Page 2 of
2 North
Korea's busy border By Andrei
Lankov
To deal with such unexpectedly large
numbers of the refugees, the North Korean
authorities built some small refugee camps, where
new arrivals were first sent. The security
services interrogated them and checked their
backgrounds, but usually these procedures did not
take too long, and the migrants were issued North
Korean identities and then allocated jobs and
housing. Most were seen as somewhat suspect, and
in the 1970s many returnee professionals lost
their good jobs. Nonetheless, for most it did not
matter: Being a tractor driver in North Korea,
with little chances of promotion, was still better
than starving in China.
The low-profile
exodus from China further strengthened private
cross-border connections. Technically, the legal
trips were stopped around 1960 when North Korea
curtailed all exchanges even with other communist
governments. As a rule, postal
exchanges stopped as
well, but in most cases letters were sent with
reliable border-crossers, so families stayed in
touch.
In the 1982-84 period, the
regulations were relaxed dramatically. Ethnic
Koreans in China were allowed to visit their
relatives, with the required paperwork being
remarkably simple. Ostensible family reunions
almost immediately became business trips.
The Chinese economy was booming under the
developmental authoritarianism of Deng Xiaoping,
while North Korea was gradually sinking into
economic stagnation, soon to give way to an acute
crisis. The Chinese visitors brought large
quantities of consumer goods for sale, and used
the proceeds to buy what little North Korean
produce would be salable at the Chinese markets -
largely medical herbs, traditional delicacies and
seafood. Their North Korean relatives usually
acted as their agents and advisers, seriously
enriching themselves in the process. After the
late 1980s, a good connection with China virtually
guaranteed success in the emerging semi-legal
market economy of North Korea.
It is
important to keep in mind that we are talking
about a large-scale phenomenon - hundreds of
thousand of North Koreans have relatives in China,
though in many cases their communication with them
is rather sporadic.
After the mid-1990s,
growing numbers of North Koreans began to move to
China for long-term stays. In earlier decades,
such migration was very rare, and with good
reason. First, few North Koreans were attracted by
the prospects of permanent residence in China,
which under the rule of Mao was poorer and more
repressive than Kim Il-sung's North Korea. Second,
such people would stand out in the Mao-era police
state, and hence would be immediately apprehended
by the authorities. Penalties for escape from
North Korea were harsh in those days - at least
five years of imprisonment, followed by a lifetime
of discrimination.
Things changed in the
1990s, though. The booming market economy of China
created many jobs, and employers did not ask too
many questions about their workers' background
(perhaps they even preferred workers with some
problems, since such people are inclined to be
less demanding). The police also turned blind eye
to the escapees.
And, of course, the "push
factor" increased as well: In 1996, a devastating
famine began in North Korea, eventually leaving
about half a million people dead. At the height of
the famine, in 1999, an estimated 200,000 to
250,000 North Koreans were hiding in China -
overwhelmingly in the areas along the border where
the large ethnic-Korean population tended to be
sympathetic to their plight, and where jobs were
easier to find for somebody with little or no
command of Chinese.
As times went by, the
nature of the cross-border movement changed: From
2000 to 2002, North Korean immigrants could be
better described as illegal migrant workers. They
often came to China for a short sojourn, stayed in
touch with their families back home, and sent
their earnings back to North Korea (such transfers
are technically illegal, but can be easily
arranged through a network of professional
go-betweens).
Eventually, the North Korean
authorities began to increase border security. The
presence of the military and security forces in
the borderland areas increased significantly, and
these measures had some impact on the situation.
If one can pay a bribe, an illegal cross-border
trip is still easy, but the cost of these bribes
has increased considerably, so many common migrant
workers cannot afford to go to China anymore.
From around 2003 it also became possible
for North Koreans to apply officially for a
cross-border trip. Such applications are
time-consuming, and often bribes are needed to
grease the wheels of the bureaucratic machine, but
the number of people who go to China privately but
officially, using legally issued travel permits,
now is in the tens of thousands annually. As with
earlier illegal visits from China (such visits
still continue), these legal trips are ostensibly
to meet the relatives, but the actual goal is
either business or short-term employment at
low-paid, unskilled jobs.
Apart from that,
North Koreans are often sent to work in China -
the sale of labor is one of the main sources of
income for Pyongyang. These workers travel
legally, with proper documents - like officials
and their family members, for whom northeastern
China, especially Shenyang, has long been a major
playground.
In recent years this legal
cross-border movement has surpassed the illegal
migration. In 2011, for example, about 122,000
North Koreans went to China legally, and for a
majority of them the destination was near the
border.
So the Sino-Korean border has
remained remarkably porous even when one or both
governments worked hard to make it more tightly
controlled.
For the vast majority of the
North Koreans, this border is in essence a window
through which they can get a glimpse of the
outside world. The news about China's economic
success and the unbelievable prosperity of South
Korea is spreading in North Korea, and in most
cases these reports travel by way of China. DVDs
of foreign (especially South Korean) movies and TV
shows are watched widely, but nearly all these
videos have been smuggled from China. It is not
incidental than South Korean songs, now widely
popular in the North, are euphemistically called
"songs of Yanbian" (the name of the area of
northeastern China with the highest concentration
of ethnic Koreans). Indeed, these songs once
infiltrated North Korea through Yanbian.
And, of course, there are rumors, stories
told by those North Koreans who have been in
China, as well as by visiting Chinese relatives.
Somewhat embellished, these stories are told and
retold widely. The North Korean authorities do not
like what these stories tell, but it seems that
not much can be done about this.
Andrei Lankov is an associate
professor at Kookmin University in Seoul, and
adjunct research fellow at the Research School of
Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National
University. He graduated from Leningrad State
University with a PhD in Far Eastern history and
China, with emphasis on Korea. He has published
books and articles on Korea and North Asia.
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