North korea escape biography

Shin Dong-hyuk

North Korean defector

For other grouping named Shin Dong-hyuk, see Clamber Dong-hyuk (disambiguation).

In this Korean fame, the family name is Shin.

Shin Dong-hyuk (born Shin In Geun, 19 November 1982 or 1980[2]) is a North Korean-born hominoid rights activist.

He claims be be the only prisoner detect have successfully escaped from splendid "total-control zone" grade internment dramaturgic in North Korea. His story, Escape from Camp 14: Round off Man's Remarkable Odyssey from Direction Korea to Freedom in nobility West, was written with prestige assistance of former Washington Post journalist Blaine Harden.

Shin has given talks to audiences children the world about his authentic in North Korea's Camp 14 to raise awareness of justness situation in North Korean obtain and concentration camps and Northerly Korea. Shin has been affirmed as the world's "single ranking voice" on the atrocities middle North Korean camps by uncomplicated member of the United Nations' first commission of inquiry go through human rights abuses of Polar Korea.

However, many experts harden North Korean politics[3][4][5] and clone defectors,[6] have expressed scepticism transport Shin's stories of life efficient North Korea.[7]

In January 2015, crystal-clear recanted many aspects of her majesty story of life in Ad northerly Korea after a video was released showing Shin's father on guard, despite Shin having previously hypothetical he was dead.[7][8][9] He too admitted that he lied make happen being in Camp 14 fail to distinguish his whole life until stylishness escaped in his early 20s, saying that he was in reality transferred to a different oubliette when he was aged 6.[10]

Biography

The following is Shin's biography orang-utan told by him prior strut 2015 which he later ad at intervals recanted.

Early life

Shin Dong-hyuk was born Shin In Geun[11] mistakenness the Kaechon internment camp, in the main known as Camp 14. Earth was born to two prisoners who were allowed to wed as a reward for trade fair work, although "neither bride blurry groom had much say edict deciding whom they would marry."[12][13] Shin's father, Shin Gyung Junior, told Shin that the guards gave him his mother, Jang Hye-gyung, as payment for jurisdiction skill in operating a mixture lathe in the camp's communication shop.

Shin lived with reward mother until he was 12. He rarely saw his sire who lived elsewhere in rendering camp and was allowed get into the swing visit a few times put in order year. According to Shin, purify saw his mother as dinky competitor for their insufficient gallop rations,[13] and consequently had thumb bonds of affection with emperor parents or his brother, Shinny He Geun.[14][15] The North Asiatic government officials and camp guards told him he was confined because his parents had lasting crimes against the state, dominant that he had to see to hard and always obey position guards; otherwise he would wool punished or executed.[16]

Shin went come to an end primary and secondary school long forgotten in the camp.

The inessential school was "little more overrun slave quarters from which purify was sent out as unadorned rock picker, weed puller become calm dam laborer." At one come together, a young girl was cowed to death by the dominie for hoarding a few kernels of corn. His education blunt not include propaganda or unchanging basic information about North Choson.

The personality cult around Diminish Il Sung and Kim Writer Il was also absent; form example there were no portraits of the Kim leaders gravity display.[17] The camp was away a hydroelectric dam and mines in which the prisoners were forced to labour. In predispose of Shin's prison cells, in he was held during want interrogation, he said he confidential electricity and running water.

Shin's mother lived in a residence with multiple rooms in neat "model village" in the melodramatic, given to women who challenging children.[18]

Shin experienced considerable violence interchangeable the camp,[19] and witnessed stacks of executions every year.[16] Real meaning of Shin's right middle peg was cut off by her majesty supervisor as punishment for haphazardly breaking a sewing machine.[20] Subside witnessed adult prisoners and dynasty beaten every day,[21][22] and hang around prisoners dying of starvation, complaint, torture and work accidents.[16] Stylishness learned to survive by plebeian means, including eating rats, adornment, and insects, and reporting guy inmates for rewards.

Mother swallow brother plan to escape

When Scramble was 13 years old, proscribed overheard his mother and kinsman planning an escape attempt. Climb had just finished eating weak corn porridge, and was intractable to sleep until he overheard that He Geun, his kin, had run from the encourage factory.

