if the North just simply ceased to be. What would happen if North Korea's ruling class just happened to be deposed?

For now we may never really know.

But I have always speculated that the vast majority of Koreans in the North would happily welcome the freedoms that the South enjoys today. Sure, Koreans raised on a steady diet of propaganda would most likely be skeptical of the current American military presence in the South. And sure there would be a massive struggle as governments and armies all rushed to fill the power vacuum that the fall of Kim would bring about. But in the end the Koreans of the North would all rather liberty over tyranny. No matter how steady the diet of propaganda might be, no matter how long one has lived under a repressive regime, the natural desire of man to long for freedom always rises to the surface eventually.

For nine young North Korean refugees this desire for freedom came to the surface as they defected from their brutal homeland. They are believed to be orphans between the ages of 15-23 that had been traveling thousands of miles in hopes of reaching Thailand. Then, just as the end was in sight, the government of Laos slammed the door shut on the dreams of freedom that these refugees had been chasing.

In their final hours in Laos the nine detained refugees held out hope that the Laotian government would do the right thing. They could almost taste their freedom as they waited. However this all ended as the Laotian officials decided to play politics with the fate of nine orphans. Instead of allowing the North Koreans to flee from certain death, Laos damned the nine refugees as the Laotian officials chose appeasement of North Korea over humanity.

So why did these orphans flee in the first place if North Korea is telling us the truth? Everything in North Korea is perfect right?

The Ggotjebi

A permanent underclass in North Korea's perverted form of classical communism. The ggotjebi are orphans that are often abandoned by their parents or loose their parents through the direct and indirect oppression of the North Korean government. They have no hope for the future if they stay in North Korea. They are reduced below what the upper class in the North consider to be human. Instead of incorporating these members of society into the fabric of society like Marx supposedly taught his pupils, Korean communist leave the ggotjebi to die of starvation and exposure to the elements.

Life for the ggotjebi becomes a life of begging for food and seeking work at very young ages. Many orphans that escape this life of simply existing by fleeing North Korea report that they had resorted to eating grass and tree bark to survive. They tell of being beaten by other Koreans as a result of being defenseless and vulnerable to abuse. Others are simply arrested and sent off to one of North Korea's concentration camps (these victims are almost always never heard from again).

This is the life that the nine refugees that Laos betrayed had fled from in North Korea. They were fleeing some of the most inhumane conditions that North Korea could provide. And yet now they face almost certain death as both China and Laos violate international law (which bans forced repatriation of defectors from North Korea).

Lambs To The Slaughter

North Korean refugees that are about to be forcibly repatriated almost always know what is waiting for them back in Kim's prisons. It isn't easily ignored when you grow up in a country where people vanish all the time. After all, North Korea is a country where children are literally born in prisons only to be kept as prisoners themselves. These nine refugees knew exactly what was awaiting them as well.

In North Korea it is a "crime against the state" to defect. This crime is almost always punished by endless torture that ultimately ends with the execution of the victim. The defector is tortured as long as they can be kept alive so that they might "name names" and hand over other "traitors" and runaways. The information they give is most certainly flawed in the fact that torture only elicits what the tormentor wants to hear... not the truth. And yet despite this, these nine refugees will be subjected to the standard punishment for defection from a police state.

So why did the world remain silent? We have known (even if most don't admit it) that the North uses these tactics since the day it first sealed the country off. So why hand over the nine orphans?

China has long practiced a policy of forced repatriation as a method of maintaining control over North Korea. Through appeasement and bribery, China keeps the Kim dynasty in power and thus preserves it's puppet government. This allows China to maintain a proxy war with the American military complex in South Korea. It keeps the cold war hot.

With the awakening of China's sleeping economy the world has become dependent upon an under-payed and repressed labor force. Free markets across the West rely upon China for the importing of cheap goods while using Chinese loans to pay for their excesses. American debt, for example, is paid for by the communist Chinese. All of this has led to a weakened "free world" as the repressive Chinese government grows more unruly and bold.

