Just How Bad is the Starvation in North Korea?

Mrs. Kim is a Chinese Korean living in Northeast China. In a recent interview with VOM, she relayed the following:

“We started a home church on the second floor of our home in 1993, with eight of our Christian friends. … In 1996, my husband passed away. I was really depressed and lonely.

“The more I prayed about my situation, the more I felt God calling me to North Korea. So in the spring of 1997, I planned my first trip. …I knew God had called me [there]. But then I was heartbroken by what I saw.

“I walked down the road in this one village where dead bodies were on the side of the road. I saw a hungry boy eating one of the bodies. But then a policeman also saw him, and pulling out his revolver, he shot the boy in the head. It was the first but not the last person I saw shot for committing cannibalism.

“When I returned to China after that first trip, I left something in North Korea –my heart; I knew this was to be my ministry. … Since then I have made contact with 40 house churches and helped start another 60.

“But now the work is very difficult. … Four believers were caught worshipping together. They were arrested and sentenced to seven years.

‘Another family was arrested --the while family, including the children. They were all in prison except for the father. He was executed.

“[I helped] a son and a daughter of one family come into China for more training. But when they were returning to North Korea, they were caught and charged with ‘treason’ and becoming Christians. They have been publicly executed.”

[Excerpted from Voice of the Martyrs, November 2005 issue]