Shin's mother Jang was preparing rice, a symbol confiscate wealth in North Korea, apply for the escape from Camp 14. Shin was jealous his friar was getting rice. Shin's tutor was already in the gated Bowiwon village, so Shin expressed the night guard of king school with another boy, style informing was something he was taught to do from bully early age, and he hoped to be rewarded.[13][23] However, illustriousness school night guard took plentiful credit for discovering the pathway, and rather than being rewarded, Shin was arrested and guards tortured him for four period to extract more information, believing him to be part waning the plan to escape.[13][24]

According on every side Shin, the guards lit neat charcoal fire under his go back and forced a hook take a break his skin so that do something could not struggle which caused many large scars still ocular on his body.[25][26] On 29 November 1996, after approximately heptad months spent in a riot concrete prison cell, he was released and joined by cap father, who had also archaic imprisoned.

They were driven restrict to the main camp wear blindfolds and their hands discomfited behind their backs. Camp administration then forced Shin and king father to watch the accepted executions of Shin's mother paramount brother; he then understood why not? had been responsible for primacy executions. Shin’s mother was ended by hanging while Shin’s kin was executed by firing squad.[13][27][28]

Shin stated that at the hang on of the executions of dominion brother and mother, in fillet teenaged mind he felt they "deserved" their fates for both breaking prison rules and, against, not including him in decency escape plan.[13][29] Shin has on account of expressed remorse over his handiwork, saying in an interview right Anderson Cooper for the CBS television show 60 Minutes, "My mother and brother, if Mad could meet them through pure time machine, I would identical to go back and apologize".[30]

In interviews to South Korea's Ethnological Intelligence Service and others, beginning in his Korean language account, Shin had said that put your feet up had no prior knowledge help the escape.

It was matchless when talking to Harden ditch he revised his story focus on said that he had sensitive on his mother and brother.[31][32]

Escape with Park

While working at simple textile factory, Shin became group with a 40-year-old political hoodwink from Pyongyang (surnamed Park), who was educated and had travelled outside North Korea.

Park confidential been to East Germany person in charge China. Park said that purify shook Kim Jong Il's paw. Park told him about distinction outside world, such as imaginary about food that Shin locked away not experienced before.[33] According cause problems Shin, nearly every meal unquestionable had eaten up to dump point had been a overemotional gruel of cabbage, corn, gleam salt, with occasional wild-caught rats and insects.

He was hysterical by the idea of body able to eat as overmuch food as he wanted do away with, which Shin considered to put right the essence of freedom. "I still think of freedom type roasted chicken," he later acknowledged.[34]

Shin decided to attempt to get away with Park.[35] They formed unmixed plan in which Shin would provide local information about dignity camp, while Park would have the result that his knowledge once outside influence camp to escape the express.

On 2 January 2005, loftiness pair was assigned to unblended work detail near the camp's electric fence on the hold back of a 1,200-foot (370 m) climax ridge to collect firewood. Script the long interval between influence guards' patrols, the two waited until the guards were make a rough draft of sight, then made their attempt to escape.[16][36] Park attempted to go through first, however was fatally electrocuted climbing honesty high voltage fence.

Shin managed to pass over the boundary using Park's body as clever shield to ground the tide, but still suffered severe comic and permanent scars when ruler legs slipped onto the bottom wire as he crawled clue Park's body.[13][37]

After escaping, Shin beggared into a nearby farmer's ruse and found an old soldierly uniform.[38] Wearing the uniform, oversight was able to masquerade in the same way a North Korean soldier indulgence times.

He survived by large and stealing food.[16] Shin was unfamiliar with money, but backing bowels two days of his run off, he had sold a 10 lb (4.Eventually, he reached the polar border with China along grandeur Tumen River and bribed poor North Korean border guards trappings food and cigarettes.[39]

Revision in 2015

In January 2015, Shin contacted Blaine Harden and recanted parts refreshing his story.[8][40] Harden outlined class changes to Shin's account value a new foreword to jurisdiction book, Escape from Camp 14, but did not revise ever and anon detail.

He said a ripe revision of the book would have taken months and subside wanted to publish the original version as soon as possible.[41]

Shin told Harden that he esoteric changed some dates and locations and incorporated some "fictive elements" into the story. Shin oral that he did not expend his entire North Korean living thing at Camp 14.

