Executive Summary

What happens to the children of North Korean women who are born in China? What happens when they remain in China, or when they escape to other countries? It is believed that as many as 300,000 North Koreans have fled the country—most of them since the famine of the 1990s, and most of them women. To address China’s “bare branches”—its much larger population of young men than young women—North Korean women are often sold to young Chinese men as brides. The children of these brides will be born stateless, lack legal rights, and face the ever-present danger of their mothers’ deportation back to North Korea because they are considered illegal immigrants in China. These unique challenges persist, despite China being a party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, among other international treaties. Even those children that eventually escape to third-party countries are haunted by their status, as their statelessness caused legal hindrances to their ability to settle and, specifically in South Korea, deprives them of government assistance. This study documents the treatment of “stateless” children born to North Korean and Chinese parents. It delineates the factors that contribute to their mistreatment—China’s unwillingness to anger the North Korean government, South Korea’s growing disinterest in North Korean defectors, and a lack of formal networks for North Korean defectors elsewhere. It further finds that, with China openly hostile toward “meddling” in its internal affairs, the most likely source of relief for these children will be a change in attitudes among South Koreans, the United States, and their allies and partners, resulting in conscious effort by their governments and civil societies to help them, both financially and in assisting with their assimilation.

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Table of Contents

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND – WHERE NORTH KOREAN DEFECTORS, AND THEIR CHILDREN, COME FROM

THE STATELESS STATUS OF CHILDREN

CHINA AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

CONCLUSION

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

About the Authors

ROB YORK has been Director for Regional Affairs at Pacific Forum since 2020.  

HANNAH COLE served as Non-resident James A. Kelly Korea Fellow at Pacific Forum in 2022.  

KAYLIN KIM served as Research Intern at Pacific Forum in 2022-23. 

Photo: Holly Hwang dropped off her daughter, Mee, at day care before heading to work in Salt Lake City. Credit: Alex Goodlett for The New York Times