Human Trafficking

March 25, 2007

Anju Links for 3/25: N. Korea Threatens to Do Us a Favor, Money We Can’t Follow, the FTA Circus, and S. Korea’s Slavery-Loving Unions

* No.Please.Stop. North Korea is threatening to pull out of the dreadful (for us) February 13th Agreed Framework 2.0 over the RSOI / Foal Eagle exercises. “This may entail such serious consequences as escalating the tension between the DPRK (North Korea) and the US and scuttling the six-party talks for the settlement of the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula, arranged with so much effort.” [Channel News Asia] A KCNA statement wouldn’t be complete without a reference to...

An Alliance?/Human Trafficking/ROK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/UCMJ & SOFA

March 17, 2007

‘Abduction’ Film Updates

This beautifully produced film, created by two National Geographic alumni, will air on BBC 4’s “Storyville” series on March 22nd at 10:30 p.m. I’d add that since absolutely nothing is open at that time in Britain, there’s no excuse not to watch. The film is also coming to DVD in May, with digitally remastered sound and subtitles in eight languages. More at AbductionFilm.com.

Abductions/Activism/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Japan & Korea/Terrorism (NK)

March 15, 2007

North Korea’s Blood Gold

Question: How can a banker and investor in overseas gold mines get sympathetic innocent-victim treatment from the International Herald Tribune? Answer: Go into business with this man. That’s the upshot of this IHT story on Colin McAskill, successor to Nigel Cowie as the new primary foreign stakeholder in the Pyongyang-based Daedong Credit Bank. Reporter Donald Greenless writes that among McAskill’s other functions, he is “helping to operate North Korea’s foreign gold sales.” McAskill offers “dossiers” of proof to disprove any...

Human Rights/Human Trafficking/NK Economics/The Camps

March 14, 2007

RFA Interviews North Korean Comfort Women

Paek Sun-Joo was an 18-year-old street child when she was sold to a 38- year-old Chinese man more than two years ago. “[The traffickers] would gather people wearing rags, appearing to be compassionate and pity them, giving them something to eat and telling them that in China they would be able to feed and clothe themselves adequately,” Paek told RFA reporter Han Min. “It is easy to be tricked when you are starving, and somebody gives you some food, telling...

China & Korea/Human Trafficking

February 5, 2007

Wobble Watch: Kaesong

In a one-hour meeting with Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung, U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow said that while it is unrealistic to recognize the goods made in the border city of Kaesong as South Korean, there is room left to negotiate within the proposed free trade agreement (FTA) between the two countries, Unification Ministry officials said. “Lee stressed that U.S. recognition of the goods produced in Kaesong as South Korean will contribute to bringing about a lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula....

Appeasement/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/NK Economics

February 1, 2007

Czechs End N. Korea Slave Trade

Czech authorities have decided to end the practice of having North Koreans work in Czech factories under what one human rights organization has described as “slave” conditions. “We have decided not to offer new work visas to North Korean citizens and not to prolong the existing visas,” the Interior Ministry official responsible for asylum and migration policy, Tomas Haisman, said in an interview. The ministry announced the decision, citing October’s U.N. resolution condemning and imposing sanctions on Pyongyang because of...

Europe/Human Rights/Human Trafficking

January 11, 2007

Lefkowitz on Kaesong: ‘Material support for a rogue government, its nuclear ambitions, and its human rights atrocities.’

[Updates Below; and a big welcome to everyone coming in from Gateway Pundit.] Ambassador Jay Lefkowitz, the U.S. Special Envoy for Human Rights in North Korea, has an excellent new op-ed in the Wall Street Journal (thanks to a reader!) that will provoke an absolute Category 5 sh*tstorm between the United States and South Korea, and for the best of reasons. Without question, the State Department and the Administration have not always lived up the high ideals the Special Envoy...

"United" Nations/Human Trafficking/NK Economics/U.S. & Korea/WMD

January 2, 2007

KBS Confirms It: N. Korean Workers in Europe Are Slaves

Thanks to Mingi Hyun for forwarding, and to my wife for translation assistance. Report, with video, here. KBS has confirmed that North Korean workers’ pay in East Europe is sent to a North Korean government account. The Czech government learned that most of the workers’ pay was sent to the North Korean government and has stopped issuing work visas for North Korean workers. . . . The underwear factory is in the small village of Zebrac (phonetic), in the Czech...

