Interviews with Shin Dong-hyuk

My story, having been born in a political prison camp and escaping, is unique. It has captured the interest and attention of people throughout the world, and for that I am quite thankful.

However, I believe I have no strength in the sense that no matter how much I go around the world and urge the international community to take action, to show interest, the North Korean government will not budge. Furthermore, North Korea will not even listen or be influenced by the strongest nation in the world, the United States.

I believe that if people really care about what is going on in the political prison camps, for example, where people are being born and getting killed, living an existence similar to what I experienced, people will really want to get involved and concrete action will be taken.

When I look at the world, it seems to me there is little attention paid to countries that oppress their people, but

these nations should be called out for their actions; by not paying attention, it’s as if people provide implicit support for these regimes.

That is why I believe the international community has a responsibility to do something.

Last fall, I had a chance to visit with officials at the United States Department of State and one of them said something quite interesting.

This official said that one of the U.S. Government’s most regrettable moments took place in the 1940’s during World War II.

Even though the international community and the United States were aware of Nazi prison camps, no immediate action was taken to deal with them.

This was one of the most troubling and regretful moments in U.S. history.

I would answer what the official said by saying that if the international community fails to take action against what is happening in North Korea, the same sentiment will be felt 60, 70 years from now: regret.

Shin Dong Hyuk is the only known person to be born in a North Korean gulag and escape to freedom. In North Korea, whole families are incarcerated for the offenses of a single family member. As many as 130,000 men, women and children are imprisoned in North Korea’s vast system of gulags.

Shin was born in 1982 in Camp 14, the product of a “reward marriage” between two prisoners. He lived with his mother until the age of 12, though they never formed a true familial bond. Shin received a basic education before being pressed into the camp’s labor force. During this time, he witnessed fellow children being beaten, executed and killed in work-related accidents.

In 1996, prison officials brought Shin to a separate detention facility where he was tortured. He had no idea why this was happening to him. Finally, the guards explained that his mother and brother had attempted to escape and they wanted more information. After being held in an underground cell for seven months, Shin was forced to attend the public execution of his mother and brother.

In 2005, Shin and another prisoner were assigned to work on a mountain. Driven by hunger, the two decided to escape over the electrified fence enclosing the camp. Shin’s leg was caught in the fence and scarred, but he managed to get through; the other prisoner was electrocuted and died. From there, Shin managed to cross the border into China where he worked as a laborer for several years until connecting with a journalist who brought him to the South Korean Embassy. From there, Shin escaped China.

Shin’s incredible story has been shared with the world in the book, Escape from Camp 14, by American journalist Blaine Harden. Since escaping, Shin has become a leading voice on North Korean human rights and the country’s gulag system, including providing testimony at the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea).