North Korea’s actions against two American journalists underscore the brutality of the country’s repressive regime and why the international community needs to stand together to press for change.
Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who work for former Vice President Al Gore’s Current TV, were arrested by North Korean authorities, who allege they entered the country illegally. There is a question about whether the women actually entered the country — they were along the Chinese border reporting on the human trafficking of North Korean women.
The women faced trumped-up charges of spying and were recently found guilty in a kangaroo court. They were sentenced to 12 years of hard labor. The outrageous decision was only compounded by North Korea’s obvious ploy. The regime is using the women as bargaining chips in its negotiations with the United Nations over its nuclear and missile programs.
In the meantime, the women go into North Korea’s notorious labor camp system, where they will join thousands of other political prisoners. Several reports over the past decade have outlined the harshness of the system. People who commit any number of petty “crimes” against the state, including disagreeing with the regime, end up in the labor camps for “reeducation.” There, they work in grueling conditions and are often indiscriminately beaten, starved and abused.
Anne Applebaum, a writer and expert on communist prison camps, said the North Korean system is a holdover of the former Soviet Union’s gulags. In a 2003 report Applebaum wrote that North Korea’s leadership “doesn’t want anyone to know any of these details, since such revelations not only will damage their foreign reputation but also put their own regime at risk.”
Several countries are working together to gain Lee and Ling’s release, and they should press for their quick return to America. They should also continue to work toward ending North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.
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