Puppet regimes like North Korea may flaunt their "staunch independence" and ideological differences (as minute as they might be) with China, yet they rely upon China for almost everything. This is evident when China can use it's disproportionate leverage when dealing with North Korea's "independence" by simply withholding cash or food. It is with this muscle that China forces it's neighbors back in line with Beijing.

The silence of the West when dealing with forced repatriation is just another sign that China is calling the shots when it comes to North Korea. When world leaders, such as President Obama, will no longer stand up for the freedoms of others and basic human rights then our own come into question. If oppressive regimes like that of China are allowed to take their oppression beyond their own borders (in this case crossing countless borders) then just how safe are we? And where has the bastion of liberty gone? Are we meant to accept the suffering of others simply because their oppressors tell us to do so?

North Korea's oppression must be challenged at every opportunity. China's violations of international law must be challenged every time they occur. We can no longer accept these crimes so that we might appease tyrants. It is long past time that the world grow a spine and start listening to its conscience more than its pocket book.

Nine lives lost to the brutality of a tyrant are nine lives too many.
















Source Documents
(note: not all sources listed)

PRI's The World
http://www.theworld.org/2013/06/laotian-officials-send-north-korean-teenage-defectors-home/

The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/03/un-repatriated-north-korean-defectors

Express
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/405520/What-will-become-of-them-North-Korean-defectors-forcibly-returned-to-horrors-they-escaped

CNN
http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/31/world/asia/laos-north-korea-refugees/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/13/world/asia/north-korea-orphans

Footsteps In The Dark

Pathway To The Edge Of The World
(part of The Darkness Visible series)

(Syria's Refugee Crisis Continues)

Where would you go if you were made homeless tonight? What would you do if your house was burnt out and your neighborhood destroyed? How would you live if the place you have called home all your life was suddenly plunged into the nightmare of war... or worse yet, genocide? 

Imagine that you are the one that is suddenly without shelter, without refuge from the lingering threat of death. Imagine that you instantly find yourself being hunted like an animal; no matter where you go, how far you run... you are pursued without mercy. Imagine being forced to watch everything and everyone you hold dear ripped away from you and but to the torch. Violently, horrifically... imagine that you have watched all of these things be destroyed... stripped from you so violently that you have no time to mourn your loss. 

For countless people, innocent in every way, this is reality. As your read this, as these words are typed, they are being hunted down like wild game. They are rounded up and killed, some are sent off to slaughter, but in the end their lives are ended in the most senseless acts of violence mankind has to offer.

Three long years after the beginning of their nightmare the Syrian people still dream of hope. It is fading, the night is threatening to swallow them whole. And yet the Syrian resistance continues... the fight rages on with no end in sight. Their footsteps still fall in the darkness of war. They still follow a path to the ends of the earth, their killers never to far behind. 

In recent weeks the world has finally realized that Assad has well crossed the line they drew in the sand. As the Syrian refugees run Assad uses helicopters and jets to track them down. Death falls like rain upon the dry desert sands as blood and tears turn to mud beneath the refugees' feet. When they feel safe, when they go just beyond the sight of the vultures above, Assad uses scuds to wipe them from the face of the earth. And if they survive, Assad uses gas to poison those who remain. 

Soil samples smuggled out of Syria show that chemical weapons were used. This was the thin red line that Assad was supposed to stay behind. This was the supposed tipping point for the war weary West. Yet here we are once again... the Syrian refugees continue to make the trek to the edge of their world. They walk through the shadows of the abyss with the fires of hell flying upon vultures wings overhead. Their tears dot the roads and paths through which they come. And now, now that their butcher uses the one forbidden tool in his arsenal, the world abandons them. 

The United Nations has registered 1.35 million Syrians as refugees at the current time. With 8,000 Syrians fleeing Syria everyday that number is only going to continue to rise. It is also important to note that only a year ago that number stood at 33,000 Syrians outside their homeland as refugees. This number does not include Syrians who are internally displaced or those currently on their way out of the country. 

