Category: Prison Camps

American Jeffrey Fowle describes his North Korean detention

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After learning about the 1990s famine and the country’s brutal persecution of Christians, Jeffrey Fowle decided to make the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) his next vacation destination. He inscribed his name and phone number in a Korean Bible, which he would “accidentally” leave behind, trusting that God would get it into the right hands.

Fowle thought the identifying information would make his plan more credible: “After all, what kind of idiot would leave a Bible with his name and phone number in it on purpose?” But somewhere along the way he changed course—a decision he still can’t explain.

Instead, Fowle hid the Bible under a waste bin, an obviously intentional act. The Bible fell into the hands of government officials who detained Fowle on the 36th floor of a high-rise hotel and kept him in an “information black-out” for six weeks. Fowle didn’t know if his family knew what had happened to him.

Fowle said he wasn’t concerned about his own safety: “I knew I was in God’s hands and that was a big comfort to me. God was in charge of the events.” His situation improved after six weeks, when the North Koreans allowed him to receive letters from his children and a pound of milk chocolate from his wife.

Fowle said his captors treated him well, letting him see a doctor and giving him ample food and water. His room had a television with three channels broadcasting government activities for four or five hours a day. After two weeks, his captors let him walk 30 to 40 minutes a day with his interpreter.

He underwent repeated interrogations, during which his captors required him to wear his best clothes—a pair of blue trousers and a striped, button down shirt. He came to call it his “Sunday-go-to-interrogation wardrobe.”

They also encouraged Foyle to “write letters to get media attention,” so he wrote to family, friends, and government officials, including President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry. When his letters failed to convey enough distress, the officials made him rewrite them: “They thought if I sounded desperate people would rally to my cause and protest.”

After nearly six months—and without explanation—his captivity ended, and Fowle found himself on a plane headed home.

About three weeks after his release, the North Koreans released two other American detainees, Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller. Fowle wonders whether his situation somehow helped them: “Things did not unfold like I had planned. But maybe this was God’s way to get Bae and Miller out as well. I’ll let God be the judge of whether this was a good or a bad idea.”

[Excerpts of a WORLD article, by Julie Borg]

Korean-American Christian aid worker detained in China near North Korean border

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A Korean-American living on the border of China and North Korea has been detained by Chinese authorities, US officials have confirmed.

Peter HahnPeter Hahn, a 73-year-old naturalized American citizen who left North Korea as a child, was taken in for questioning by local police on Tuesday and placed under detention after a six-hour interrogation, his lawyer told reporters earlier.

According to Hahn’s lawyer, Shanghai-based Zhang Peihong, the aid worker is accused of embezzlement and possession of fraudulent receipts. Zhang described the allegations as “groundless” and “impossible to stand up.”

Hahn has run a Christian aid agency in Tumen, Jilin province for the past two decades, which provides education and supplies to the poor in North Korea. Two other staff members, including a South Korean national, were detained earlier this month.

Hahn’s detention comes three months after Chinese authorities detained Canadians Kevin and Julie Garratt, who had lived in Dandong, Liaoning province – also on the North Korean border – since 1984. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said the couple was “under investigation for suspected theft of state secrets about China’s military and national defence research.”

Pastor Simon Suh told reporters that around 1,000 South Korean missionaries have been forced out of China, and many churches in the region had closed. “Obviously, the screw is tightening all along the border,” a South Korean Christian activist told Reuters.

[South China Morning Post]

UN rapporteur states Kim Jong Un guilty of complicity in North Korean abuses

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Marzuki Darusman, the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in North Korea, said the country’s leader Kim Jong-un was guilty of “complicity in crimes against humanity” and “should be held responsible” by international justice.

Darusman made the remark at a press conference in Seoul, in reference to a UN report and a subsequent resolution that called for North Korea’s referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC). He added that the report “was able to point unequivocally to the responsibility and the culpability (for) these massive human rights violations to a single source of policy decision-making in the country”.

In March, a UN commission of inquiry published a detailed report which accused Pyongyang of carrying out “crimes against humanity” comparable to those committed by the German Nazis or the apartheid regime in South Africa.

Kim Jong-un ignored the UN letter that “directly put culpability on the supreme leader for these massive human rights violations”, according to the UN envoy.

The UN General Assembly is scheduled to vote on the resolution.

