Free Republic

227 More North Koreans Arrive in Biggest Mass Defection to South Korea By Soo-Jeong Lee/Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - A second wave of North Korean defectors arrived in the capital Wednesday, bringing the total in a two-day airlift from an unidentified Asian country to nearly 460, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said. It was easily the largest group of defectors ever to reach the South. All had recently fled the communist North and taken refuge in hopes of eventually reaching South Korea. Wednesday's group of 227 North Koreans arrived at Incheon International Airport on a chartered Korean Air...

Report: Large Group of North Koreans Arrive in South Korea The Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - About 200 North Koreans arrived in the capital on Tuesday from an unidentified Asian country, the largest group of defectors to reach South Korea, according to a news report. The defectors arrived on a chartered plane arranged by the South Korean government at an airport outside Seoul, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said. The 200 North Koreans were among 460 defectors that South Korea is trying to bring in from a Southeast Asian country. The second group was expected to arrive Wednesday....

A former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has defected to Azerbaijan and disclosed that Iran's military is infused with pro-U.S. sentiment. Col. Bakharali Bagiryan arrived in Baku last week. "I came to Azerbaijan 40 days ago and was registered with the Azerbaijani representative office of the UNHCR as a political émigré," Bagiryan said at the Baku Press Club Feb. 23. Bagiryan said many Iranian military troops would like to defect. "In Iran, the military are not issued with passports, which deprives them of the opportunity to leave the country legally," he said. "I have been sent to Azerbaijan...

A former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has defected to Azerbaijan and disclosed that Iran's military is infused with pro-U.S. sentiment. Col. Bakharali Bagiryan arrived in Baku last week. "I came to Azerbaijan 40 days ago and was registered with the Azerbaijani representative office of the UNHCR as a political 魩gr鬢 Bagiryan said at the Baku Press Club Feb. 23. Bagiryan said many Iranian military troops would like to defect. "In Iran, the military are not issued with passports, which deprives them of the opportunity to leave the country legally," he said. "I have been sent to Azerbaijan...

School For NK Defectors, Privately Run, Offers Oasis of Warmth (Korea Times) Photo by Kim Hyun-tae Defectors aren’t completely alone when they arrive in South Korea. Cho Myong-suk runs a school to help ease the transition into a capitalist society, despite not receiving any government support. Life in South Made a Little Easier With Help of Friends by Kim Tae-jong The issue of how best to deal with North Korean defectors after their arrival and how to ensure they become productive members of society is definitely complex. Fortunately there are people out there trying to do just that. ``Our ultimate...

<p>AMHERST, Massachusetts -- When Yu-kun Jia, 13, races to catch her school bus in this Western Massachusetts town, she tries to block out the fact that she is one of China's most well-known political defectors. Or that her future in the United States remains uncertain. Or that she desperately misses her mother, who still lives in a rural Chinese village.</p>

The day before the renowned Cuban National Ballet took to the stage in Daytona Beach, two of its young dancers slipped away in a startling pas de deux, hoping for a new life in America. Gema Díaz, 21, and Cervilio Amador, 20, were supposed to perform in the company's production of Don Quixote on Sunday. But the pair had already defected, spirited away Saturday in a taxi that ferried them to West Palm Beach. By Wednesday, they were meeting with an immigration attorney in Coral Gables, preparing to officially ask for political asylum. ''This is an extraordinary story,'' said attorney...

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- Nearly 4,000 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the 1950-53 Korean War, three quarters of them in the past five years, South Korea's Unification Ministry said in a report submitted Sunday. A total of 2,958 North Koreans, or 77 percent of the total 3,834 defectors, fled their country and arrived in South Korea after 1998, according to South Korea's Yonhap news agency. The ministry expects the number to rise as thousands of North Koreans are believed to be living in hiding in China, seeking a chance to come to South Korea. Most of...

SEOUL, Oct. 4 — Han, a Communist Party official in North Korea, was walking home from work when he heard he was in trouble. He had smuggled a radio back from China after an official trip. He listened to it late at night, huddled with earphones on and shades drawn, to hear music that brought him a whisper of sanity and took him away from the horrors of his day. Now, someone had found it, or someone had told. “It could have been my children who said something outside. It could have been my friend; one knew,” said Han, 39,...

U.S. Group to Fight North's Rights Abuses by Joo Yong-jung (midway@chosun.com) WASHINGTON - Several religious and human rights groups in the United States are driving forward to establish an organization that would strive to protect the freedom and rights of the North Korean people. To form the North Korea Freedom Coalition, representatives from 13 groups, including Concerned Women for America, the Defense Forum and the Hudson Institute, held a preliminary meeting Thursday. They decided to sponsor Congress's North Korea Freedom Act, and announced the general principles for extending liberties to North Koreans. Michael Horowitz from the Hudson Institute said in...