But the Syrians are not the only people currently walking through this long harsh night...

 (Rohingya Refugees In Bangladesh 1992)

For countless decades now the Rohingya people have been a people without a homeland. The ancestral homeland they have tried to remain in has been hostile at best. People they called neighbors are now their murderers. A government that hates them continues to use them as slaves. This is only highlighted by the current conditions that they currently face... conditions that warrant being called genocide. 

Since the summer of 2012 the Rohingya have been facing government backed genocide. Their homes were burnt to the ground as the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) pumped the Arakan state full of racial propaganda. In a fluid motion the RNDP made certain that the Burmese military would establish concentration camps in which to round up the displaced Rohingya. Nasaka (Burmese border guards) were enlisted, all to voluntarily, to kill the Rohingya that tried to escape. What followed the "ethnic riots" (genocidal pogroms) of that summer was nothing short of chaos... organized mayhem. 

Once the Rohingya were sealed off in their own villages or rounded up into death camps the government of Myanmar set up blockades. These checkpoints were designed to keep food and water out of the Rohingya villages and camps. Medicine was quickly added to the list of things that the Rohingya were forbidden to have or use. It appeared that the government of Myanmar was not willing to allow the world to watch the full-fledged slaughter but was more than willing to allow the Rohingya to starve to death.

Today the Rohingya that are able to escape do so by putting their lives at risk. They trust human traffickers and profiteers to get them a place on a boat destined for Malaysia or Indonesia. By handing over everything they have and abandoning everything they have ever known, the Rohingya gamble upon the unknown. The devil they can't see waiting is somehow better than the devil they currently know in Burma. 

Boats out of Myanmar are death traps. They are rarely equipped with the food, fuel, or water to get the overloaded vessels more than a day or two out to sea. Starvation, drowning, and slaughter are all very real possibilities for those who set out to flee Burma. And once they arrive at their destination, given they didn't perish by then, there is no certainty that they won't be sent back Myanmar. 

This long trek out across the unfamiliar lands and seas of Southeast Asia have been the subject of countless news articles and documentaries over the years. With each "season" the Rohingya are referred to as "boat people". With every "season" the Rohingya are abandoned by the world as country after country set them back out to sea. 

For the Rohingya there are no official numbers for just how many are refugees. This is mainly due to the fact that Myanmar views all Rohingya as illegal even in their homeland, the Arakan region of Burma. Thus all 800,000 estimated Rohingya within their own homeland could be considered refugees even though they have not left their homes. As for those in camps, there are 125,000 estimated Rohingya (and other Muslim minority groups) being counted as refugees. 

Life for the Rohingya is nearly impossible. For the Rohingya trapped in camps the coming rainy season will bring new challenges. Their camps are set up in flood plains. Once the rains start their makeshift homes could be underwater. And according to some even this was intentional, that in some way the government of Burma had planned for the coming rains and the trouble they would cause. 

In a matter of weeks the rains will come. Like clockwork, the rains always arrive in Burma.

The long road to the edge of their world calls to the Rohingya. The devil they can't see waiting at sea calls to them with the same song of Homer's sirens. In the dark night, as the flames of hate gather all around, the Rohingya look for a way out... they seek hope in a place where there is none to be found. 

And yet beneath this shroud of black there are still more footsteps to follow...

(North Koreans Captured Trying To Seek Asylum)

When you look at a picture of Korea at night there is a remarkable apparition that appears. Between the bright lights of Seoul and the illuminated border with China it will always show its face. There, in the eternal darkness of pride and self-loathing, that is where you can see the face of evil. In the darkened landscape of North Korea you can see what the ego of a twisted individual can do when left unchecked. 

For the peasant class of North Korea this darkness has been a cloak from under which they have never been allowed to peek. Their homeland, or a portion of it, has been transformed into the worlds largest open air prison. The lights come on when the warden says so. Food comes out when the warden says so. And their time in the yard is regulated by the warden's guards. Even the elite amongst them are subject to the whims of their sovereign leader.

