According to the CS Monitor, people have little faith in the North Korean system

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA – Mrs. Park is North Korean salt of the earth. Until the 70-year-old was stripped, beaten, and charged with dissent, Park and her family were patriotic, loyal, ordinary. They were true believers in the ruling Kim family’s “juche” ideology, which holds that Korea must be separate from all nations and that total obedience is owed to the Kim family. Park’s eight kids worshiped Kim Il Sung, the “father of their minds.” When Kim died and millions perished in an epic famine, the Parks didn’t panic. They wrote a letter to Kim Jong Il, volunteering to farm – something only a pure and loyal family would dare in North Korea.

Yet today Mrs. Park (not her real name) is in South Korea, an escapee. Her family is broken. So are her ideals. She’s been captured in China – sent home to the North, made to endure camps, and witness horrific acts. She had gone to China in 2000 only to feed her family. But her world got turned upside down.

The significance of Park’s story may be how typical it is. In the past decade many North Korean families have had their state-enforced high ideals shattered, according to refugees and nongovernmental and academic sources working with them. A recent high-level defector from Pyongyang confirms that many elites in the North are now a “skeptical class,” according to sources in South Korea’s national unification ministry.

The loss of faith among foot-soldiers in Kim’s army of believers, say analysts, is a noteworthy change in an unpredictable regime.

North Korea today faces a paradox: While its material standard of living has been improving, moving from awful to less awful – its morale and its collective beliefs continue to fray. Energy, food, cash, and know-how flow faster into the North, from China and South Korea. But the quality of patriotism, military discipline, and ideological purity – elements that have uniquely bound the North – are shaky, say many sources.

Much of the improvement in the economy has to do with individuals, driven by the need to survive, going outside the system to get by. I see it as a good sign. Hopefully, weaning oneself from being dependent of the government would lead other signs of subvertion within the country.

Safe Haven is not the only shelter for orphans

A South Korean organization which assists defectors, Durihana Mission is taking a proactive role in sheltering abandoned children of female defectors in China.

In an interview with Radio Free Asia (RFA), Pastor Chun Ki Won of Durihana Mission revealed on the 22nd “Children of female defectors roaming as street kids with no parents nor country are now receiving shelter at a refuge.”

Pastor Chun said “It is estimated that there are over 10,000 children of female defectors abandoned in China. Recently, Angel House is giving shelter to children with no home, an opportunity to participate in worship and proactive activities.”

“These children age from infants to about 7 year and are all children born from female defectors forced into undesired Chinese marriages.”

This shows that serving refugees is a long term commitment. These children cannot be caught in China. At the same time, it would be near impossible for them to get asylum since their parents are not there to sponsor them. The only way for them to survive is to integrate them into Chinese society and hope for the best. This problem will not go away even after the collapse of the North Korean regime.

Asia Times has a 4 part series analysing the food situation in North Korea. Is it long? Yes. Is it complicated? Yes. Read it? You better.