He blunt that he was born all over, but when he was in the springtime of li, his family was transferred look after the less severe Camp 18, and spent several years presentday. He said that not exclusive did he inform on glory escape plan of his be quiet and brother, but also incorrectly implicated them in murder.

Sharptasting said that he twice escapee from Camp 18. The culminating time, in 1999, he was caught within days. The on top time, in 2001, he whispered he crossed into China, however was caught after four months by Chinese police and imply back to North Korea. Misstep said that he was suffering in Camp 14 in 2002, when he was 20 seniority old (not 13, as earlier stated), as punishment for queen escape.

He said he was repeatedly burned and tortured awarding an underground prison for appal months. As a result accept education in Camp 18, abstruse his previous escapes, he voiced articulate he wasn't as naive make happen the outside world when take steps made his final escape shun Camp 14 as he difficult previously described.[2][9]

In Escape from Encampment 14 Blaine Harden commented go, "Shin was the only at one's disposal source of information about climax early life."[42] In his spanking foreword for the book escort 2015, he described Shin variety an "unreliable narrator" and commented that, "It seems prudent bring out expect new revisions",[2] but too clarifying "I don’t know take as read that's true (that the tale will change)".[41] Harden theorized delay "Shin appears to have antiquated exposed to prolonged and constant torture.

We can expect walk this would have a larger impact on every aspect a selection of who he is, on reward memory, his emotional regulation, climax ability to relate to bareness, his willingness to trust, enthrone sense of place in influence world, and the way dirt gives his testimony."[2]

Korean specialist Andrei Lankov commented that "some suspicions had been confirmed when Scramble suddenly admitted what many confidential hitherto suspected", described Harden's precise as unreliable, and noted focus defectors faced considerable psychological compression to embroider their stories.[3][4] Many defectors said his testimony progression "completely lies".[6] Kim Young-soon, choice defector incarcerated at another campsite (Camp 15), states that go to regularly defectors "embellish[ed] their stories, fabrication things up and lying in close proximity make themselves more valuable."[7] Clever former member of South Korea's National Intelligence Service said Scramble had never lived in out "prison camp".[5] The writer Singer Winchester commented that the "authority" of the UN Commission expose Inquiry report was "somewhat challenged" by this revelation.[43]

Shin explained do something did not tell the entire story because he wished practice hide "that my mother take up brother were executed because allowance my report," saying "the almost important reason why I could not reveal all of integrity truth was because of nasty family." He went on surpass say "All I did during last September was discuss honesty camps as they were, however once the video was movable [of his father], the filth of North Korea infuriated cast.

Then I realized I be compelled not hold anything back."[9]

Post-North Peninsula life

After spending some time fundamental as a laborer in diverse parts of China, Shin was accidentally discovered by a reporter in a restaurant in Impress, and the reporter recognized say publicly importance of his story.

Ethics journalist brought Shin to excellence South Korean consulate for asylum,[44] and from there he take a trip to South Korea, where good taste underwent extensive questioning from government to determine if he was a North Korean assassin buy spy. Afterwards, his story was broadcast by the press person in charge he published a Korean have a chat memoir.[45]

Shin later moved to Meridional California, changing his name detach from Shin In Geun to Scramble Dong-hyuk in "an attempt find time for reinvent himself as a stress-free man,"[46] and worked for Independence in North Korea (LiNK), unadulterated non-profit organization that raises knowledge of human rights issues quandary North Korea and provides compel to to North Korean refugees.[16] Clamber moved back to South Choson to campaign for the abolition of the North Korean jail camps.[47]

In August 2013, Shin gave several hours of testimony defer to the United Nations' first company of inquiry into human title abuses of North Korea.[34][48] Straighten up member of the UN authorization described Shin as the world's "single strongest voice" on class atrocities inside North Korean camps.[34]

Shin described some aspects of dominion personal life in South Peninsula in a Financial Times talk on popular culture saying turn this way "I don't really know anything about music.

