Helping North Korean Christians just got even more dangerous.
Fifteen to 20 years ago, northeast China used to be a safe haven for North Korean Christian believers. But now, helping North Korean believers has become a significant risk.
A man dressed in a blue labourer’s uniform and wearing a black cap rides his bike at an easy pace over a hardened road that runs parallel to the Tumen River. Three barefoot women wash their family’s clothes in the gentle stream, and two children play with pebbles.
The whole scene couldn’t be more tranquil.
That is, it would be … if you weren’t looking from behind a two-meter-high barbed wire fence. Or if you didn’t see the small bullet holes on the riverbank across the water. And if you didn’t notice the watch tower in the distance, or the pole with cameras and megaphones nearby.
And yet, this is now a common scene in northeastern China, along its border with North Korea.
Only 15 to 20 years ago, it was still relatively easy for North Koreans to cross illegally into China. And because so many of the North Koreans were supported by local Christians, this part of China became a fruitful mission field.
But that has changed. The appointment of Xi Jinping as China’s president, the COVID pandemic, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have turned this mission field into a minefield for Christians.
A riskier crossing
It’s understandable why people would want to leave North Korea, even if it’s only a temporary visit to China. The country is home to the brutal dictatorship of Kim Jong Un, and the horrific prison system is a risk for anyone who steps outside the lines of the regime. Christians are also heavily persecuted—North Korea currently ranks No. 1 on the Open Doors’ World Watch List.
North Korea also grapples with regular food shortages. A BBC report this summer interviewed people from the country who spoke of neighbors dying from starvation. It’s an echo of the famines of the 1990s, which killed at least 1 million people.
And yet, the number of North Koreans who make it to the South continues to drop, suggesting a larger pattern. According to South Korea’s Ministry of Unification, 2,000 North Korean escapees arrived in the South in 2006 and until 2011, South Korea accepted between 2,000 to 3,000 North Koreans every year. In the 2010s, that number dropped to between 1,000 and 2,000.
But in 2020 only 229 refugees made it. In 2021 just 63 came to South Korea, and in 2022 only 67. What happened?
“The first reason is Kim Jong-Un,” explains Brother Simon, who works with Open Doors’ North Korea ministry. “He succeeded his father in 2011 and was not even 30 at the time. His power base was weaker than that of his father and grandfather, and he had to oppress the North Korean people even more. He increased punishments, made laws stricter, and enforced the borders. At the same time, the Chinese government also strengthened the security in the border area. It wasn’t only difficult and dangerous to cross the border, but once in China, it was much harder to leave that country. North Koreans got stuck.”
The COVID pandemic had a major impact too. “Until the beginning of 2020, it was difficult to escape from North Korea, but not impossible,” Brother Simon says. “When the pandemic hit, the border was completely closed on both sides. Lockdowns in both China and North Korea prevented any people from traveling. This made escaping nearly impossible. China was the first country to implement restrictions and about the last to lift them. North Korea began very late, but also kept the restrictions for a long time.
In 2022 only 67 North Korean refugees arrived in South Korea. That number is down from between 2-3,000 in 2011.
Changing alliances and laws
Brother Simon also points out that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has had a negative effect on Christians and their fellow citizens in North Korea, too, because the war has changed North Korea’s relationship with its more powerful neighbours.
“The geopolitical arena is always changing,” he says. “Because the US and the West have supported Ukraine and isolated Russia, Russia has now become a stronger partner of North Korea. Not only Russia, but China, too. There was a time when China was critical of North Korea, but right now, they act like they are friends. This bond has been strengthened by the war in Ukraine.”
The pandemic had at least one upside. China hardly arrested any North Koreans because they were unable to repatriate them to their own country. But now that the borders have reopened and China’s President Xi Jinping and North Korea’s Leader Kim Jong-Un are friendlier, many North Koreans have been arrested and repatriated.
According to Human Rights Watch, China recently deported more than 500 illegal refugees, most of them women. “They will be asked if they have had contact with Christians”, says Eun-Kyung, another North Korean who was able to escape. She knows what it is like to be put in a van and driven back to North Korea. She was caught several times in the past but managed to escape twice and be released once. She was one of the lucky ones. Not everyone survives starvation, torture, and hard labour.
“The important thing is not to admit that you have read the Bible, been to church, or met any South Koreans,” she says.
The situation has also grown more dangerous because of China’s own changes in its laws. Doing mission work among North Koreans in northeastern China became risker when China amended a counter-espionage law, broadening the definitions of what is considered spying and increasing punishments for perceived crimes.
This law is vague and ambiguous and leaves much open to the interpretation of the authorities. It makes it much more dangerous to share certain information with foreign nationals.
“In practice, this means that Christians who help North Koreans can be detained and sentenced to 10 years in prison for conducting spy activities,” says Brother Simon. “And local Christians who want to meet foreigners need to report that in advance to the police. Doing mission work has become more dangerous.”
‘Jesus is still at work’
This is confirmed by Sister Han*, a contact of Open Doors in China. She doesn’t live close to the area where she helps Christian North Koreans who live in China, and she has to travel to that part of China. “Ever since the pandemic, I cannot take the bus anymore,” she says. “There are just too many checkpoints. I have to go in a local car using a local driver. And I have to wear local clothes. Basically, I travel in disguise if I meet North Korean women.”
These North Korean women have usually been trafficked and forcibly married to Chinese husbands. They receive food, support and Bible study from Open Doors. “If we meet in the countryside, we feel relatively free,” says Sister Han. “But if we meet in a building in the city, we must be very careful and sing and pray softly. You can always see that the women are nervous. Who knows who is watching or who is listening.”
But that doesn’t mean Open Doors and its local partners have stopped the work of serving North Korean believers. “Yes, the work continues,” says Lee. “But we have to be even more cautious. China is the country with the most sophisticated monitoring system in the world. You can’t even buy a train ticket without showing your ID. Then there are cameras connected to databases that make use of face recognition software.
“The Chinese government will always know where you are. But so does our Lord God. His Spirit helps us to reach the North Korean people who come to China. Jesus is still at work.”
God still works. Even behind the barbed wire.
*Name changed to protect identity
