There is collateral damage from the path North Koreans take to find freedom. North Korean women often leave their half North Korean, half Chinese children behind when they decide to take the Modern Day Underground Railroad. Many leave with the promise of inviting their children and “husbands” to their new country once their citizenship is won. The Korea Institute for National Reunification estimates that there are about 30,000 of these children in China. Crossing Borders has cared for hundreds of children who find themselves at the center of international custody tug-of-wars.

I was contacted by a North Korean refugee in such a predicament in the year 2012. She lived in the Chicago area. Though I usually don’t take these meetings, my mother pleaded with me to go and hear her out. At a suburban McDonalds, we sipped coffee and I heard her story. She had escaped China in the early 2000s and was sold in China as a bride to an abusive husband. She pleaded with her owner and husband to let her leave China. She promised him that, once she gained citizenship in America, she would call for both him and their daughter and they would all live happily in the United States. But things didn’t work out as planned.

When she arrived in America, she was far removed from her husband because of the freedoms she was afforded. For the first time in her life, her human rights were respected. If her husband beat her in America as he did in China, the police would be just a phone call away. She made the difficult choice to tell her husband that she would not be keeping her promise. She decided that she would not be calling for him. But this choice came with a heavy cost: her daughter. Her ex-husband and former owner then said to her that it would take a legal US visa or a pile of cash to see her daughter again. 

As we sat next to McDonald’s playland, this woman asked me if I could help her. She asked if I could coordinate the kidnapping of her daughter. I explained to this woman that, unfortunately, I would not be able to help her. She has not been reunited with her daughter to this day.

North Korean refugees in China have made it out of the most oppressive regime in the world. After leaving their country, they find themselves in a place with a seemingly endless supply of food but they are essentially slaves. At some point they must consider the risk of leaving China. The proposition is daunting in and of itself. It is almost impossible to think about the other consequences to their decisions.

This problem is not uncommon amongst the North Korean children in our Orphan Care program. As their parents fight about custody and visas, they entrust their children to our care. Crossing Borders has never seen a resolution to this type of situation.

This is why it is so imperative to continue to offer support to North Koreans who escape China. Even though they have freedoms and new lives, they often are dealing with issues from their journey to freedom. If they are not dealing with custody battles, they must wrestle with the trauma from all the years of suffering in North Korea and from being trafficked in China.

This year, we opened Elim House, a safehouse for abused North Korean women in South Korea. The climb is steep but is not impossible. Some refugees in our network have made it through the Modern Day Underground Railroad and have prospered in South Korea. One thing we have learned in ministering to these refugees for over 17 years is that we can offer no hope to these people outside of God. This hope is not of higher earning potential and medical care. It is the eternal hope that we have in the gospel.