Unchained - Yeonmi Park on Why Doing Business With North Korea Is Like Buying a Ticket to a Concentration Camp - Ep.149

Episode Date: December 10, 2019

In light of the questions around whether or not Virgil Griffith's talk at a blockchain conference in Pyongyang could have helped everyday North Koreans, Yeonmi Park, a North Korean defector, human rights activist, board member of the Human Rights Foundation and author of “In Order to Live, A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom,” talks to Unchained. She tells us about her life growing up in North Korea, how she thought the "dear leader" could read her thoughts, why freedom of thought is not allowed in North Korea, and how a South Korean had to teach her that Kim Jong Il was fat and not starving for the North Koreans, as she had been taught. She talks about what happened after her father was sent to a prison camp for selling copper, silver and nickel, how three generations of her family were then tainted and put in the "hostile" class of the caste system, and how watching the movie Titanic introduced her to the concept of romantic love. She tells the story of how, because of hunger, she fled to China — right into the hands of human traffickers, but decided to stay because of what trash cans in China signified to her, and describes the first time she heard the word "free." She also covers the difficulty of her transition to freedom and how reading George Orwell's Animal Farm was a turning point for her.  We discuss why the strategy for liberating North Korea is mostly about getting outside information in, who benefits from tours to North Korea and why lifting sanctions would only help the regime. She also explains why the only people who would have benefited from Griffith's talk would have been North Korean elite, and how any actions in line with what the dictator wants help him maintain power. She says the best ways to improve the situation in North Korea are to boost awareness of what is happening, empower the people there by getting outside information in and helping during the rescue, as 300,000 defectors, most of them women and girls living as sexual slaves, are hiding in China.  Thank you to our sponsors!  Givewell: http://givewell.org/unchained Kraken: https://www.kraken.com Crypto.com: https://crypto.com/ CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained Episode links:  Yeonmi Park: https://yeonmi.com/ Yeonmi Park on Twitter: https://twitter.com/YeonmiParkNK Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OfficialYeonmiPark/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yeonmi_park/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpQu57KgT7gOoLCAu3FFQsA Human Rights Foundation: https://hrf.org/ In Order to Live: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318940/in-order-to-live-by-yeonmi-park-with-maryanne-vollers/ One of the first speeches by Yeonmi that went viral: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ei-gGvLWOZI Yeonmi's TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/yeonmi_park_what_i_learned_about_freedom_after_escaping_north_korea New York Times video op-ed with Yeonmi's message for President Trump: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/opinion/north-korea-trump-kim-human-rights.html DOJ complaint against Virgil Griffith: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/manhattan-us-attorney-announces-arrest-united-states-citizen-assisting-north-korea Economist video on the efforts to get outside information into North Korea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVRQpfXGQyc&app=desktop Guardian article on North Korean defector activist groups attempting to get outside information into North Korea: https://amp.theguardian.com/global/2016/aug/27/north-korea-defectors-ian-birrell Wired article on getting outside information in: https://www.wired.com/2015/03/north-korea/ The story of Otto Warmbier: https://www.gq.com/story/otto-warmbier-north-korea-american-hostage-true-story South Korean woman shot for crossing line at a resort in North Korea: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/jul/12/korea Unchained interview with Alex Gladstein of the Human Rights Foundation: https://unchainedpodcast.com/alex-gladstein-of-the-human-rights-foundation-on-the-3-reasons-bitcoin-matters/ Unconfirmed interview with Alex Gladstein: https://unchainedpodcast.com/alex-gladstein-of-the-human-rights-foundation-on-the-first-crypto-war-ep-021/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everyone, two quick announcements before we start the show. First, Unchained Now has a merchandise shop. We've got a few t-shirts, a couple hats, and a mug. My team and I got creative with one of the t-shirt designs and came up with an image of a crypto rabbit falling down a hole. Swirling into the hole with the rabbit are playing cards showing some of the coins like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Monaro, as well as a Dow card ripped in half. There's a Guy Fox mask, a defy cake, a Lambo, and a teapot that says total, as well as teacups showing the Reddit and Twitter logos. There's even a shit coin. The rabbit is wearing a big Bitcoin key on a keychain, a unicorn and rainbow t-shirt, and, of course, is listening to Unchained. Check it out at shop.com. Again, that's shop.

That's shop.unchained podcast.com. For those of you interested in giving an unchained t-shirt, hat or mug as a Christmas gift, order by December 13th, which is this Friday. Second, I wanted to say a few words about this episode. I think it's one of the best interviews ever on this show. Yes, the news hook has to do with the arrest of Virgil Griffith, but if you listen to the show, it's really about the two main tenets of the crypto ethos, decentralization and censorship resistance. As you can probably tell from my tweets and even the thoughts I expressed last week on Unconfirmed, I've been thinking a lot over why the reaction to Virgil's arrest just boggled my mind. And I realized what he was doing is pretty much against what most,

if not all of my sources, have told me, drives them to work in this space. North Korea is the most centralized and most censorious place, organization, entity, population, government, group, country, whatever you want to call it, on the planet. As Alex Gladstein put it on an episode of The Scoop, he recently recorded with Frank Chaparro, quote, this is the least cypherpunk thing you could possibly imagine to aid and abet the world's most vicious tyranny. Seeing people defend what Virgil was doing made me question whether I'd understood or even heard my sources correctly all these years. Like all along, had they actually been saying censorship assistance? People who are for decentralization and censorship resistance

and who understand the situation in North Korea would be fighting against the regime, not trying to help it. The interview for this episode starts with Yanmi's story, which takes a while to get through, since, as she puts it, North Korea is so different from a world. It's like living on another planet. Toward the end, we talk in broadstrokes about who could have benefited from what Virgil did, the general impact of doing any business, even tourism with North Korea, and the controversial issue of sanctions. I hope this show gets you guys thinking about why you're interested in this technology and industry and the larger impact it can have on the world and why you all hold the values of decentralization and censorship resistance. Now on to the show.

