Defectors Send $10 Million a Year to North Korea

North Korean defectors settled in South Korea are sending secretly some US$10 million a year to their families in the North.

Some 3,000 to 5,000 of 20,000 defectors settled in South Korea are sending cash each to their families back home through middlemen every year, the government and defectors' organizations believe. Defectors organization said middlemen take commissions of about 30 percent.

The money is believed to be a mainstay of the North Korean underground economy. A security official said the defectors' money has created a lively economy in the North Korea-China border area.

Chosun Ilbo