This past Sunday, 60 minutes ran a story about a North Korean man who escaped a brutal, concentration camp-like, prison after 23 years.
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| source: CBS |
"It's called Camp 14, and according to human rights groups, it's
part of the largest network of political prisons in the world today.
Some 150,000 people are believed to be doing hard labor on the brink of
starvation in these hidden gulags. But it's not just those who have been
accused of political crimes; it's their entire families --
grandparents, parents, and children. A practice called "three
generations of punishment." - CBS News.
To watch this story, click
here.
It absolutely amazes me that something like this can happen today without anyone really doing anything about it. As a Jewish person who lost family members in the holocaust, it horrifies me that there is basically a concentration camp in North Korea. How can we let this happen? I understand the political situation with North Korea, but this is something that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.
What do you think? Should the United States or another country attempt to intervene?
If we just went into North Korea we would have a huge mess in our hands. China and Russia would not like it at all. If any country tried to take matters into their own hands I can only believe there would be serious military repercussions. The United States can’t do everything. We’re fighting in the middle east and not really getting anywhere. Syria could explode at any minute, especially now that they’re maybe going to use chemical weapons? In my opinion this is the sort of thing the United Nations should be handling, but I would have to be an idiot to believe that it’s going to get fixed that way any time soon. That whole country is just a mess. This whole Camp 14 thing is pretty awful, but I don’t necessarily see that there’s a viable way to stop it right now that’s not going to cause potentially worse things from happening.
ReplyDeleteAs awful as Camp 14 is, it would not be in the United States best interest to intervene. Deciding to not intervene is a kind of Dirty Hands problem, as standing idly by as thousands of people live in a concentration camps, is a hard idea to swallow, especially after the Holocaust, and Stalin's regime, which saw the murder of millions of Soviets, but it is in the best interest of the nation as a whole to not tempt North Korea or her allies with war.
ReplyDeleteAlso I think that we have learned our lesson in terms of fighting ambiguous wars in Korea.
I agree with the comments here that we cannot afford to go into North Korea right now. It would be ideal if the United Nations would do something about it (although sanctions rarely work and they pretty much never accomplish anything). However, we have way too much on our plates right now regarding the Middle East and our own domestic problems such as the economy. It is unfortunate that there are places in the world that still treat humans like this, but we have already attempted to change things in North Korea and that ended in a disaster. I think that it is time that other countries get involved with human's rights issues and horrors such as this one; the United States cannot do everything. It may be our responsibility as human beings to make sure that people are being treated right, but I don't think we could even successfully make a difference right now. North Korea is a threat to us right now anyways, and we can't afford to make them hate us even more than they already do when we have so many issues going on elsewhere.
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