Hi everyone. Welcome to Unchained, your no-hyp resource for all things crypto. I'm your host, Laura Shin. If you enjoy Unchained or Unconfirmed to my other podcast, which now features a weekly news recap after every interview, please give us a top rating or review in Apple Podcasts or you listen to the show. This holiday season, how can your donation do the most good in the world? Givewell spends 20,000 hours each year researching charity, looking for the places where your donation will save or improve lives the most. They provide a free list of the most impactful charities they've found. You can find out more or make a donation at givewell.org slash unchained. First time donors using that link will have their donations matched up to $1,000. They accept traditional

payment methods, Bitcoin, Ethereum, and several other cryptocurrencies. Keep this in mind while you make your end-of-year tax moves. Again, that's givewell.org slash unchained. Cracken is the best exchange in the world for buying and selling digital assets. It has the tightest security, deep liquidity, and a great fee structure with no minimum or hidden fees. Whether you're looking for a simple fiat on-ramp or futures trading, Cracken is the place for you. Cypher Trace cutting-edge cryptocurrency intelligence powers anti-money laundering, blockchain analytics, and threat Intel. Leading exchanges, virtual currency businesses, banks, and regulators themselves use CipherTrace to comply with regulation and to monitor compliance. Crypto.com. Get their app and buy crypto at true cost with no fees or markups.

Get a metal MCO visa card with up to 5% back on all your spending. Want more? Download The crypto.com app today. Today's guest is Yanmi Park, North Korean Defector, human rights activist, board member of the Human Rights Foundation, and author of In Order to Live, a North Korean girl's journey to freedom. Welcome, Yanmi. Hi, Laura. Thank you for having me. You're not an obvious guest for my show because you're not involved in the crypto space. However, as I'm sure you're aware from Alex Gladstein, the chief strategy officer of the Human Rights Foundation, who has been a previous.

guest on both my podcasts. Cryptocurrency and North Korea are two topics that are intersecting much more often. First, Kim Jong-un's regime has been trying to get its hands on cryptocurrency. And then recently, I don't know if you're aware of this news, but on Thanksgiving, someone involved in a cryptocurrency called Ethereum was arrested here in the U.S. for giving a talk at a blockchain conference in Pyongyang and then later allegedly trying to help the regime send cryptocurrency to evade sanctions. So I thought just, you know, from the crypto community, it became aware to me. Many people were not aware of what life in North Korea was really like. So I thought it would be helpful to have you here to talk about your experience, to talk about what it means when people

do business with North Korea and about the information flow there. So why don't we just start with a really basic question. Why don't you tell us what it was like to grow up in North Korea? Yeah. So I think Thank you for having me, and I'm really grateful for this opportunity to talk about it, because a lot of people in the West do have very, you know, strong interest in North Korea, and they somehow want to, like, participate in some way. But not all the times their, like, involvement is necessarily helpful to improve North Korea and human rights situation. And it ends up just, like, helping the dictatorship. Yes, I did hear about the news around.

the Thanksgiving and I was, you know, not really surprised because there are so many people that I met were just so naively somehow their involvement is going to open up the countries at some point. So when I was born in North Korea, I was born in the like almost mid-1990s. So that was, you know, after southern year collapse and North Korea was, you know, going down here because they were not getting all this help from all other like communist countries. And so when I was born, you know, there was no public distribution system was running. And just the country was in a such a deep concession and there's so just starvation was everywhere.

And there was a big, you know, information blockage. even till this day there's no internet in North Korea of course the elite in Pyongyang few have access to but the most commoners like myself they don't even know the existence of internet

and with that blockage of information and the lack of food you know putting us all in a spot to just like survive and so that's what I was you know doing in North Korea I don't remember ever living there.

It was just every day with a survivor to try to find food or trying to, you know, survive from the oppression from the regime. And you did go to school for a period. What was school like there? Yeah, so I was born into initially a meter class and I was able to go to school. Everything that I learned from school was, you know, Nothing like we learn here.

It's not like you're learning about any, like, you know, science or history, but rather everything was propaganda by the government saying how our enemy, like American bastards, were trying to kid us and how our dear leader so bravely defeated our enemies. And also why we need our dear leader to protect us from our enemies. because, you know, Americans are trying to attack us and kill us, and without our dear leader, we would or be dead. So they told us, and they taught us that why we should all be grateful. So, for instance, like, every room in North Korea needs to have a portraits of our dear leaders.

And if their house called fire, the first thing the fathers would, like, you know, protect is not even children. The first thing they have to protect is the portraits of their leaders. And if the portraits get, uh, you know, get burned or get damaged, then not only the person who was responsible, but the three generations of that family member is going to go to concentration camp and get punished. So the, you know, even in school, wait, even if the fire was an accident? No, even though Although earthquake happens There was a case where a man who did not know

So in North Korea, every front page of newspaper Have to have a portrait of the leader And tell us what he did But on the back side is normal like, you know, the writing So he didn't see the other side And he ripped it And then he, you know, smoked it with his cigarettes And then that was the reason

he was sent to political prison camp. So the degree of the terror and the oppression and the like zero tolerance is what keeps in North Korea keeps going right now for like 70 years. You also said in your TED talk that you were taught that the dear leader could read your thoughts. Yeah. How did they make you think that and how did that affect your own thinking? So, you know, in school, so if you try to understand North Korea as a country, it's a completely, it's a harder topic to understand. But if you think of it as a religion, so North Korea apparently, it is one of the ten religions in the world.

And we often don't know that. We think it's just some crazy country, but it is a court. So North Korea regime, you know, copied the Bible. So, I mean, there are people believing in my God. So, you know, it's not completely absurd that North Korean people believe in Kim. So basically, they told us that our dear leader, the first Kim, loved us so much. And he was chosen by this universe. Who could do miracles, gave us his son, Kim Jong-Ye.

So even Kim Jong-ir died, that his body died, but his spirit is with us forever. So therefore his spirit knows what I'm thinking even when I'm sleep and I'm awake and he can show up in the east and the west at the same time. He can do anything in this world. And then there's no like information coming in and if that's all you can't believe and that's all you're taught to believe from your birth. Of course that's what you're going to believe. So when even after I escape to China, when people are saying like, you know, Kim is, a dictator and that's why you're starving and I was like, what are your bastard talking about my dear leader that way? You know, I was so afraid that I was even going to commit a thought

crime. So thinking even in North Korea is a rebellion. You know, it's not a degree of you are asking for like freedom of speech. Even like freedom of thinking is not allowed in North Korea. That's how oppressed the country is. You also wrote about how when you would leave for school, your mother always told you to watch your mouth. And she also told you things like that even if you whisper, the birds and mice would hear you. What message was she trying to give you? So they were like, so even, so in North Korea,

everyone exists to become a revolutionary, to die and serve for the regime. We don't, we are not individuals, be born and fulfill our dreams or our aspiration. And even elementary school students is like there's no concept of human rights or minor. So you have to go to see public execution. And people get disappeared all the time. And usually the biggest crime you can commit in North Korea is not raping somebody or not murdering somebody. The biggest crime you can commit is saying something not right about the regime.

