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Médecins Sans Frontières Condemns Repression in China
Calls for Fair Treatment of Refugees
Urgent appeal for the protection of North Korean refugees in China
On January 18, 48 North Koreans, including families with
children, who were about to leave China by sea and seek
asylum either in South Korea or Japan, were arrested by the
Chinese security services in Yantai City, Shandong Province.
Three aid workers who assisted them were arrested as well.
The detained North Koreans, as do thousands of their
countrymen, face the risk of being severely interrogated by
Chinese security services and forcibly repatriated to North
Korea where a grim fate awaits them. As for the three aid
workers, they may be subject to long-term imprisonment in
China. The case of this group of 48 North Koreans is most
revealing: it unveils the distress of the North Korean
refugee population in China and the urgent necessity to
provide them assistance. It graphically illustrates a human
tragedy that will not be solved through repression. We can
only condemn the Chinese arrest of these asylum seekers and
denounce the recurring non-observance of their right to flee
and the persecutions they are subject to.
Within the past three years, China has arrested and forcibly
repatriated thousands of North Koreans in flight from their
own country in search of asylum and assistance. Since early
December 2002, as a way to definitively eliminate the
embarrassing question of North Korean refugees, China has
launched a new manhunt in collusion with North Korean
security services. As of mid-January 2003, 3200 North Korean
civilians in China have already been repatriated as a result
of this so-called "100 day campaign". 1300 others are
awaiting their repatriation in the detention centers of
Tumen and Longjing. The systematic and organized dragnet
taking place in China leaves North Korean refugees no other
alternative than a desperate flight to a third country, at
the risk of their very lives.
The humanitarian aid workers who attempt to rescue North
Korean refugees also face the brutal determination of the
Chinese authorities, who deem the assistance of North Korean
refugees as a criminal offense. In addition to facing jail
terms, deportation and fines for assistance, Yanbian
residents who are suspected of being humanitarian aid
workers are now forced to take a written oath to the effect
that they will not provide assistance to North Korean
refugees. Bounties for the identification of either
humanitarian aid workers or North Koreans remain
commonplace. Predictably, in this context, support for North
Korean refugees in distress is diminishing and assisting
them has become a challenge that increasingly few aid
organizations, crushed by this sanction policy, are able to
undertake.
As international attention is now turned to Pyongyang's
regime for a separate crisis, the fate of North Korean
refugees remains resolutely ignored. Neither China's
repeated violation of international conventions nor
desperate attempts by hundreds of North Koreans to seek
asylum in foreign representations have resulted in
measurable progress on the question of the protection of
North Korean refugees in search of asylum. The United
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Beijing,
approached repeatedly on this matter, has simply been unable
to ensure their protection.
MSF earnestly urges the UNHCR to demand from the Chinese
authorities access to the North Koreans under arrest and to
examine their asylum requests. MSF asks that according to
the dispositions of International law, the North Korean
detainees not be repatriated and that they be protected.
MSF asks that the humanitarian volunteers be freed.
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) vigorously condemns the
repression and the forced repatriation of North Koreans in
China. It denounces the Chinese measures aimed at
criminalizing the humanitarian assistance directed to the
North Koreans.
For further information, please call:
MSF Korea
Representatives: Marine Buissonnière & Sophie Delaunay
8219 835 6642
MSF Paris
Program Director: Pierre Salignon
Communication Director: Anne Fouchard
331 40212929
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