The head of the US-backed Iraqi National Congress (INC), Ahmad Chalabi, said Thursday that he put US officials in contact with three Iraqi defectors who provided detailed information about Saddm Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction program. "We ... introduced them to three defectors on the weapons program," Chalabi said after a briefing here with about 30 US lawmakers on a range of postwar issues, including the pace of Iraqi reconstruction and the prospects finding Saddam. "One of them was an engineer," Chalabi said. "We believe that he had valuable information about sites. He did not have any operational information...

N Korea Defectors Detail Drug Rings (& Missile Export)21May03 The Herald Sun, AustraliaIn a dramatic confession to the US Congress, two men identified as high-ranking North Korean defectors today said they had been intimately involved in test-firing Pyongyang's missiles in Iran and a state-sponsored drugs ring. The men, led into a congressional hearing wearing black hoods, gave evidence behind a screen to conceal their identities. They currently live in South Korea, but were brought to the United States by two refugee advocacy groups. Their appearance came as the Bush administration tries to turn the spotlight on North Korea's alleged...

May 14, 2003 Sources: N.Korean Defectors Smuggled Out of China By REUTERS Filed at 6:42 a.m. ET BEIJING (Reuters) - Several North Korean military defectors have fled their country and sought or been granted asylum in the West or in South Korea, independent sources said on Wednesday. Three sources told Reuters the defectors fled through China and traveled by plane, train or road on false identification papers to Southeast Asia in recent months. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it had no knowledge of the defections, which could prove embarrassing for Beijing as it tries to facilitate negotiations between Washington and...

North aide says defector was only minor scientist BEIJING ¡ª A North Korean nuclear scientist who defected to the United States last year was not a particularly important figure, a senior North Korean source here said yesterday. The linked defections of the U.S.-trained nuclear scientist Kyong Won-ha and a number of military officials, organized privately by nationals of several nations, was reported over the weekend, and Dr. Kyong was described as a central figure in the North Korean nuclear program. ¡°North Korean authorities discovered Dr. Kyong¡¯s disappearance during the second half of last year,¡± the North Korean source said. ¡°As...

A SWATH of North Korea's military and scientific elite, among them key nuclear specialists, has defected to the US and its allies through a highly secret smuggling operation involving the tiny Pacific island of Nauru. The defections have taken place since last October and have been made possible through the help of 11 countries that agreed to provide consular protection to smuggle the targets from neighbouring China, according to sources close to the operation, which has now been wound up. Some countries also agreed to act as transit points for up to 30 days once the defectors left China, the...

SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq, March 17 — The highest-level officer to defect from Saddam Hussein’s army disappeared from his home in Denmark on Monday under mysterious circumstances, according to family members and a Danish state official. Gen. Nizar al-Khazraji, Saddam’s former army chief of staff, was seen by some as playing an important role in a post-war

WITH THE THIRD INFANTRY DIVISION, Northwestern Kuwait — As more than 20,000 soldiers attached to the Third Infantry Division moved close to the Iraqi border — within sight of it, in some cases — 15 Iraqi soldiers guarding the border surrendered and crossed over to Kuwait this evening, officers here said.

Excuse the vanity post. I'll make it brief.There are more stories than I care to count, and a commensurate number of FR threads, on peace marches, war protests, anti-bombing demonstrations, anti-military rallies, call them what you will. And what should they be called?May I suggest a little straightforward language? When you discuss the matter with friends and family, when you write letters to the editor, when you call a talk radio program, refer to them as anti-American rallies. Because the unvarnished truth is, whether these assemblies take place in Baghdad, Paris, London, or Charlotte, that's what they are.The participants, of...

KEY WEST - Four armed defectors from Cuba's border guard, clad in green camouflage and black boots, walked onto Key West's main drag after arriving undetected early Friday -- the same day that the U.S. attorney general put the nation on a heightened state of terrorist alert. The men tied their 30-foot go-fast boat behind the Hyatt Key West Resort and Marina, stashing it within a short distance of the Coast Guard station, which failed to spot their 4 a.m. arrival. Police found two AK-47s and eight magazines of ammunition inside the Cigarette speedboat. The incident occurred six days after...

Four Cubans dressed in camo have just been taken into custody by the US Coast Guard just off Key West. Cuba says they've stolen the boat Looks like a few more people fed up with the Peoples Republic of Cuba.