So that is like the biggest crime. you can come in. So, you know, every morning that I leave home to go to school, it's not like my mom saying, oh, be careful, you know, on the road or strangers or anything. She would say, you know, always remember. Even if you think no one is listening, the birds and mice always can hear you. So that was a teaching from my mom. And, you know, that just made me to numb and never think what critical thinking is.

So when I came to South Korea, people said, like, you know, how did you believe that Kim Jong-year was starving? Because in North Korea, they tell us that our dear leaders are hungry for us because they are working so hard and they don't get enough sleep. And as a young girl, I believed it. And then I escaped to South Korea and I look at the picture of Kim Jong-eer. And then that first time, and then they were saying, like, he's a fat guy. He cannot be possibly starving. and like someone literally had to teach me that he was fat. Otherwise, because I would never think critically, I couldn't sit in myself.

And that's how I learned that, you know, everything has to be taught, including, you know, that critical thinking. We think we somehow understand the critical thinking naturally, but that's something that doesn't come naturally if you were born in North Korea who never heard the concept. of critical thinking. Your father was sent to a labor camp when you were 10. What crime had he committed? Or crime in airports, I should say. Exactly, isn't it? I mean, if he were born in the free country,

who would be a complete normal person, but in North Korea, it's a socialist country, so trading is a crime. So when we call it black market in North Korea, that does not mean we are selling money. weapons or drugs or human trafficking people. Literally, you are selling rice, clocks, clothes, and shoes,

you know, something daily life items. And he was involved in black market business. Initially, he was selling sugar, dried fish in cluck, but later he stole the matter, like a copper, silver, me care, and that, and then that was a crime.

So he was sent to labor camp and he was sentenced to more than 10 years for that. And how did your life change after he was imprisoned? Right. So as I said, in North Korea, if someone committed a crime, the crime doesn't start with a personal committee. So in North Korea, they are, even though it's a socialist country, there's no real equality.

The government, the regime, made the Songbun system, which is a different class system. and because of my father was a criminal, then my status was going down too. And they would call me, you know, my blood was tainted and I wasn't pure anymore in the eyes of my dear party. And I could never be able to ever like marry someone who was in a higher life status. And I could all, my fate was determined to be always starving and. possibly just dies from the disease and starvation. And how do they enforce that? I mean, how do you enforce the orders like the...

Yeah, like the Sangbun cast thing? Like how do they... Is it that you're not allowed to go to school or like what happens? Yeah, so Sangbun system is such an inhuman way of oppressing and controlling people. So there are three big categories. we say core is like top we are very royal

to the region maybe a couple of percent or the people who are in Pyongyang and though we say you know wavering is like a meter class who are like merchants or

you know like teachers like some people like in the meter and though when we say hostile class in the bottom who have relatives in the South Korea

or whose family members who who left to South Korea, or whose family members, like my father who went to prison camp. So most of them are in that bottom class and some of them in the meter and the very tiny percent are on the top. But in that, even three big categories, they divide to another 50 sub-characteries of different class. The craziest thing is that you can't even know yourself that where your sonbun is exactly, but you know if you are in the wavering or hotfire or doing the court class. So when you are trying to even marry or become a police officer or get a job,

all the people are doing the background and check and tell you where you are and why you can do, what you cannot do. So we all somehow know our fate when you are born. We know which our grandpa was in the South or which my uncle was in the prison or who married, whom, and also a family member, not only somebody, but then it's not only ending there, but if someone married their family members, but then the other side family members were in the prison,

then your song one says going down too. So you can always go down, but you can never go up, unless there's a miracle happens. So it's so easy to go down and there's a song one cast, but like never going up. So the guys, many would never marry me because my son was extremely low. And if I marry even someone who was in the high caste system, they were going to only come down. They can never go up.

So that's how people make each other hate, you know, and each other to divide and be with only same background. So the core people will not get tanked by the people like us, like who are in the hospital class. You also somehow saw the movie Titanic, which is an American movie while you were in North Korea. How did you see that? And what impact did it have on you? So, as I said, right, there's no internal in North Korea. But luckily, we have this long, wide border opened up with China. And a lot of outside information comes from China by the smugglers. And watching this outside information isn't something, you know, like it's an extremely risky thing to do. It would be something unimaginable for us to think that people can get cared for watching a movie.

But apparently it is in North Korea. There are people losing their lives for watching outside information. And my case, I was young, but my uncles had a movie Titanic. Somehow they got, I don't know how they got it, but they were like lentil to us. So I watched the movie along with my parents. And that was the first time I felt some humanity and also had a little bit, you know, taste of freedom. And it didn't quite like challenging me to think the rest of the world was going to be free and very prosperous. but I just thought maybe

outside the world maybe not that that that trouble as my region told me and you also talked about how it changed or introduced the idea of love to you that previously you had only one definition

of love what was that definition and then what did that movie open your mind to? Yeah so if you have read a movie I mean, read a book 1984 by Georgia War. He talks about the importance of the language. The big brother kid comes up with a new speak, right?

And basically, that's what North Korea regime did. They came up with a new dictionary. The dictionary does not have definition for freedom, human rights, or even gay. You know, there is no way you can look up in the dictionary what that is. And also love. The dictionary only defines the love as something, the love that you have for dear leader or the party.

You can never use the word to describe your emotions to another human being like your father or mother, your lover. So if you don't have that word, then you don't understand the concept. therefore your ability to think those complex things is getting very limited and in that situation in North Korea you know we don't have the concept of those love that there was a never movie made to show that a lover can die for another lover every movie in North Korea made to show us that how you know the revolutionaries dying for the party and revolution and how what aneworthing that is

So when I saw a movie Titanic, I was like extremely confused because, you know, there's not a single thing about revolution. And at the end, this guy is dying for women. And I was so shocked like, why would anyone make a movie, you know, out of such a shame for story? And like that was something, you know, dying for your lover was something never valued or never talked about. I didn't even think that was a possibility. And then I was keep thinking and I thought, you know, it's just so beautiful. I felt like it was so natural to just love somebody and die for love her. And that's when I thought, you know, that's when I started thinking slightly differently

and questioned really, you know, very minor my own way. And you eventually escaped when you were 13. How did you escape? and what made you try to risk your life to escape? Yeah, so when I was escaped from North Korea, you know, it's very different. It's like I never seen the map of the world. I never knew, you know, how many countries we had, how many countries we had, what democracy was or what freedom was.

