North Korea - Missionary Released, Christians Ordered Executed

Missionary John Short

John Short, the 75-year-old missionary who was arrested in North Korean on February 16 was released on March 2. The Australian missionary, who lives in Hong Kong, was forced to write a “confession” and “apology” of committing “a criminal act by secretly spreading my Bible tracts” (“Australian Christian Missionary John Short,” The Christian Post, Mar. 7, 2014). American missionary Kenneth Bae remains imprisoned. He was arrested in November 2012 and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor for “trying to overthrow the government through religious activities.” It was also reported this week that Kim Jong Un has ordered the execution of 33 people “on charges of attempting to overthrow the regime by receiving money to set up 500 underground churches” (“North Koreans Face Execution,” The Chosunilbo, Chosun, South Korea’s English news media, Mar. 10, 2014). The money was supposedly received from Baptist missionary Kim Jung-wook, who was arrested last year, but a source in China says that he was kidnapped by North Korean agents in Dandong. North Korea is the most oppressive country in the world. It operates concentration camps where prisoners are treated with horrible brutality. Former prison guard Ahn Myong-chol described prisoners as “walking skeletons and cripples in rags.” Large numbers of prisoners die of starvation, illness, work accidents, and torture. In a testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives in 2002, Lee Soon-ok said that “most of the 6,000 prisoners who were there when I arrived in 1987 had quietly perished under the harsh prison conditions by the time I was released in 1992” (“Testimony of Ms. Soon Ok Lee, North Korean prison camp survivor,” United States Senate Hearings). It has been estimated that some 200,000 people are currently imprisoned in North Korea’s concentration camps and that 20 to 25 percent perish each year. Last December dictator Kim Jong Un had his own uncle killed, reportedly together with the entire family.

(Friday Church News Notes, March 14, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

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