Human Rights/Human Trafficking/NK Economics

December 21, 2006

Slavery, Then and Now

Apparently, North Korean restaurants are popular in China, for everyone except the young women who are forced to work in them. Fortunately, China is a good enough neighbor to help North Korea hunt the absconders down. Remind you of anything? This is about as clear a case of human trafficking as you’ll ever see. In a just world, China would get sanctions for this. In the world in which we really live, the James Bakers and...

China/China & Korea/Human Rights/Human Trafficking

December 4, 2006

EU Investigating Forced N. Korean Labor

Update: More at the Daily NK. You may recall my previous post (and R. Elgin’s) about the use of female North Korean slave laborers to stitch upholstery for German luxury sedans, which certainly brings back a few memories about the golden age of German business ethics. It looks like that source of income will soon come to an end, as the European Parliament is now investigating the conditions under which North Koreans labor in the Czech Republic and...

Europe/Human Rights/Human Trafficking

December 1, 2006

Kaesong Is Just ‘Ideal,’ Says Baghdad Jim

With a guy as far out on the fringe of his own party as “Baghdad Jim” McDermot, you’ve got to wonder two things: (1) what would his union voters say about this? and (2) why is this really news at all?

Appeasement/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/NK Economics

August 17, 2006

TKL Saves Washington’s Upstanding Moral Reputation

The questionable massage parlor James blogged about here has been raided and shut down. In the District, federal agents targeted five brothels that were masquerading as massage parlors or spas. The establishments were 14K Spot, which operated in a basement in the 1400 block of K Street Northwest; Downtown Spa, in the 1000 block of Vermont Avenue Northwest; OK Spa, in the 2400 block of Wisconsin Avenue Northwest; Cleveland Park Holistic Health, on the second floor of a building in...

Human Trafficking/Korean Society/Media Criticism/Uncategorized

July 28, 2006

Journalistic Absurdity of the Day

Yonhap News gives us this head-scratcher in the course of reporting on North Korea’s new demand for its missile launches not to affect the Kaesong Industrial Complex: Nevertheless, the joint industrial complex has been a burden for the South Korean government as there are concerns that a portion of the wages paid to North Korean workers there could be used to develop missiles. (emphasis mine) I’m in awe. Those people labor long hours in sweatshops for a pittance and still...

Appeasement/Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Humor/Satire/NK Economics/Uncategorized/WMD

June 29, 2006

NK Freedom Watch, Issue 4

… courtesy of Freedom House. This issue discusses Europe’s increasing concern for the North Korean people, but focuses on human trafficking. Their definition of human trafficking doesn’t just involve the movement of enslaved people, but also involves the movement of things enslaved people are forced to make. I particularly recommend this issue to those interested in such issues as Kaesong and other exports from the North; this issue contains accounts of gulag inmates being made to produce products for export.

Activism/Europe/Human Rights/Human Trafficking

June 10, 2006

Minister Lee, Call Your Lawyer!

I wonder if the UniFiction Ministry’s Kaesong brain trust — perhaps the same great minds that thought they could fill Wal-Mart shelves with Kaesong products — ever stumbled across these articles of the Republic of Korea Constitution: Article 32 (1) All citizens shall have the right to work. The State shall endeavor to promote the employment of workers and to guarantee optimum wages through social and economic means and shall enforce a minimum wage system under the conditions as prescribed...

Appeasement/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Korean Law/NK Economics/U.S. & Korea

May 22, 2006

Modern-Day Comfort Women Describe Escape and Survival

In a follow-on to interviews they gave here, some of the first six North Korean refugees are talking about their escapes from the North. Here is an excerpt from the Dong-a Ilbo’s report: A woman who shared the same cell with Chan-mi died of malnutrition with her whole body swollen; another woman she witnessed was beaten to death. Chan-mi wept when she said, “When I was pardoned last year in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the Korean Workers’ Party...

Activism/China/China & Korea/Defectors/Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Refugees/U.S. & Korea/Uncategorized

May 19, 2006

Four N. Korean Refugees Enter U.S. Embassy in China

[Updated 5/21; scroll down.] The Chosun Ilbo reports that a new group of North Korean refugees is under U.S. protection, this time in China. Four North Korean refugees have reportedly moved from the Korean Consulate in Shenyang, China to the U.S. mission to seek asylum there. If they succeed, they would become the second group of defectors from the Stalinist country to be accepted in the U.S., after six who were given official refugee status there via a Southeast Asian...

"United" Nations/China/China & Korea/Defectors/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Refugees/U.S. & Korea/Uncategorized

Category: Human Trafficking