I was luckily living in a town called the Hesan, where we are facing border with China. So we just had one river. that was flowing between China and North Korea. And at night, I was able to see China, and they had electricity at night. If you see North Korea right now from the satellite pictures, you know, it is literally the darkest spot on the world. They don't have 24 hours electricity and extremely dark at night. And by being of advantage living in the border town, I was, you know, single lights.

And I just ultimately, I became really, really hungry. So the Austrian regime, often we think it's such a poor country, but it isn't. It has all the money in the world to build all those luxurious resort for the party members. They have all the money in the world to spend for billions of dollars every year, making more nukes and testing them. And regime chose to starve us because they can't control us that way. You know, if you are full and you have food to eat, the next thing you're going to think of is, like, meaning of your life and what can be better in my life. But when you're like on the verge of starving to death, you don't think of any of that. You just only try to survive.

So, nursing regime purposely, like, starving us, the class that I was in. and I wasn't able to find anything to eat in North Korea and only way for me was saying that time was if I go where the lights were, maybe I find something to eat and I also heard this rumors in my town that, you know, dogs in China eat rice and I thought that was like such a joke you know, like people in North Korea dying from not eating food

like how possible on our like dogs can advise and I still thought maybe you know what can I do if I don't do

anything within my life I might not be alive tomorrow morning and that was risking my life and crossing that frozen river to China and see what happens

and that's why I decided to escape and to that journey and what happened when you got to China I was tricked by human traffickers. So once I arrived in China, so right before I escaped,

I had really, I was going to escape my own sister. So I was 13 years old and she was 16 years old. And we were two of us who were going to escape together, but one day I got such a horrible stomach ache. And then I went to hospital. And, you know, in North Korea, the hospital that I was in, we don't have x-rays or any machine to know what's going on. So, simply, my doctor rubbed my belly, and he said, oh, I think you have some appendicitis.

We have to operate on you right now soon. And they cut my belly without any painkiller. And they, you know, opened it and they realized it was just a lot of malnutrition infection. And they closed me down. So most of people in North Korea in hospitals do not die from a cancer or any other disease. We get killed very before that, which is a lot of times just starvation infection. And so my sister couldn't go with me. I wasn't sure my surgery was successful or not get infected.

So she escaped a few days before and left me a note saying, go follow this lady that she's going to help you go to China. So luckily I got up a hospital without infection and as soon as I removed my stitches, I did find a lady with my mother and she said she couldn't send me

to China and she lied to me that if I go to China, I was going to find food and I find my sister. So my mother and I crossed the frozen river into China with the help of a guy, but

later we realized that was a human trafficker that they sold us to Chinese men they sold my mother for like around 75 or something dollars and they sold me for less than 300 because I was a virgin and young and as soon as we got into China a Chinese human trafficker raped my mother in front of me and then they told us if you want to survive in China, then you have to be a sword as a sexual slave. And I was, yeah, that's the moment when I completely lost my faith in humanity. And I just stopped feeling things, I think. And during this time, I heard about how somebody said the word,

free to you and you didn't know what that was. Can you tell us about the first time you heard the word free? Yeah, so while I was living in China as a slave for two years, at the end of two years time, it was extremely dangerous. You know, in China, Chinese regime constantly cracking down us and they catch us and sent us back to North Korea to get tortured and they cared. So in China, I was living in there, I was so, so unbearable, even as much as being in North Korea. And one day, we met a North Carolina defective woman, and she told me, actually, if we go to South Korea, then we will be free. And I was so confused.

I asked her, like, what do you mean I will be free? And she said, oh, you can wear your jeans. You can watch your movies. and no one will arrest you for that and from someone from North Korea people killed

like killed by watching movie or reading like jeans or getting you into you know prison and getting punished it was something so revolutionary that I couldn't believe

like how can on earth that is okay and she said like you know it is really true that if we go to South Korea that you know we will be free we can you know we're a jean

and watch movies and no one's an arrest to you. So I thought, that's amazing. I'm going to risk my life for that. That's when I decided to cross, walking across the Garby Desert in minus 40 degrees. And without a compass in my hand, I crossed a desert to Mongolia in 2009 when I was 15 years old. And that's how I became free. In a moment, we'll discuss more about Yanmi. story and why so many human rights groups focus on getting outside information into North Korea.

But first a quick word from the sponsors who make this show possible. Crypto.com sees a future of cryptocurrency in every wallet. Have you seen the MCO Visa card? A metal card powered by crypto. Loaded with perks, including up to 5% back on all your spending and unlimited airport lounge access. They pay for your Spotify and Netflix too. What's not to love? With crypto.com, not only can you spend your crypto, but you can you spend your crypto, but you can grow it too. Earn up to 6% per year on the most popular coins like BTC, XRP, LTC, and up to 12% per year on stable coins like Pax or TUSD. Just a few taps before you start receiving interest every week. Join the over 1 million others and download the crypto.com app today.