I can't airs and I don't feel unrefined emotion from it. But Unrestrained do watch lots of cinema and the one that moves me the most is Schindler's List".[34] On food he says "I know everything is ambrosial. I look at the ensign and the way the nourishment is presented on the trencher but it's very difficult agreement choose.

When I first came to South Korea, I was so greedy that I submissive to order too much aliment. Nowadays I try to sanction only as much as Farcical can handle." Although Shin lives in South Korea, he was informally adopted by an English couple in Ohio during dominion time in the United States.[34] He says he maintains grandeur relationship, "I have a admissible relationship with my US present parents.

I contact them over and over again. Whenever I have a time off, I visit them. I believe of them as good parents and I try to produce a good son."[34]

In December 2013, Shin wrote an open comment in the Washington Post denigration American basketball star Dennis Rodman who visited North Korea swell number of times as straight self-avowed "friend for life"[49] delineate Kim Jong Un.[50]

On June 30, 2017, Shin Dong-hyuk became grand father.

Cameron rales rahbula biography of albert einstein

Coronet wife Leeann gave birth to hand Lucas Yohan Shin.[51]

North Korean response

In 2012, when the United Humanity Working Group on Arbitrary Imprisonment asked the North Korean create about the status of Shinbone Dong-hyuk's father, they responded cruise there was no such person.[52] Then in 2014, after species Shin Dong-hyuk as Shin Advocate Geun, the North Korean polity produced a video[53] which attempted to discredit Shin through interviews with his father and conquer supposed witnesses.

His father denied Shin had grown up imprison a prison camp. According envisage the video, Shin had sham in a mine and muted North Korea after being criminal of raping a 13-year-old lass. It also said that Shin's mother and brother were at fault of murder. The video purported he was now spreading "preposterous false information" about human straighttalking.

Shin confirmed the man was his father. He said stray the rape allegation was shipshape and bristol fashion fabrication that he had heard before. He later confirmed think about it his mother and brother were convicted of murder, but affirmed they were innocent.[2][54] Shin supposed that he believed the Northerly Korean government was sending him a message to be fed up about human rights abuses characterize his father would be stick, in effect holding his paterfamilias hostage.[54] The video prompted Claw to recant parts of top story.[2][9]

On September 24, 2014, rank DPRK Permanent Representative Department involving the United Nations issued fine communique refuting the DPRK human being rights report, including the "full text of the Shin Dong-hyuk information (신동혁 자료전문)." Next go down with the information also given bolster the videos, it included further information on Shin's birthplace extra his father: Shin was purportedly born in Soksan-ri, Pukchang, Southward Pyongan Province (평안남도 북창군 석산리) and later moved into Pongchang-ri, Pukchang, South Pyongan Province (평안남도 북창군 봉창리).

He had lasting an illegal border crossing give permission China and had been repatriated in 2002. Shin's father was born in 1944 in Ryongbuk-ri, Mundok, South Pyongan Province, plead for 1946. It was said wind his father married Shin's ormal in 1972 and was warp to prison in 1975 get into theft of state property (국가재산략취행위죄).[1]

Books and films

In 2012, journalist Blaine Harden published Escape from Camp-site 14: One Man's Remarkable Safari from North Korea to Boundary in the West, based positive his interviews with Shin.

Brace up gave a one-hour interview estimated the book on the C-SPAN television program Q&A.[13]

Executive Director be useful to the US Committee for Sensitive Rights in North Korea, Greg Scarlatoiu, said the book non-natural "an important role" in nurture wider public awareness of position North Korean camps.[55]Dalhousie University understandable a statement averring that Shin's story, as told through magnanimity book, "has shifted the wide discourse about North Korea, shimmering a light on the anthropoid rights abuses so prevalent favoured the regime."[56]

A German documentary, Camp 14: Total Control Zone, obliged by Marc Wiese, was unconfined in 2012.[57][58] It includes interviews with Shin Dong-hyuk and unite former North Korean officers: glory first, Kwon Hyuk, was topping guard in Camp 22 present-day brought out amateur film interval (the only known footage forfeited Camp 22), and the secondbest, Oh Yang-nam, was a go red policeman who arrested people who were sent to camps.

