Obamas Betrayal of Rev. Kim Dong-Shik
11/26/12
By Robert Park
I myself had hope in 2008 that the Obama administration would have been able to do some good on behalf of the North Korean people. This is in spite of the fact that as Senator of Illinois, Obama had already reneged on an important promise concerning North Korea, and to the heartbreak of one Korean-American family from the small town of Skokie.
The promise was concerning Rev. Kim Dong-shik, a U.S. permanent resident whose wife and two children are U.S. citizens. Mr. Kim was abducted in January 2000 by North Korean agents while assisting North Korean refugees in China, whose brutal and unlawful policy of blanket repatriation for all North Korean refugees found within their borders has led to countless deaths and separated Korean families. Mr. Kim was operating nine shelters for these refugees in Yanji, providing for their material needs and helping defectors come to South Korea, before being forcibly taken to North Korea where he eventually died from the effects of torture and malnutrition suffered during his imprisonment.
Responding to pleas from Rev. Kims wife and fellow church members for help, in 2005 then-Senator Obama and other Illinois lawmakers co-signed a letter to North Koreas UN Mission in which they called Mr. Kim a hero and compared him to Ms. Harriet Tubman, the great abolitionist who established the underground railroard before Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation, and Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat and humanitarian who rescued tens of thousands of Jews in Nazi-occupied Hungary during the Second World War.
The comparisons then-Senator Obama and his Congressional Delegation drew were accurate: North Korea is a slave state that has murdered several million innocents and which runs a concentration camp system where political prisoners, including children, have been systematically starved, tortured, raped, publicly executed, gassed and experimented on. These are crimes against humanity. Genocide occurs on a daily basis in North Korea and, it is true, Mr. Kim was and is a real hero. The question then must be asked how Mr. Obama could so easily change positions on such a pressing matter.
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Obama’s Betrayal of Rev. Kim Dong-Shik
11/26/12
By Robert Park
I myself had hope in 2008 that the Obama administration would have been able to do some good on behalf of the North Korean people. This is in spite of the fact that as Senator of Illinois, Obama had already reneged on an important promise concerning North Korea, and to the heartbreak of one Korean-American family from the small town of Skokie.
The promise was concerning Rev. Kim Dong-shik, a U.S. permanent resident whose wife and two children are U.S. citizens. Mr. Kim was abducted in January 2000 by North Korean agents while assisting North Korean refugees in China, whose brutal and unlawful policy of blanket repatriation for all North Korean refugees found within their borders has led to countless deaths and separated Korean families. Mr. Kim was operating nine shelters for these refugees in Yanji, providing for their material needs and helping defectors come to South Korea, before being forcibly taken to North Korea where he eventually died from the effects of torture and malnutrition suffered during his imprisonment.
Responding to pleas from Rev. Kims wife and fellow church members for help, in 2005 then-Senator Obama and other Illinois lawmakers co-signed a letter to North Koreas UN Mission in which they called Mr. Kim a hero and compared him to Ms. Harriet Tubman, the great abolitionist who established the underground railroard before Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation, and Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat and humanitarian who rescued tens of thousands of Jews in Nazi-occupied Hungary during the Second World War.
The comparisons then-Senator Obama and his Congressional Delegation drew were accurate: North Korea is a slave state that has murdered several million innocents and which runs a concentration camp system where political prisoners, including children, have been systematically starved, tortured, raped, publicly executed, gassed and experimented on. These are crimes against humanity. Genocide occurs on a daily basis in North Korea and, it is true, Mr. Kim was and is a real hero. The question then must be asked how Mr. Obama could so easily change positions on such a pressing matter.
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Obama’s Betrayal of Rev. Kim Dong-Shik
