Is China obligated to help North Koreans?

[tooironic]

I was reading on BBC News today that China has rejected the United Nations report of alleged crimes against humanity in North Korea.

 

BBC writes:

 

A panel of experts said that China might be aiding and abetting the crimes by forcibly repatriating North Koreans. But a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman in Beijing said China saw them as illegal migrants.

 

Do you think China has an obligation to help North Korean defectors? Realistically, is there anything that the government could do to help the situation? I'm not saying that to be facetious, I honestly don't know. The abuses North Koreans have suffered make my stomach turn.

 

As an aside, the situation reminds me a lot of the Australian government's response to asylum seekers trying to reach Australia by boat. In both cases it seems like the administration is trying to maintain the status quo and act as if these people don't exist.

[Lu]

To my knowledge, countries have an obligation to help refugees, and generally if someone from another country shows up and says they are a refugee, the receiving country is supposed to investigate that claim and then allow genuine refugees to stay and send the others home. China gets around this by claiming all people fleeing North Korea are economic immigrants, who are in China illegally, and can thus be thrown out.

 

What China should do (and I'm not sure who exactly it has this obligation to, the UN perhaps?) is stop automatically classing all North Koreans as economic immigrants and instead investigate their claims and then grant them asylum. But for political reasons, it won't do this of course. Also perhaps for practical reasons: Virtually all North Koreans getting out of their country do so by coming to China, and China is probably not keen on giving such large groups of refugees any reason not to travel on to another destination.

 

I read that Mongolia also immediately returns all North Korean refugees to their own country, namely... South Korea, so that illegally crossing the Mongolian border equals a ticket to the place you actually want to go.

 

China doesn't kick out all refugees, and takes in some people from countries such as Somalia, and large numbers of ethnic Chinese who fled the Vietnam war are still living in China. The UNHCR has the numbers, I forgot them.

[querido]

-Is China (in fact) obligated?
The answer is no.
-Is China (in my mind) obligated?
The answer is no; my thinking that they're obligated does obligate them.
 
Try again:
-Should China be obligated?
If they don't obey the degree, that question is asking:
-Should China be forced?
No, I don't think one should conduct war against China to fix North Korea.
 
Try again:
-Should an Entity capable of doing so force North Korea to fix itself?
 
Well, there's a question whose analysis could be continued, but you're still stuck with the same unanswerable ancient question at its core. This problem is caused by the word "should". Some people or groups evade this problem by dispensing with the word "should"; they just do, as their wealth and power enable (depending on the context). So, what is your question?
-Would you approve if these Interests decided to "do" North Korea?
Probably not. But if I knew that the Interests who "did" South Korea were still with us it would at least be possible to continue talking about it.

[Silent]

 

To my knowledge, countries have an obligation to help refugees

 

I don't know the legislation, I think this is true, but only in a very restricted way. Economical and criminal refugees are definitely not included. For political refugee's (if considered at all) and war refugee's it may very well be limited to those whose life is in danger.

 

Plenty of scope to send North Koreans back.

 

 

I read that Mongolia also immediately returns all North Korean refugees to their own country, namely... South Korea, so that illegally crossing the Mongolian border equals a ticket to the place you actually want to go.

I think this is perfectly correct both the north and the south claim they're one single country.

[Lu]

I don't know the legislation, I think this is true, but only in a very restricted way. Economical and criminal refugees are definitely not included. For political refugee's (if considered at all) and war refugee's it may very well be limited to those whose life is in danger.

 

Plenty of scope to send North Koreans back.

Yes, it's not for economic migrants, only for (political or war) refugees. But if China would honestly and fairly assess the North Koreans who flee there, I'm pretty sure most of them would be found to be genuine political refugees, who would be in serious danger if they would be sent back. I understand the reasons China does what it does, and it's unlikely to change, but as I understand the situation, the rules don't in fact allow it.

[Silent]

 

I'm pretty sure most of them would be found to be genuine political refugees, who would be in serious danger if they would be sent back.

I think most of the refugees are not in immediate danger before the moment they flee. As a result China may claim that their lives are in danger due to a criminal act (illegally crossing the border) thus they're not valid refugees to be protected.