North Korean Human Rights Act Update

Section 301 of the North Korean Human Rights Act required the State Department to submit a report on the conditions facing North Korean refugeess, and what we can do to help them. The report is out, and you can read it here. China takes some blunt frontal criticism for flagrantly violating the U.N. Refugee Convention, but the report is indefensibly soft on both South Korea and the UNHCR itself. Both are content to hide behind the Chinese police, hoping the latter will deflect North Koreans back to whatever peril awaits them.

It’s as if our own State Department had never heard of Chung Dong-Young’s Fugitive Slave Law, or the wretched and unprincipled dereliction of the U.N.’s “quiet diplomacy.” Both are ominous signs that the State Department will evade the chore of putting any effective pressure on either the U.N. or South Korea, over whom we might the influence to effect changes for the better.

UPDATE: Perhaps the fact that we’re still discussing it with the South Koreans explains it in part, but all we’re suggesting is that we take 10% of the people the South Koreans take. The South Koreans, of course, would like the denominator of that fraction to be as near to zero as possible. It seems as if that would suit our own State Department, too.

Of course, I still have reservations about the adaptability of North Koreans to life here. What is needed is a deal with Mongolia, Russia, or a Central Asian nation to house them temporarily (and a nice supply of untraceable AK-47s).