Will the world follow France and advocate banning privacy coins? Will government-backed stable coins become the new fiat? Are distributed and peer-to-peer exchanges just a flash in the pan? The answer is maybe. Virtual currencies can flourish and create a new, private, and more versatile economy. But that grand vision can't happen without keeping crypto clean. And that requires support of governments and accountability for bad actors. Privacy enhanced compliance using cryptographic controls has the potential to preserve anonymity without compromising legitimate investigations. CipherT trace is working on this vision of the future. Sign up to stay up to date on the Privacy Enhanced Compliance Initiative and receive authoritative crypto-a-ml reports quarterly. www.com.com slash keep crypto clean. Today's episode is brought

to you by Cracken. Cracken is the best exchange in the world for buying and selling digital assets. With all the recent exchange hacks and other troubles, you want to trade on an exchange you can trust. Cracken's focus on security is utterly amazing. Their liquidity is deep and their fee structure is great with no minimum or hidden fees. They even reward you for trading so you can make more trades for less. If you're a beginner, you will find an easy on-ramp from five Fiat currencies, and if you're an advanced trader, you'll love their 5x margin and futures trading. To learn more, please go to crackin.com. That's KRAK-K-E-N.com. back to my conversation with Yanmi Park. So you made it to South Korea and why don't you just fill us in on everything that has happened to you to this point where, you know, now you live in the States and you have a degree from Colombia and, you know, you speak at the UN and you just, you know, have written a book. Why don't you fill us in on what happened once you reach freedom?

once I reached the freedom arrived in South Korea I thought like oh I'm at the end of the journey my life is going to be great but it was completely opposite learning to be free was so people

it was so difficult that I actually said if there's a guarantee that I'm going to get enough like frozen potatoes and enough like some some food, I might go back to North Korea, I mean, if the region don't care me.

And that's how hard it was adjusting to freedom and South Korea, because South Korea also had such a heavy discrimination against nursing defectors, and I was made fun of to speaking the way that I was, like having an Irishman accent. And also catching up with the society, like South Korea, were still. so advanced and they the competition is so vigorous that there was no way for me to compete when i arrived i was almost a dork and the kids in south korea were like going to study english when they were in mothers their stomach and studying english in their kindergarten and they you know do so much for education and it was you know just in every possible way it was so

difficult. But, you know, after all that difficulty, when I was in University in South Korea, one day I read a book Animal Farm by Georgia O'Rear, and that was my

turning point. So until that point, you know, so the biggest thing after North Korea is, of course, yeah, understanding freedom or freeware or to modernity, it was all challenging, you know, it was completely going from one different planet to different

planet. But what was the hardest thing was trusting again, right? So when I arrived in South Korea, they said, oh, Kim's were dictators and, you know, Korean were studied by Kimmerstown, not by Americans and South Koreans. And they say, oh, you're brainwashed. Everything you believed was lie, and everything I'm telling you is true. And I was so shocked and I was like, so everything that I believed was lied and how do I know what you're saying is not lie? At that point, you're just so confused.

Like, how is it possible? Everything that all I believed is, all my heart was lied. And, you know, I would stop trusting again. And when I read the book 19, like, I mean, by Georgia, where I thought you know, farm, I could see North Korea in me I could see my grandma in the old pigs I could see that just young pigs like in myself

everything made sense to me why everything became that way and then I started really trusting the information that I was finding online and the books in South Korea and then one day I was sitting in the room and watch the TV in South Korea

and it was you know big, big emotional concert, like fundraising concerts. The celebrities were crying and and then suddenly it was showing like, you know, donation and it was a campaign for animals rights. And like my jaw dropped. I couldn't believe you had the animal's rights.

Like what is animals rights? I didn't even know I had a right as a human being. how on earth that we are living in the same planet there are that 25 million people don't even know they are oppressed don't know even they are enslaved and they have rights but the other parts of the world they have a room to care by animals right

and that's when I decided something was so wrong and then I realized or so that just the world had no idea about what happening to North Korean people because the media in the West, you know, when I was starting my activism is when the movie, I don't know if you heard the movie called the interview came up by Sony. Yeah, I saw it. I have a friend who was in it, but anyway.

Really? It was a really sad moment because every newspaper was so busy making fun of North Korean dictator and North Korea. How bizarre these people are. on the square. The old people were so brainwashed and acting like robots. And how bizarre this dictated looking like cartoon character with a funny haircut. And everything was so funny that people didn't get the gravity of this tragedy that we are having. It's a Holocaust happening. But the world is just so busy making fun of it.

And that's when I realized I have to let the world know what's happening. It is not so funny. I mean, I think if people were confused about North Korea, that of course we have freedom to make fun of North Korea, that's our freedom and that's our privilege. But when something is so funny, then you lose the gravity of the seriousness of this issue, how much people are being, you know, affected by this tragedy.

So I think that's when, you know, started educating myself, and really understood, like, why the world is not caring about this issue was not just because the people were in freedom were just evil and having no compassion, but it's just because they did not know what was happening. And that's what I do now. It's really I dedicate all my life to let the world know what's happening and just tell the word that this must be stopped. So we're going to get to how you do that. But I, actually also just want to ask a little bit more about foreign media in North Korea nowadays. If you know, how common is it for people now? Like, do you think, is there still literally no

internet access? Because, you know, you defected, obviously, a while ago. So I'm not sure how much you know how things have changed or, you know, because I, as far as I understand, I think a lot of groups working to free North Korea, their main focus is still on getting outside. And I'm not sign information in. Why is that their strategy? And how do they do that? Yeah. So, yeah, I'm still working with a lot of underground networks and I have contacts in

North Korea. So I get the up-to-date news from North Korea. And, you know, I work with a lot of NGOs who does rescue and who gets information. And based on what I hear from the people in North Korea right now is that, yes, so all of the information is really everyday life. At least minimum, more than 80% of people, 87% even of the percent people have access to the information, especially among the elites. And in this metropolitan cities and in the border towns, they have a lot of access to

the outside information and the fact that that is changing the people's minds. the young generation like myself grew up with outside information that they do really have less loyalty towards the regime. Of course, they are staying silent because of the fear, because of this punishment, inhuman punishment by the regime. But inside, they know that the regime is not the good one. So, you know, for me is that to change in North Korea, it's not like the answer should be

the movement should start within North Korean people they should demand their freedom and their rights and that's true like positive change is going to happen in North Korea and that only can start with liberation of their minds and the outside information is liberating their minds they are slave and even in their minds the regime But this information is going in and they see and they are not slaves anymore, only with their minds.

And I think if we get enough information and to tell them what they deserve and what humans deserve, I do think this is a real chance that when we can free North Korea with information. And when you say that there's a lot of outside information in North Korea, does that mean that the punishment for watching it is less? or like how can it be a lot and how do you define a lot? Do they still have to do it in secret or like how is this happening? Yes. So the one when I saw like, you know, it's so because of the country right now becoming very corrupt. So North Korea regime, you know, has one of the worst corruptions in the world.