[IANS]

Christian groups treading carefully in North Korea

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Christian groups in North Korea are vowing to carry on their missionary work despite mounting risks since Korean-American activist Kenneth Bae was imprisoned two years ago.

North Korea and neighboring China have clamped down on the groups’ activities recently, and the organizations say that has forced them to become more secretive. Bae’s unexpected release has not changed that.

Bae has remained silent on his missionary work and his imprisonment. On Monday, Bae’s sister said he would not do interviews. Such reticence is necessary, said one U.S.-based activist, because of the dangers involved in propagating religion, especially in an overt, organized way, in a totalitarian state. “If one person is caught, then everyone else can suffer the consequences,” said Sam Kim, executive director of the Korean Church Coalition for North Korea Freedom, which is based in Southern California.

“We have to come up with a strategy to avoid another case like Kenneth Bae’s,” said Kim Seung-eun, a missionary for the Caleb Mission, which is based in South Korea’s South Chungcheong Province but frequently travels to North Korea.

Open Doors, a group that monitors religious persecution globally, says North Korea is the worst country to be Christian. It says 70,000 Christians are in labor camps there.

The clamp-down on Christian-backed humanitarian organizations along the North Korea-China border has made it harder for activists to aid fleeing North Koreans. “The people I talk to – the rescuers – say that it’s tough right now,” said Melanie Kirkpatrick, who has written a history of the “underground railroad,” the network that helps people escape from North Korea.

[Reuters]

Gruff former general the right man for North Korean mission

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The North Koreans passed word they wanted a high-ranking U.S. government official for the job, so President Barack Obama sent a gruff former general to spirit home two Americans held captive. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper is no diplomat by training, and that’s perhaps just why he earned the clandestine call.

For past visits to the unpredictable and reclusive country, the United States has sent smooth-tongued luminaries such as former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, and former U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson. Or North Korean experts, one of whom was Sydney Seiler, a former intelligence official who is now with the State Department.

But analysts who follow North Korea say Clapper may have been perfect for the role. The spy chief was senior enough to convey a message of respect to the North Korean. But he is not a diplomat, so he could beg off any unrelated demands the North Koreans may have made. The two countries do not have diplomatic relations.

“The director of national intelligence was just the right person for this,” said Joseph DeTrani, who used to work for Clapper as his North Korean mission manager.

Matthew Miller arrives in US from North KoreaOn Saturday, Clapper landed on a U.S. government plane with the two Americans, Matthew Miller of Bakersfield, California, and Kenneth Bae of Lynnwood, Washington, at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, near Tacoma, Washington.

Many analysts suggested that the conciliatory moves, after years of bellicose rhetoric and inflammatory actions, were in response to recent pressure over North Korea’s human rights record.

DeTrani said he believed that report may have been a factor, but he saw the releases as a hopeful sign that North Korea “wants to come out of the penalty box. … The North Koreans want to come back to negotiations,” said DeTrani, who nows leads an intelligence contractor trade group. “They are going through a bad patch. The last two years have been a disaster. They are more and more of an isolated state. We’re seeing an outreach – the leadership in Pyongyang is saying, ‘we’ve got to change course, it’s not working.”

[Associated Press]

Released Americans and the behind-the-scenes fixer who has North Korea’s ear

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Few people know how or why Pyongyang decided to release two American prisoners over the weekend. Acts of leniency from the autocratic North Korea are rare indeed.

Kun “Tony” NamkungBut one man who could shed light on an uncommon act of diplomacy is Kun “Tony” Namkung, a mysterious intermediary who has for years negotiated with the unpredictable regime. With no official position, Kun ‘Tony’ Namkung seems to have played a central role in the sudden release of three American prisoners.

Offering sensitive advice to high-level US, Japanese and South Korean figures in their dealings with North Korea, Mr Namkung, 67, has played a critical backstage role in bringing about the release of three Americans: first, last month, Jeffrey Fowle, and then, at the weekend, the missionary Kenneth Bae and “adventurer” Matthew Todd Miller, both sentenced to hard labour for “hostile acts”.

On his most recent visit to Pyongyang last month, Mr Namkung lobbied hard with a wide range of contacts to win freedom for all three of the Americans. His efforts followed a prolonged campaign for mercy for 46-year-old Mr Bae, arrested two years ago for trying to spread “Christian propaganda” while leading a tour group from China to the industrial zone at Rason near the Chinese border.