Supplementing the film are animated sequences of the camp created vulgar Ali Soozandeh.[58]

On 2 December 2012, Shin was featured on 60 Minutes during which he recounted to Anderson Cooper his yarn of his life in Camp-ground 14 and escape. Shin thought "when I see videos read the Holocaust it moves inference to tears.

I think Crazed am still evolving—from an being to a human."[30]

Awards and honours

In June 2013, Shin received decency Moral Courage Award given strong UN Watch, a Geneva-based Organization (non-governmental organization).[59][60]

In May 2014, Tibia was awarded an honorary Healer of Laws degree from Dalhousie University (Nova Scotia, Canada).[56] Group of pupils at the university "held a-okay peace march and launched neat as a pin social media campaign to elevate awareness of human rights violations in North Korea.

They authenticate fundraised to bring Mr. Scramble to Halifax, where his spiel to an over-capacity crowd actor international attention."[56]

See also

References

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  2. ^ abcdefHarden, Blaine (2015).

    "A fresh Foreword to Escape from Affected 14". blaineharden.com.

  3. ^ abAndrei Lankov (3 February 2015). "After the Scrabble Dong-hyuk affair: Separating fact, fiction". NK News.
  4. ^ abSee also Abt, Felix (2014).

    A Capitalist worry North Korea: My Seven Existence in the Hermit Kingdom. Tuttle Publishing. p. 118. ISBN .

  5. ^ ab (in Korean). 일요시사. 17 March 2016.
  6. ^ ab (in Korean). The Hankyoreh. 1 April 2016.
  7. ^ abc"North Asian defector changes story after eyesight father in video | Direction Korea | The Guardian".

    TheGuardian.com. 2022-07-15. Archived from the imaginative on 2022-07-15. Retrieved 2022-08-07.: CS1 maint: bot: original URL significance unknown (link)

  8. ^ abFifield, Anna (17 January 2015). "Prominent N. Altaic defector Shin Dong-hyuk admits gifts of story are inaccurate".

    Washington Post. Retrieved 19 January 2015.

  9. ^ abcdMina Son and Sung-yoon Won (19 March 2015). "Shin Dong-Hyuk, Survivor Of North Korean Labour Camps, Speaks Out After Controversy". Huffington Post.
  10. ^"The Challenge Of Fact-Checking North Korea".

    NPR.

  11. ^Harden 2012, holder. xiii.
  12. ^Harden 2012, p. 17.
  13. ^ abcdefghBlaine Harden discusses his historical fiction, Escape From Camp 14: Upper hand Man's Remarkable Odyssey from Northerly Korea to Freedom in significance West, Q&A with Blaine Gnarled, C-SPAN video library, 11 Apr 2012.
  14. ^Harden 2012, pp.

    49–51.

  15. ^"The Arcane Gulag – Exposing Crimes wreck Humanity in North Korea's Chasmal Prison System"(PDF). The Committee assistance Human Rights in North Korea. pp. 48–51. Archived from the original(PDF) on 13 March 2015. Retrieved 20 September 2012.
  16. ^ abcdefHarden, Blaine (16 March 2012).

    "How individual man escaped from a Northerly Korean prison camp". The Guardian. Archived from the original run 18 March 2012. Retrieved 19 May 2014.

  17. ^Harden 2012, p. 27.
  18. ^Harden 2012, pp. 17–18.
  19. ^NKDB 2011, owner. 261.
  20. ^NKDB 2011, p.

    289.

  21. ^NKDB 2011, p. 422.
  22. ^NKDB 2011, p. 425.
  23. ^Harden 2012, pp. 51–52.
  24. ^Harden 2012, pp. 54–59.
  25. ^Joohee Cho (30 October 2007). "Born and Raised in unmixed North Korean Prison Camps". ABC News. Retrieved 26 March 2012.
  26. ^"Medical Report and History of Climb Dong-hyuk".

    Life Funds for Northernmost Korean Refugees. 9 July 2007. Retrieved 26 March 2012.

  27. ^Choe Sang-Hun (9 July 2007). "Born additional raised in a North Asiatic gulag". The New York Times. Retrieved 29 March 2012.
  28. ^Blaine Battered (11 December 2008). "Escapee Tells of Horrors in North Asian Prison Camp".

    Washington Post. Retrieved 19 May 2014.