And because if you think about it, as a you're officer in the government, You don't really get the rations and your salary is extremely low. They said the doctor's salary of money is something over a dollar. You cannot possibly survive with that money a month. The doctors, officials and the party members have to find a way to survive. And that means accepting the bribes. And the bribe is coming from people who commits a crime. So, of course, there are three people going to prison camps.

and still getting executed for distributing outside information. But for doing that, they get money. You know, you need to make money somehow, and that means you have to set out of information. But when you get caught, then you have to bribe, but if you get unlucky, you're going to get executed. So, of course, this is an extremely dangerous thing, but also it opens the opportunity for the people to survive.

and that's a way. Of course, you cannot now go to movie theater and publicly watch us of information, but you do it at your home, your TV. And the electricity is a real problem, but then these people getting ready by corruption and they get this, you know, somehow there's like a natural way or burning the oil or something. They get the electricity that way, and they get. get, like, you know, the device is like we call a no-tech. My car is noble, I mean laptop, but the no-taire that doesn't have internet but can't

the U-S-DB-State or SD cards. So all this, like modern technology is helping North Koreans to access to information. And also, there's so much demand, but this NGO is, you know, is increasing the supply. They get all this information like USB sticks and all this like, they cut the cost when it was North Korea. And that just makes it so much available for people to access. And also it's to get out because of the corruption than before. And people's royalty has changed. You know, everyone just tried to survive.

So maybe like in my mother's generation, there were like so many true believers and they would like, you know, go to authority and, you know, complain. But now just people just want to survive. So less loyalty makes it available for people to trust each other and selling these things underground and bribe each other to survive. Hmm. Yeah, I was just realizing, like, I bet you probably watch Titanic on a DVD, but now on a US...

No, my time was actually... Yeah, what was the... It was really old time. It was like the films were in it. Even before the DVD. It was like in the late 90s and North Korea, always catching up with technology a few decades later. So, you know, my time was like,

before I escaped, it was like a DVD. But when I saw, like, Titanic was something like really old cassette almost. Like in VHS? Cosset? Yeah. Yeah, those things I use. And right now, though, when I talk to my like North Korean contacts in North Korea, they use like SD cards, like USB with tiny devices that you can even swallow when you're in trouble. You can just swallow them.

And, you know, the official can't really find in you. My time was so hard to hide because they were so big. But now it's so easy. Yeah. And not only that, but you can only watch one movie on one tape. but with an SD card or a USB, you can watch hundreds or thousands even. I don't know how much you can fit on there. Yeah.

Even like I remember we needed like few tapes even like watch Titanic was such a long movie. You know, it was like hard to finish a Titanic because of lack of electricity or all of that. We did a few tapes and we sometimes took like my time. Like, you know, sometimes it took one to finish a movie because. we only get the electricity under like that ideal leader's like birthday or New Year's Eve, something like only national holiday that gave us electricity. But now, you know, USB does not have only the entire device with the power. You can charge and you can last for many hours.

So it's, you know, North Koreans are also benefiting by these like, you know, technological advances right now. Yeah. So one thing I wanted to ask you is there's this increasingly popular trend for tourists, even from the United States, to go to North Korea. When people go to North Korea as tourists, what impact does that have on the country? So it is a thing. So in North Korea, when I was there, they told us, you know, everyone wants to come to North Korea. We are the most envied a country in the world. Literally, there was so many. called Nothing to Envy. So we had nothing to envy in this word

because we are the envious country, you know? And they say everyone admires our dear leaders and they all like worships our dear leaders. So they will show us the pictures of the foreigners, come to North Korea and bow in front of the Statue of King.

And of course I believe it, you know. Yeah, everyone really admires our dear leader. And so when you go to North Korea as a tourist, Yes, you reinforce these propaganda that Norwegian people are doing. The second of all, the dictatorship wants this a high currency by these tourists. And the tourist idea and the argument of them going to North Korea is such a naive way of arguing. They say, oh, if I go to North Korea, I'm going to change some people's minds because I'm such a generous, benevolent foreigner. and the restaurant, if I show them that I'm such a kind person,

they will change their mind about themselves. And then they're going to, you know, maybe start a revolution or like open up. But the craziest thing is that, you know, Kim Jong-un was educated in Switzerland. He went to school in a country that is most democratic. They respect human dignity and freedom. So by teaching them how general restaurants is not going to change. North Korean elite, of course, knows everything.

They know too well that they don't want change. They know that if the system collapse, they lose their privileges. They lose their royal status. They are not of course, sungun anymore. and they know that those defectors go to South Korea, they all become commoners. Even they were the highest ranking in the party, when they defected South Korea or America,

they just become one of everybody. They are not special anymore. Their children don't get those benefits for their lifetime. These elite people go to school in Beijing or Europe in Germany, and like in Moscow, they see the rest of the world. They know what's happening exactly. And they have every intention to keep the system going for their benefit. So when you go, your guys were the ones who were studying in Beijing

and who went abroad to study foreign language and who are the children of the most elite people. And when you only interact with those people and when you go to staying at this hotels or these like casinos or anywhere you go, the people, that you meet the ones who are benefited by the regime, who doesn't want the change. So you don't like helping anyone's mindset

and you also give money to the regime to maintain power. And also it's ethical is so wrong. It's like you are visiting concentration camp but not as a liberator, but as a friend, as a, you know, a celebrator of this tragedy.

You know, imagine you right now when you're in the during the world, or two, we have a ticket to concentration camp and not delivering them but show them how you are so very badding your fee. And that's what you're doing, going to North Korea and looking at miserable, starving North Koreans,

and look at me on free because I was fortunate, you know, to boring democracy, but you're not. So in so many possible ways, this is so messed up. And I just, I can't even describe. I think a lot of people do not have the bad intention to go. They are just so genuinely, naively believe that they can change people's minds. And this is not benefit in some way. But that is so, so not.

And actually there's such a destructive behavior in the movement of living North Korean. And yeah, it's just so sad how sometimes people are so naive. that way. Yeah, and I wanted to ask, because this is similar, but a little bit different, that cryptocurrency researcher I mentioned before, his name is Virgil Griffith. He had permission from the North Korean government to give a talk at this conference in Pyongyang on blockchain technology. So knowing what you know about how the Kim regime works, how they, you know, interact or how they allow interactions with foreigners. Who do you think the audience would have been, who would have benefited from such a talk?

