Female defectors working part-time to support families back home have no recourse when Chinese nationals refuse to return money, unable to use banks or report losses to police.
“There have been a string of recent incidents in Jilin and Liaoning provinces in which female defectors lost the hard-earned money they made from part-time work after leaving it with people they trusted,” a Daily NK source in China said recently.
According to the source, most female North Korean defectors in China rely on allowances they receive from their Chinese husbands because they cannot officially work due to their status as illegal aliens. However, since their Chinese husbands often don’t give them enough money, they earn a bit of money on the side by working part-time in restaurants or on farms.
Female defectors use their hard-earned money to support their families in North Korea or to supplement their meager allowances. However, their Chinese husbands often not only fail to give their wives allowances, but even pressure them to turn over the money they make from part-time work to spend on themselves.
Unable to put money in bank accounts and feeling uneasy about leaving money at home with their husbands and in-laws, some female defectors leave their money with Chinese people they trust. However, some of these women lose the money when the Chinese people they trusted refuse to return it.
Four years of savings disappear as trusted individuals feign ignorance
One female defector in her 40s, living in Jilin province, left the 10,000 Chinese yuan ($1,380) she had saved after four years of part-time work with a Chinese man she had been seeing for about two years behind her husband’s back, but lost it when he refused to return it.
Last month, the defector asked for some of the money back to send to her parents in North Korea for their 70th birthday, but the man feigned ignorance to the end, asking, “When did I receive money from you?” Unable to report the matter to the police due to her illegal status or tell her husband the truth, she ultimately had to give up on getting her money back.
Two other defectors in their 30s living in Shenyang, Liaoning province, left 20,000 and 25,000 yuan ($2,760 and $3,450), respectively, with Chinese people they trusted. They entrusted their money — which they had saved to go to South Korea — to the individuals because they had nowhere safe to put it, but in the end, they got not even a cent back.
“Defectors living in China do work hard to earn a living and send money to their families in North Korea, but their hard-earned cash can disappear in a second,” the source said. “However, there’s nothing to protect them from such losses, so such incidents will inevitably continue.”
Above all, the people who take advantage of the defectors’ illegal status in China are pushing the women further into a corner, the source said.
One of the defectors in her 30s in Shenyang said, “Here in China, at least I don’t have to worry about starving, but when I think of the rest of my life, I sigh and wonder why I came here to live like this.” She added, “Since my Chinese husband and his in-laws don’t accept me as a real family member, I easily trusted somebody who treated me well and left them my money, only for me to lose it. So now I can’t sleep, wondering how I’m going to live.”
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: dailynk.com
