wfn.org | South Korean Pastor Describes Conditions in North Korea

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

13-May-1997 
97201 
 
                  South Korean Pastor Describes  
                    Conditions in North Korea 
 
                           by Gary Luhr 
 
SEOUL, Korea--The pastor of the second largest Presbyterian church in South 
Korea believes reunification of that country with North Korea could come 
within the next three years as a result of food shortages and devastating 
economic conditions in the North. 
 
     Before that happens, however, South Korea needs to help North Korea 
develop its economy in order to "prevent a chaotic situation in which 
anything can happen," the pastor, the Rev. Kwak Sun Hee, told members of 
the General Assembly Council (GAC) Executive Committee during their visit 
to Seoul, April 25-May 3. 
 
     Kwak, who was born in North Korea, is pastor of the 30,000-member 
So-Mang Presbyterian Church in Seoul. He became a refugee during the Korean 
War. Recently he negotiated an agreement with North Korea to start a 
technical college to train North Koreans in agriculture and other fields. 
The school will be modeled after one he started six years ago for Koreans 
living in China.  
 
     Speaking through an interpreter, Kwak said, "It is important to 
recognize that the people of North Korea are also people of God." 
  
     Though most residents of South Korea are forbidden to visit the North, 
Kwak has a permanent visa that allows him to visit whenever he likes. For 
the past year and a half his congregation has been supplying food to 
150,000 North Koreans plus 3,000 children in orphanages. He tells them the 
food is from "Christians in South Korea." 
 
     "The economic situation in North Korea is beyond our imagination," 
Kwak said. Flooding the past two years has led to severe food shortages and 
rationing, with a daily allotment of 400-500 grams of food per person. But 
rationing stopped some time ago, he added. "The government is telling 
people, 
 You resolve it yourselves.'" 
 
     As a result, he said, North Koreans can now travel a little more 
freely within their country in search of food for their survival.  
 
     Eighty percent of the factories in North Korea are closed, including a 
steel mill that was once the largest in Asia, Kwak said. "The reason," he 
said, "is the workers do not have food to eat so they do not have strength 
to work." Half of the university students have been unable to attend 
classes  because they could not get food rations living in the dormitories 
and had to return home, he said. 
 
     Kwak said malnutrition in North Korea is serious, particularly among 
children. He added that in recent weeks there even have been news reports 
of people eating human flesh. 
 
     The government of North Korea blames the nation's poverty on "American 
imperialists and the South Korean regime," Kwak said. 
 
      "People in North Korea believe South Korea [is going to] attack 
[them] and that they have to buy planes, tanks, and artillery to prepare 
for war," he said. He added that 40-60 percent of North Korea's Gross 
National Product goes to secure military hardware, leaving few resources to 
build the nation's economy. 
 
     "We can think of North Korea as a prisoner-of-war camp in terms of its 
political, economic and social life," Kwak said. "The first question of us 
as the church is whether Christian mission is possible in North Korea." 
 
     He believes the answer is yes, based on experience in China. He said 
there were three million Christians in China in 1949, when the Communists 
took over, and 60 million in 1980, when the nation was finally opened to 
the West. "I believe there still are a number of Christians underground in 
North Korea," he said. He mentioned that on one trip to his homeland he met 
a man who said he knew Kwak from hearing him on radio broadcasts from South 
Korea. 
 
     One opportunity for doing mission in North Korea is to share food with 
no strings attached, Kwak said. "The most urgent task before the church," 
he said, "is to pray for North Korea and to share food with North Koreans." 
By so doing, he said, one can share God's love. He added that when 
reunification happens, "the person most susceptible to the gospel of Jesus 
Christ will be the person who experienced eating the bread we share today." 

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