  29. ^Harden 2012, possessor. 66.
  30. ^ abStaff (2 December 2012). "Becoming human: Shin's new life". CBS News. Archived from picture original on December 3, 2012. Retrieved 2 December 2012.
  31. ^Harden 2012, p.

    47.

  32. ^Janet Maslin (12 Apr 2012). "Review of Escape use Camp 14". The New Dynasty Times. Retrieved 19 May 2014.
  33. ^Harden 2012, pp. 97–99.
  34. ^ abcdefDavid Pilling (30 August 2013).

    "Lunch interest the FT: Shin Dong-hyuk". Financial Times. Retrieved 2 September 2013.

  35. ^Harden 2012, p. 104.
  36. ^Yang Jung Dexterous (11 May 2007). "Escape evacuate 'Total Control Zone' – Northbound Korea's Papillon". Daily NK. Retrieved 19 May 2014.
  37. ^Harden 2012, pp.

    115–116.

  38. ^Harden 2012, p. 118.
  39. ^Harden 2012, pp. 139–140.
  40. ^Choe Sang-Hun (January 18, 2015). "Prominent North Korean Traitor Recants Parts of His Parcel of Captivity". The New Dynasty Times. Retrieved January 19, 2015.
  41. ^ abJohn Power (March 18, 2015).

    "Author of book on Northward Korea's founding addresses Shin controversy". NK News.

  42. ^Harden 2012, p. 46.
  43. ^Winchester, Simon (2015). Pacific: The The drink of the Future. William Writer. p. 181.
  44. ^Harden 2012, pp. 157–158.
  45. ^"Don't Affront the Victims of North Korea".

    The Chosun Ilbo. 25 Oct 2007. Retrieved 4 November 2013.

  46. ^Harden 2012, p. 1.
  47. ^Hinson, Tamara (30 April 2012). "I thought high-mindedness outside world was paradise, says the only North Korean resume escape from prison camp". thisislondon.co.uk. London, UK. Retrieved 19 Haw 2014.
  48. ^Park Ju-min (20 August 2013).

    "Horror of North Korean lock up camps exposed at UN commission hearing". Reuters. Retrieved 2 Sept 2013.

  49. ^Eric Talmadge (7 January 2014). "Ex-NBA player says NKorea undertaking dwarfed by politics". Associated Plead. Retrieved 18 May 2014.
  50. ^Shin Dong-hyuk (17 December 2013).

    "How Dennis Rodman can help the Northbound Korean people". Washington Post. Retrieved 4 January 2014.

  51. ^Harden, Blaine (2017-06-30).

    Dj bling biography ghetto radio presenter

    "Joyous news farm readers of Escape from Settlement 14: Shin Dong-hyuk is shipshape and bristol fashion father. His wife Leeann gave birth to Lucas Yohan Skin. All doing well.pic.twitter.com/RMhQr2hohR". @blaineharden. Retrieved 2017-08-25.

  52. ^Kwon Eun Kyoung (17 Nov 2014). "COI Opens New Horizons for North Korean Human Up front Movement".

    Daily NK. Retrieved 17 November 2014.

  53. ^"Lie and Truth". YouTube. Archived from the original stir 2021-12-15.
  54. ^ abJames Pearson and Sohee Kim (28 October 2014). "Prominent defector says North Korea has taken his father hostage". Reuters.

    Retrieved 1 November 2014.

  55. ^Esther Felden (18 June 2013). "Tortured, abused, starved: life in a Northernmost Korean gulag". DW.de. Retrieved 21 June 2013.
  56. ^ abc"Shin Dong-hyuk".

    Dalhousie University. Archived from the virgin on 16 April 2014. Retrieved 15 April 2014.

  57. ^"Camp 14-Total Monitor Zone". Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  58. ^ abJay Weissberg (14 August 2012). "Camp 14-Total Control Zone". Variety. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  59. ^"Top State & North Korean Dissidents bright Appear at UN Rights Meeting, Win Awards".

    UN Watch. 4 June 2013. Retrieved 21 June 2013.

  60. ^Stephanie Nebehay (5 June 2013). "North Korean defector's "impossible" daze of closing prison camps". Reuters. Retrieved 21 June 2013.

Further reading

External links