Jubilee Campaign: Prayer Requests

Jubilee Campaign is a nonprofit organization seeking to help the persecuted church and children at risk around the world. We advocate for the release of prisoners of conscience and endeavor to change laws wherever necessary.
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Please pray for ...

• North Koreans who live in squalor and whose lives are threatened by mere attempts to provide for their families
• The NKRs who have escaped to use their voices as a way to change the hearts and minds of others-God to send in the force necessary to rescue these people from harm
• The regime of Kim Jong-Il to fall
• The NKRs who face discrimination in South Korea as they have little means to support themselves
• The post-Kim Jong-Il era to bring stability to Korea, not economic downturn-The ability to care for those impoverished-Protection for Christian aid workers in China as well as for the Gospel message to transform hearts and give peace to North Koreans

The following was prepared by Jubilee Campaign ...

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is the most secretive regime in the world. Few penetrate its borders and fewer personally encounter the horrible poverty plaguing this country and hundreds of thousands of its citizens. Jubilee Campaign partners with the North Korea Freedom Coalition to provide a voice for North Korean refugees (NKRs), and to spread awareness of the gross injustices against them. NKRs are known in the DPRK as "defectors" or "traitors" for attempting to escape in hope of a better life and more freedom. NKRs face repatriation, torture, rape, forced abortion, prison camps, and death. They are treated sub-human. Their children live incredibly malnourished and often scrounge for crumbs they find at people's feet.

Inside sources and reliable veterans document the inner workings of this country from China as of July, 2008:

Border patrols on both sides of the Tumen and Yalu Rivers are being beefed up with more guards and shorter distances between them. The North Korean border patrol has a "shoot-on-sight" order for NKRs trying to cross the border illegally. One activist reported that snipers are now being posted at elevated positions above the river, giving them a wider view and a longer time to train their scopes on fleeing NKRs.

Widespread house-to-house checks by Chinese police in border areas were administered to ferret out NKRs in Chinese households as of the past few months. The work of volunteers has been hindered by an extreme tightening of hotel and guesthouse registration requirements. As of the last few months, rules are strictly enforced that the passport of each traveler must be registered with the H/G, and this data processing is directly accessible by the local police office, giving no anonymity to the guests. In a similar vein, Internet café access may only be gained by showing a Chinese national ID card.

Police officials in the Chinese and North Korean border regions are authorized to issue substantial bounties to the local ethnic Korean-Chinese population to reveal the whereabouts of NKRs hiding in their neighborhoods. These bounties have increased in recent months and are designed to undermine the sympathy that the ethnic Korean-Chinese population naturally has for their NKR cousins from across the river. Bounties are also offered in larger sums for information on any local resident or foreigner who might be helping the NKRs in China.

How many are crossing secretly along the two-river border that stretches many hundreds of miles between China and North Korean is unknown, but the rapidly worsening food situation inside the DPRK (exacerbated by a recent embargo by the Chinese government of grain exports due to the global food crisis, the more strict regulation of food aid by the new South Korean government, and declining distribution worldwide by the World Food Program) increases the "push factors" on North Korean citizens taking the chance to cross.

Widespread reports at the border area confirm that food shortages are now critical in the central part of the country and news of death from malnutrition is becoming more widespread, always with comparisons to the severity of food shortages in the mid-1990's. Prices have soared, and a growing number of black marketers inside NK are deliberately withholding rice to further escalate the price in spite of the famine.

The best estimate we have received from experts located on the border is that roughly 30% of the NKRs are caught by the Chinese and sent back at present. One recent and reliable report indicated the continued use of forced abortions on some pregnant NKR females who are repatriated. A testimony heard on May 12, 2008 told of a NKR mother of two small children, ages 6 and 7, who was repatriated to North Korea the previous day without her children. The authorities paid no heed to the mother-children relationship and callously repatriated the mother only. The activist said that this indicated a new level of hardening of the Chinese position in such cases.

As the activist observer passed the Tumen Detention Center, one knowledgeable resident who was driving the vehicle stated that the there are currently 600 NKRs being held by Chinese authorities in that one detention center alone. They are repatriated systematically once a month, according to this well-placed source.

Inside the DPRK, punishments on repatriated NKRs for leaving North Korea without permission are getting heavier. Reports have come that some repatriated NKRs in the North Korean town of Hoeryong are being forced to walk up to 40 km. to a worksite and the same distance back in a work camp, as part of their punishment for fleeing their homeland.