Saving Lives Through the "Enhancing North Korea Humanitarian Assistance Act"
On Monday, April 20th, I had the privilege of participating in a webinar on “COVID, Sanctions, and the North Korea Virtual Hill Briefing”. Sponsored by Women Cross the DMZ and Korea Peace Now!. The webinar featured speakers such as Henri Feron from the Center for International Policy, Dr. Kee Park who is the DPRK Director of the Korean American Medical Association and a lecturer at Harvard, and Dan Jasper who represents American Friends Service Committee. Each one of the speakers on the virtual panel discussion has direct experience visiting and working inside the DPRK. I contributed to the webinar by sharing our humanitarian organization’s first-hand experiences and difficulties in complying with the multiple layers of permits and licenses required to provide humanitarian assistance inside North Korea.
For over twelve years, my husband and I have been working in the DPRK through our nonprofit, Ignis Community. We provide food and medicine for over 1,000 children and childcare workers in the Northeast region of North Korea and help get medical treatment for children with developmental disabilities throughout the nation- a demographic with few resources in the DPRK.
For almost three years now, since September 1, 2017, the progress of our humanitarian work has been, for the most part, stalled. Small strides have continued in training doctors and shipping medical equipment into the country, but by and large, life-saving treatment for children with developmental disabilities is at a stand-still. This is primarily due to the geographic travel restriction imposed upon U.S. citizens, including humanitarian workers serving the DPRK. Although Ignis Community has received four Special Validation Passports for medical purposes and two Special Validation Passports for general humanitarian assistance, six trips in three years’ time is insufficient to provide adequate humanitarian assistance to the most vulnerable in North Korea.
Children under the age of five are among the most vulnerable in the DPRK
Despite popular opinion, humanitarian work involves much more than just delivering goods. In a country like the DPRK, much time and relationship-building is necessary to even learn of the greatest needs in the country, have access to these areas of need, and verify the delivery of medications and food. Years of building trust is necessary for effective communication with North Koreans and permission to visit remote, rural areas. Discussions with appropriate North Korean counterparts are multi-layered as humanitarian organizations strive to provide assistance to the most vulnerable in society while also ensuring adequate monitoring and accountability to our donors.
Ignis Community has had limited success because of our consistent presence on the ground in North Korea. Whenever possible, not only do the humanitarian workers live in country but also their entire families. Our full-time residence in the DPRK has allowed us to develop trusting relationships with our North Korean counterparts, personally deliver humanitarian assistance to areas of need, verify the actual situation on the ground in North Korea, and open up doors for new opportunities.
One of the greatest examples of the power of long-term presence in the DPRK is Ignis Community’s medical treatment of children with developmental disabilities. Our organization did not start out with expertise in this medical field. Originally, our family lived and worked in the Northeast Free Economic Zone of North Korea and provided basic food, medicine, and spinal treatment for childcare facilities and clinics in remote fishing and farming villages. A pediatric patient with cerebral palsy just happened to come to one of the clinics we worked out. At the time we had no expertise for treating children with conditions like cerebral palsy. But with the training we had in rehabilitation medicine, we did the best we could and learned as we went. Later we were able to receive specific professional training to develop our skills and began to see immediate results.
When the opportunity came for our family to relocate to the capital city of Pyongyang, we hesitated to move for one reason. We did not want to leave behind a patient with cerebral palsy that we had been treating in the Northeast region. If we left, we knew that there would be no treatment or hope for this child’s future. Therefore, we requested to transfer this five year-old girl to the hospital in Pyongyang.
This resulted in the birth of a brand-new treatment program in the Pyongyang Spine Rehabilitation Center (PYSRC) for children with developmental disabilities in the DPRK. Prior to the development of the Ignis Community’s PYSRC, no official specialization existed for treating cerebral palsy or autism in the DPRK. Developmental disabilities were considered to be untreatable or treated with lack of expertise, similar to other developing nations. Children who had mild to severe developmental disabilities lacked adequate medical care, education, and opportunities. Now children with cerebral palsy and autism have started receiving medical treatment through physical therapy and occupational therapy in the Pyongyang Medical School Hospital for the first time as doctors are being trained in Pediatric Rehabilitation.
Throughout our five years of living in Pyongyang, the development of Pediatric Rehabilitation expanded to include treatment in not just the capital city but also the entire nation. After several years of meetings with our North Korean counterparts, Ignis Community obtained a contract with the DPRK Ministry of Public Health to develop pediatric rehabilitation in all ten provincial children’s hospitals throughout the country.
Treating a child with cerebral palsy in the Pyongyang Medical School Hospital
However, humanitarian work in the DPRK is currently facing unprecedented obstacles and delays. To continue our life-saving work for children with disabilities, our organization was required to obtain various licenses and permits from both the United States and the United Nations. A license from the US Treasury Department, a license from the Department of Commerce, an exemption from the UN Sanctions Committee, and Special Validation Passports from the US State Department are all required to continue our humanitarian work in North Korea. Our US Treasury License alone took us 11 months to obtain, and each time we enter the DPRK we have to apply again for Special Validation Passports, which recently have been taking an average of two to three months to obtain. And although obtaining our US Treasury License halted our treatment program for almost an entire year, it is the lack of permission to actually go and do our work that has had the most significant impact on humanitarian assistance in the DPRK.
Ignis Community’s progress in providing medical care for children with developmental disabilities was only possible because our family was living day in and day out in North Korea, daily developing trust with our North Korean counterparts. Now we are lucky if we are able to visit the country two or three times a year. Only qualified professionals are allowed limited access to the DPRK for humanitarian purposes, and as a result, donors are discouraged and often loose interest. All the progress we have made over the past thirteen years is now threatened and has been significantly hindered by US regulations and global sanctions.
That is why the current “Enhancing North Korea Humanitarian Assistance Act” bill being proposed is essential to preserve humanitarian work in the DPRK. This bill is simply a matter of human decency, saving lives of innocent children. It calls for protection of humanitarian work in the DPRK, speedy approval and multiple-entry Special Validation Passports from the US State Department, and quick review of US Treasury Licenses.
We must work together to ensure that humanitarian work can continue to save lives. No child deserves to die, and no country should be subject to sanctions that harm the innocent and most vulnerable in society. Even the US State Department has confessed that humanitarian workers are the best America has to offer. We are the best face of America to North Korea. Currently, our hands are tied and our work is limited, but if passed, the “Enhancing North Korea Humanitarian Assistance Act” could protect and preserve life-saving work in the DPRK.