This insanity has led some North Koreans to risk everything on the off chance that they might escape. But unlike the Syrians, unlike the Rohingya... the North Koreans risk the lives of their families, their friends, and even their acquaintances once they take to their pathway to the edge of the world they know. One footstep down this path and there is no turning back. With one move in this direction they suddenly find themselves hunted. Their families are hunted. Their friends disappear. 

Yet despite all that the North Koreans risk for liberty, for hope, for freedom... there is a network that keeps the pathways open. In the darkness these warriors fight for freedom. Without firing a shot they wound the system from which they came. This is the underground railroad of North Korea. 

At the edge of the Korean world there is a passage to freedom. Nobody knows where it starts. Nobody dares speak of how you get there. But it is from there that gateway that the journey to freedom begins for North Koreans. 

Death however is forever present for the refugees of North Korea. Once in China, the North Koreans are considered illegal "economic migrants". The People's Republic of China does not recognize North Koreans as refugees due to its alliance with North Korea. To admit that people would become refugees from North Korea would mean that China would have to admit that communism in North Korea is broken. And it is in this aspect of escape that death readily awaits North Koreans fleeing over the border to China. 

"[T]he term “refugee” shall apply to any person who … owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it." ~1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (UN)

Despite agreeing to the terms that the United Nations laid down in 1951, China refuses to stop it's program of "repatriating" North Koreans to the government from which they fled. Once caught the North Koreans know what awaits them. If taken over the border and put back into North Korea the refugees face certain death, either immediate or after lengthy prison sentences carried out in work camps (death camps).

At the moment there are an estimated 250,000 North Koreans hiding within China. Most are refugees still attempting to make their way to countries that do not "repatriate" them back to North Korea. Others are simply trying to live under the radar in hopes that eventually either the laws will change or the North Korean government will cease it's pursuit of them. For all 250,000 the threat of death and or capture still lingers over their heads. 

For North Koreans who become refugees the long pathway is filled with danger. Agents from North Korea are openly allowed to cross the border and hunt "defectors" down like animals. China proudly engages in raids to root out Korean refugees. And the local populations through which they travel hold racial bias that make them prone to turning over refugees to the authorities (with added incentive of bounties). But their footsteps continue to be heard in the darkness. 

The plight of the refugee is never an easy thing to imagine. It is hard for those of us in a world so different from theirs' to fully comprehend what it is like to be pursued in this way. Even at our best, with the most sincere intentions, we may never know what it means to be a refugee...  a person without a home or country. Yet that should never stop us from trying to understand. It should never keep us from trying to help those in the most need of it. 

For some the plight of of the Syrian people may be where your heart calls you. For others it may be the Rohingya and their desperate situation. And for a few it may even be the oppressive reality of the North Koreans that calls to you. No matter where your heart is leading you, these people need your help. Their paths lead them through the darkest places on this planet. Their lives have been made almost unbearable for circumstances far beyond their control. They need your help. 

There are numerous organizations that are helping these very people mentioned here. Below you can find ways you too can help. But it is most important to remember that the quickest way to help is always to "scream" (search 'scream' here on Alder's Ledge to learn more). 

To help the Syrian refugees:

World Vision 

 http://donate.worldvision.org/OA_HTML/xxwv2ibeCCtpItmDspRte.jsp?lpos=ctr_txt_SyrianRefugeeCrisis&item=2035030&go=item&

To help the Rohingya:

Partners Relief And Development  

http://www.partnersworld.org/

To learn more about and help North Korean refugees:

Seoul Tran Documentary 

http://seoultrain.com/purchase/

Source Documents 

(Note not all sources listed) 

Enet English

http://www.enetenglish.gr/?i=news.en.politics&id=686

Radio New Zealand

http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/world/131610/un-issues-grim-warning-on-rohingya-refugees

Seoul Train (movie)

http://seoultrain.com/