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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Helping North Korea's refugees is the key to regime change |
| 2006-12-18 |
| by Melanie Kirkpatrick, Wall Street Journal This being The Wall Street Journal, we went straight to the bottom line. How much, we asked our visitor at a recent editorial board meeting, does it cost to free one North Korean refugee hiding in China? The Rev. Phillip Buck pauses a moment before replying, apparently making the yuan-to-dollar conversions on the abacus in his mind. "If I do it myself," he says, "the cost is $800 per person. If I hire a broker to do it, it's $1,500." Pastor Buck is a rescuer. It's a job title that applies to a courageous few--mostly Americans and South Koreans and predominantly Christians--who operate the underground railroad that ferries North Korean refugees out of China to South Korea, and now, thanks to 2004 legislation, to the U.S. Mr. Buck, an American from Seattle, says he has rescued more than 100 refugees and helped support another 1,000 who are still on the run. For this "crime"--China's policy is to hunt down and repatriate North Koreans--he spent 15 months in a Chinese prison. He was released in August. . . . . . . The refugees, Pastor Buck argues, are the key to regime change in North Korea and, by inference, the key to halting the North's nuclear and missile programs. Help one man or woman escape, he says, and that person will get word to his family back home about the freedom that awaits them on the outside. Others will follow, and the regime will implode. This is what happened in 1989, when Hungary refused to turn back East Germans fleeing to the West, thereby hastening the collapse of the Berlin Wall. . . . |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #1 Don't see it. While commendable, the refugees are already out of Kimmie's clutches; it is the ones still inside that we need to convince. Until we can hijack the radio and TV frequencies and start broadcasting our own stuff, this is not the way to do it. kind of reminds me of rebuilding the discarded engine after i have swapped it out and have no intention of reinstalling it.... |
| Posted by: USN, Ret. 2006-12-18 14:43 |