North Korea recently lured two Korean-Chinese civilians in

China back to North Korea and forcibly transferred them to Pyongyang, Daily NK

has learned. It is alleged that Korean-Chinese families remaining in North

Korea are being used to entice specific targets, who are suspected of Christian

proselytizing, back across the Sino-North Korean border so that they can be

detained.

A source from the border city of Sinuiju in North Pyongan

Province reported the news to Daily NK on March 2nd, explaining, “Recently, two

Korean-Chinese were captured and taken

off to Pyongyang. The word among traders is that evidence emerged that the two had

been introducing [North Koreans] to churches.”

“The authorities already stated that anyone who comes into

contact with a church will be treated as a counter-revolutionary. Accordingly, they

figured they shouldn’t leave alone the people who introduce them to the

churches,” the source went on. “It’s neither here nor there that they are in

China; if Korean-Chinese can be lured to Sinuiju or somewhere else [in North

Korea] then they can be seized, so this will probably happen again.”

The case looks like an extension of recent policy in other

areas of border security. Some North Koreans in China on legal family visit

permits have been repatriated and investigated on suspicion of making contact

with South Koreans or Christian churches. This kind of allergic reaction to

Christianity indicates how destabilizing the circulation of external

information inside North Korea is for the regime, and this explains why the

authorities are so keen to limit it.

According to the Sinuiju source, the regime uses hwagyo [Chinese-Korean] families still

in North Korea to help lure back their arrest targets with talk of urgent

matters to attend to back home. In general, the regime does not arrest people

inside China, as this brings the threat of a diplomatic rift with the Beijing

government upon which Pyongyang is economically reliant.

However, this is not the only tool in the armory of the

security forces. There are even signs of attempts to get traders with hwagyo acquaintances to bring them back

to North Korea with trade as a decoy.

Although Daily NK could not confirm the specific case of the

two men, news from secondary sources inside China appears to corroborate it.

One source explained, “Some hwagyo who

had not been in China for very long did suddenly disappear. I heard that they

had been caught and taken back to Chosun.”

“As a result, other hwagyo

here have been avoiding South Koreans, and avoiding contact with them, too,” the source in China added.

“We’ve received word that additional Ministry of State

Security personnel have been deployed [to China] to help with the surveillance

of people on family visit permits and hwagyo,”

he went on. “They’re lingering in restaurants and the like; apparently, the aim

is to watch out for hwagyo meeting

Southerners to pass on information.”