Mr Namkung knew Mr Bae’s and Mr Miller’s release was imminent when Mr Fowle, who had been detained at a hotel awaiting trial, was told 30 minutes before being taken to the airport that he was going home. “One down, two to go,” Mr Namkung, who holds a doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley, emailed after Mr Fowle’s release.

[The Independent]

North Korea worried that Kim Jong Un could be accused in the International Criminal Court

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The release of Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller is the latest twist in the fitful relationship between the Obama administration and the young North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, whose approach to the U.S. has shifted back and forth from defiance to occasional conciliation.

A senior Obama administration official said the president approved the mission last week and U.S. officials spent the next several days planning the trip. James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, spent roughly a day on the ground and met with North Korean security officials — but not with Kim. Clapper went with the sole purpose of bringing home the two detainees, although the U.S. anticipated that other issues of concern to the North would come up during Clapper’s discussions, the official said.

Analysts who study North Korea said the decision to free Bae and Miller now from long prison terms probably was a bid to ease pressure in connection with its human rights record. A recent U.N. report documented rape, torture, executions and forced labor in the North’s network of prison camps, accusing the government of “widespread, systematic and gross” human rights violations.

North Korea seems worried that Kim could be accused in the International Criminal Court, said Sue Mi Terry, a former senior intelligence analyst now at Columbia University.

Bruce Klingner, a former CIA analyst now at the Heritage Foundation, agreed that efforts to shine a spotlight on the country’s human rights record “startled the regime and led to frantic attempts to derail the process.”

[Associated Press]

Last two Americans held captive by North Korea back in US

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Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller landed Saturday night at a Washington state military base after a top U.S. intelligence official secured their release from the reclusive Communist country.

kenneth bae releasedBae, surrounded by family members, spoke briefly to the media after the plane carrying him and Miller landed about 9 p.m. He had been serving a 15-year sentence for alleged anti-government activities. He was detained in 2012.

“I just want to say thank you all for supporting me and standing by me,” he said.

“It’s been an amazing two years, I learned a lot, I grew a lot, I lost a lot of weight,” said Bae, a Korean-American missionary with health problems. Asked how he was feeling, he said, “I’m recovering at this time.”

His family has said he suffers from diabetes, an enlarged heart, liver problems and back pain.

Miller was serving a six-year jail term on charges of espionage after he allegedly ripped up his tourist visa at Pyongyang’s airport in April and demanded asylum. North Korea said Miller had wanted to experience prison life so that he could secretly investigate North Korea’s human rights situation.

U.S. officials said Miller of Bakersfield, California, and Bae of Lynnwood, Washington, flew back with James Clapper, the director of national intelligence. Clapper is the highest-ranking American to visit Pyongyang in more than a decade.

[Associated Press]

Americans Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller released from North Korean imprisonment

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U.S. citizens Kenneth Bae and Matthew Todd Miller have been released from North Korea, where they were detained for two years and seven months, respectively, the U.S. State Department announced Saturday.

“The safety and welfare of U.S. citizens abroad is the Department of State’s highest priority, and the United States has long called on [the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] authorities to release these individuals on humanitarian grounds,” spokesperson Jen Psaki said in a statement.

James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, took part in discussions with North Korea about Bae’s and Miller’s release. Accompanied by Clapper, the two were en route back to the United States to be reunited with their families Saturday.

“We welcome the DPRK’s decision to release both Mr. Bae and Mr. Miller,” said Brian P. Hale, the director of public affairs for the office of the director of national intelligence, in a statement.

[TIME]

EU human rights rep confirms North Korean invite

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A European Union official confirmed that North Korea has invited the EU’s special representative for human rights to visit, which would be a significant step toward resuming a human rights dialogue that Pyongyang broke off in 2003.

For North Korea to offer any dialogue on human rights, a topic which its government until recently would not discuss, is seen as significant by the international community. But such an offer also has been greeted with skepticism by rights groups and some diplomats.

North Korea also has offered the possibility of visits by United Nations rights officials, but the North Korea diplomat, Kim Un Chol, said that those offers would be dropped unless a U.N. resolution on the country removes any reference to the International Criminal Court.

North Korea has been on the defensive since a U.N. commission of inquiry early this year detailed what it said were vast human rights abuses in the impoverished but nuclear-armed country and warned that leader Kim Jong Un could be held accountable.

[AP]