So right now, North Korea, Venezuela, all these countries are interested. The regimes are interested in other people because they want to avoid a sanction. They want to make the moral nuke. They want to, North Korea makes money by selling drugs, by human trafficking its own people, by selling weapons to Middle East. So they do all this dark crime and they need more money and they need to avoid the international sanctions. And they need like cryptocurrency. So it is, I mean, of course, the cryptocurrencies can empower a lot of individuals oppressed by the regimes.

But also we have to be cautious because it can be also used by the dictator. I don't know how North Korea went far to creating their own currency and cryptocurrency I'm going to do. it, but anyone who is benefited by this free society going there and helping this murder is a crime. And I think he is about to prosecute by the U.S. government, right? Yeah, yeah. It's not clear what will happen, obviously, but, you know, he was charged. Right. If he was really benefiting this dictator, that is a crime. So I think it's a I don't know enough to go into

the entire crypto benefit. I think when it comes to North Korea all I can say is North Korean government is extremely interesting cryptocurrency because they want to avoid the sanctions in their illegal like activities and they need a technology and support

And I just hope that people stay on the side of, you know, people not with the dictators. And I mean, what can I really say? He had a freedom to go to North Korea and give that speech. But that wasn't legal, apparently. And I think we have rule of law in this world, and that's what keeps our world better than North Korea. Yeah. Yeah, I also, you know, earlier when you said cryptocurrency could help people in oppressed regimes, I mean, I think, obviously, that's true if they have access to the Internet, but in North Korea, where they don't,

I think it would be quite difficult for anybody who's not part of the regime to benefit. That cryptocurrency conference that he was in, he was absolutely benefiting the regime, not the people, obviously. He didn't go there to empower the people. He went there to empower the dictatorship. The people who can only attend that cryptocurrency conference is the extreme top elite, who trained to become hackers, who trained to do all those illegal activities, and who wants every intention to want the regime to stay. He didn't go or something like in a commonwealth conference where everyone could attend.

So, you know, he just went there to tend up with a dictator and try to empower the regime. So that's, yeah, that's a thing. And that's critical conference, like, conference. He wasn't like so many conference. Yeah, yeah. I'm so glad you said this because people on Twitter seem to think that he could have interacted with everyday North Koreans. And I, you know, I'm not an expert in North Korea, but I have read so many books on it. And I was like, what?

I was like, I don't think you guys know how this place works because he would be in a prison camp right now if he did that. No, he might get shot So, you know, all reindeer got tortured And to death The American poor university students, right? From Virginia Tech And there's a South Korean woman Who went to Gunggang, like a mountain, the tourist

And the officer said, oh, you cannot pass that line And she did and they shot her right on the spot Oh, my God People truly believe that They can go to North Korea and meet everyday life, why don't they dare to try it? It's a humane kingdom, not because the information is only controlled for North Koreans. North Korean regime controls the information both ways.

They control what North Korean people can hear about the rest of the world, and they control the information that why we can know about North Korean people, even outsiders we can't know. So when you even go there as a tourist, you cannot just go grab or like take a bike, you know, hiking around and like go anywhere you want or like, you know, there's a backpack traveling that you do in the Southeast Asia. You have to be with your guides all the time. Otherwise, you become a traitor and send a prison camp like what all the rainbeard is. Yeah, yeah. And all he did was taking a poster or something.

Yeah, that was a crime. Can you believe that? That's the crime that he took his life for. I mean, if North Korea has got to treat a white person, white American that way, can you imagine what they do are doing to North Koreans who doesn't have voice who are not visible in the rest of the world? If that's the brutality, they do with a white person from America. It's like, that terror that North Koreans are going through is something beyond our, you know, comprehension.

Yeah. And just to be, you know, to ask a finer point on this, because I also saw people on Twitter saying things like, you know, sanctions hurt the citizens of these countries more than they hurt the leaders. So, you know, yeah. And he was one of the things that the. Department of Justice charged him with was helping the North Korean regime evade sanctions. So if he actually had done that, what effect do you think that would have? Would that help the North Korean people or hurt them? So I have an anecdote. So when I was young, I said it was 90s, right? North Korea had a greatest famine. It was a man-made famine. The regime chose to stile us.

So more than, even like over 3 million people died, not in Pyongyang, but the people who were like in us in the hospital class in the northern part. That was a lot of people, you know, seeing that about it on the streets everyday life for me. I never thought that was something unusual that I had to be shocked. And in that situation, I was, I'm still very petty. North Koreans are average three to four inches shorter than South Koreans. even though we were saying people because of the malnutrition. And so this non-nutrition, when we were there, they were gathering with five children and they get some of these foreigners to come and see.

And they get, you know, food from some unit shop, I don't know, you rent or other countries get so much cash and medical aid, all of this. And they use us as like toys and show them. And then when those things come in, they all take them to tell you. So those aid, those money, does the rice, those food that you send doesn't come to us. That goes to North Korean elite people. So if those aid hurt, why did I escape and became a sexual slave and being raped in China? The first thing, when I arrived in China, and after getting my mom raped, and they said, you have to be sold and get raped.

And then say, if you don't like it, you can go back to North Korea. My mother asked me, what did I want to do? She asked me, do you want to go back? What do you want to do? One thing made me to change my mind was when I, for the first time, saw a trash bin in China. I didn't know what it was, but the lady told me, that's where you throw away things that you don't want. I was so shocked

Like how How nurse do you have things to throw away in this country I never needed a trash can in my life in North Korea There's nothing to throw away in North Korea And people like in North Korea If they really get benefited by all this international aid You know no one should be dying In those 90s when I was exactly in North Korea

South Korea, all these like Hyundai, all these big groups when the Kim Da Zheng, he won the Nobel Peace Prize. He gave millions of dollars, I mean, the billions of dollars money, and the food, cash, and every part of

researchers he could get in South Korea and the international could be hurt. None came to the most vulnerable people like us. And it all ran to the region. So the people right now keep arguing, The sanction is hurting everyday life. There's no way we can be hurt than why we are already now.

There's no way people can suffer more than what we are suffering right now. And those things that we give to the North Korean regime only benefiting the regime. And why is that so hard as people understand computer science and economics, all of these things? if you do the thing that the dictator doesn't want, that means you are winning. If you want to give the thing that the dictator wants, that you are benefiting him. Northcan dictator wants the sanction to be lifted.

