A North Korean refugee in Russia has been given asylum in the U.S. Having gained approval of both the Russian and U.S. governments, Han Dong-man, who had been a logger in Siberia, left for the U.S. on Tuesday afternoon. He has been under protection of the Moscow Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees since October last year. He is the first North Korean defector to find asylum in the U.S. from Russia, which has refused to recognize North Korean defectors as refugees and approve their seeking of asylum to the U.S. for fear of harming diplomatic ties with the North. Han is reportedly to settle near Los Angeles.
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North Korean refugee Han Dong-man, who was allowed by the Russian government to take asylum in the U.S.
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From Hamhung, South Hamgyong Province, Han came to Russia in 1993 to work at a North Korean logging camp in Tynda. But he escaped from the camp in 1998 because the North Korean government failed to pay his wages and has since then tried to go to South Korea or a third country. North Korea exports workers to Russia under a forestry agreement established between the two in 1958. Some 20,000 North Korean loggers are reportedly working in Siberia.
In a telephone interview with the Chosun Ilbo, Han said he decided to go to the U.S. because he was told by the Korean embassy that the South Korean government no longer gives resettlement stipends to those who fled the North more than 10 years ago. South Korea¡¯s Act on the Protection and Settlement Support of Residents Escaping from North Korea stipulates that North Korean refugees who have been in a third country for more than 10 years can be exempted from government assistance.
The case has raised hopes of human rights organizations home and abroad working for North Korean refugees that Russia is capable of showing generosity when it makes decisions about North Korean refugees, even if its principles have not changed. ¡°Some 500 North Korean refugees who escaped from North Korean logging camps are waiting for their turn to be sent to South Korea or a third country in major Russian cities including Moscow and Novosibirsk,¡± said the Rev. Cheon Ki-won of Durihana Mission. ¡°Something urgently needs to be done for them.¡±
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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