Stop China’s repatriation of North Koreans

Human rights advocacy groups are alarmed at Beijing readying to send back hundreds of North Korean escapees after it forcibly repatriated around 500 defectors earlier this month. Reports say that Chinese police would be returning 620 North Koreans out of 2,000 detained in China after borders reopened on Aug. 27 following the three-year pandemic seal. The deportation despite their apparent torture, imprisonment and execution back home raises serious humanitarian issues.

According to human rights watch groups, recent repatriates included a 40-something woman who had lived in China for 25 years after fleeing her homeland in the late 1990s during the Great Famine when more than 1 million died from hunger. Chinese authorities discovered unregistered North Koreans while inspecting their homes across the three border provinces to fight Covid-19. They even used biometrics technology to filter out defectors to strengthen public security control. China does not recognize North Koreans as refugees and treats them as aliens violating its domestic law through illegal stay.

The conservative Yoon Suk Yeol administration, which places highest value on human rights and civil rights, has been tepidly responding to Beijing’s forced repatriation of North Koreans.

When it was the opposition, the People Power Party strongly criticized the liberal government under President Moon Jae-in for sending two fishermen back to the North against their will in 2019. Prime Minister Han Duck-soo reportedly expressed concerns about the repatriation when he met Chinese President Xi Jinping while attending the opening of the Hangzhou Asian Games last month. But our foreign ministry or unification ministry issued no statements against Beijing’s latest action. The government is keeping silence even when North Korean defectors are legally recognized as South Korean citizens under the Constitution.

Seoul must mobilize both direct and indirect diplomatic channels and all other means to stop further repatriation. It must persuade Washington to raise the issue during the summit between U.S. President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart to be held on the sidelines of the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco next month. The government also must heighten international awareness and campaign when the UN General Assembly adopts a resolution on human rights conditions in the North.

Recently, four North Koreans were found in a small wooden boat in waters off the east coast of South Korea. More North Koreans could attempt the risky sea voyage to the South to flee from oppression and food shortages amid the repatriation by the Chinese. South Korea must prepare a contingency plan now.