That means it is definitely benefiting him. And we don't want the benefit dictator, right? Like, when I got attacked by the North Korean regime, I thought, oh, I'm winning. I need to be hated by him. I need to be criticized. by him. If I was praising by him, I would definitely do something wrong. The North and regime wants sanctioned lifted, and they want tourists to come in. And if you do the exact opposite,

I know that we are on the right side of the history. It's really not that hard. It's just so easy. And I just don't know why some people are so like somehow invested emotionally on this world of sanction. Sanction in the context of North Korea, It's exactly meaning of the starving the elite, starving the regime. Sanction items is like North Korean regime cannot buy the items, like in a ski resort item. They cannot buy sports cars. They cannot buy Chanel bags or product bags.

Those are the items on the sanction items. And even those food that we send is not going to the most vulnerable people. So why are there so many people are so passionately using their time and resources and arguing that how we, why we should benefit the dictator who is so fat enough and who is always so well fat. Why do we need to feed them more with all our resources that can go to benefiting so many, so many starving people right now? So given the fact that the Kim regime has nuclear weapons and, you know, is apparently now finding other ways to fund itself, What do you think is the best way to deal with Kim Jong-un, you know, obviously getting information in as one?

But what else do you think could be done to help free the North Korean people? So there are several ways, but I think there are really, number one is awareness that people really don't know exactly what's happening. Right? There are so many misinformation and they need to understand the regime has no intention. ever going to give up the nickel reference voluntarily. They are just playing with the rest of the world. And they just try to use this as a, you know, car like we're going to get rid of the news so you give me more money.

And so they can actually secretly build more nukes. But you need to understand that. That's why, one, we need a sanction. We need to stive the regime as much as we can. And as much as we can. And I think that's why that Trump's sanctions. work. That's why we got North Korea out of their hymnicism and two in the conversation table. So we need a sanction. And the second is empowering people. We need this information

to go in North Korea. So people get empowered. They know they deserve this right. They know that the rest of the reward is prosperous and free. And the third that I personally care is the rescue. it's like during the Nazi Holocaust, right? These defectors escape to China with everything they have and they become human slaves, like modern slaves, they become sexual slaves. And there are so many NGOs that rescue them to South Korea, to America, to free country. And there are currently up to like almost 300,000 defectors are hiding in China. most of them are women and girls who are being raped right now every day.

And we need to rescue them. And I think that's what I just say, that there are three ways. One is over on us so we can pressure on vision more. And second is getting information. And third is rescuing this. Most of one of the people right now in the world to safety. And there are so many NGOs that are already involved in this, movement right now.

And for people, for the listeners who are hearing your stories and are moved to help North Korea, are there any particular organizations or like what do you suggest they do? Yeah, it's exactly the reason, exactly the reason why I'm on the board of the Human Rights Foundation is that Human Rights Foundation, of course they are, you know, interested in getting involved in getting information inside North Korea, but they are helping with all these other questions. groups, you know, doing the rescue, rescuing work, you know, doing the empowering women or this most vulnerable people.

And they have, you know, connection to all those NGOs and helping them. So if you reach out to HRF, you know, they know every NGO that are working in this spirit and they're going to connect you the people that you want to help it with. And they have every connection to everybody. So, you know, it's very easy. All you have to do is reach out to people who are at the HR. and what do you care about and how do you know get involved and what you can contribute and they always find your way to you know help they connect you and do the right thing yeah and listeners

who haven't heard my episodes with Alex Gladstein of the Human Rights Foundation I will link to those in the show notes he is just a fond of information about human rights issues as well as cryptocurrency and how Bitcoin can help oppressed people. So, Yanmi, where can people learn more about you and your work? Well, I'm very active on social media, Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, where I also wrote a book, so it has a lot of more in-depth of North Korean history, why we can that way, and they are where they're heading to. So if you just really want to, know the perspective of North Korea, not from the perpetrators, not from the regime or these illy people.

If you just really want to know the perspective that this real survivors are having, then you should not only my memoir, but there are a lot of other members are written by defectors. And I assure that none of the factors who survived the regime is going to tell you True reason is the answer and lifting the sanction is the answer. None of us are saying that. Everyone, we experience the region the first hand. We all say the opposite. And if you believe not to, you know, believe survivors

and if you choose to believe in perpetrators, and that's, you know, out of my control. But please listen to all the other survivors who have written their memoir, saying, you know, they are risking their life to, you know, raise their voice. Even though I escape right now, I'm a green cardholder living in America because I'm speaking out like right now and tell the words about the truth. All my relatives, three generations of my relatives back in North Korea, been disappeared. I don't know they've been executed or in a concentration camp, but that's the thing. This is the region that we are dealing with.

That's how evil this regime is. They are still punishing people, even though I escaped. So I don't know how else I can describe how evil this regime and how you should be so careful with your actions if that's what are going to benefit the regime or the people. Because sometimes without our ignorance can't, you know, have the evil. And I think that we are responsible for our ignorance. I do hope someday that, you know, you can reunite with your family.

Yeah, I hope they're alive. Yeah. Before we end, I also absolutely need to give a ringing endorsement of your book in order to live. Thank you. You know, a couple years ago, I read it before meeting you at the Oslo Freedom Forum. And listeners should know, you know, there are many moments where, you know, you know, It's quite heartbreaking about what Yanmi went through. But honestly, by the end, Yanmi, your indomitable spirit just really shines through.

And I just was so moved. You know, it made me feel the depths of sadness, but it also made me feel the utmost hope for humanity. And for listeners, even if you don't listen to my recommendation, I will tell you that Yonmi's book has the highest rating I've ever seen. goodreads, which shows that thousands and thousands and thousands of people think it's exceptional, not just me. So, Yanmi, just congratulations for, you know, all your, just, like, just for your life and what you've been through and achieved and overcome and the work that you continue to do.

And thank you for coming on my show. Thank you. It's been all of your honor. Thank you. Thanks so much for joining us today. To learn more about Yonmi and her work, check out the show notes inside your podcast player. If you're not yet subscribed to my other podcast, Unconfirmed, which is shorter, a bit news year, and now features a short news recap. Be sure to check that out. Also, find out what I think are the top crypto stories each week by signing up from my email newsletter at Unchainedpodcast.com. Unchained is produced by me, Laura Shin, with help from factual recording, Anthony Yun, Daniel Ness, Josh Durham, and the team at CLK transcription. Thanks for the listening.