dough -- defectors pay brokers in china to contact their families, and they get dvds, flash drives and balloon launches. north koreans, especially the eleads, are keeping up with south korean soap operas, and watching south korean and western films. it's more important than over to raise the human rights concerns so they know our concerns are for them. for example, it was a brilliant action by the obama administration to include special envoy for north korean human rights, ambassador robert king in the delegation that went to north korea to investigate the food situation. it's the human rights in north korea that are causing the starvation. furthermore, north koreans are no long dependent on kim jong-il to survive, and because of farmer markets and the capitalism is saving them. kim jong-il's unprovoked attacks on south korea, as congressman paine mentioned, have awake ended south koreans to the truth, we must not ignore the human rights of north koreans for the false promise of this regime to end its nuclear program. governments, nongovernmental organizations, and individuals, first of all, should make human rights central to all negotiations with or about north korea. second, we should only provide food when relief organizations can stay and monitor it to the point of consumption. otherwise, it will most assuredly be diverted to maintain the regime that is causing the starvation in the first place. third, we need to continue to support radio broadcasting, especially programs like radio free asia and voice of america,; fourth, we need to empower the defector organizations using creative methods to get information into north korea. like fires for a free north korea, and the north korean peoples liberation front. five, we must convince the chinese to end their brutal policy of forced repatriation for north korean refugees which is prolonging the crisis by giving kim jong-il a reason to resist any reforms that would improve the situation in the country so north koreans do not want to risk their lives trying to three. sixth, we should support the 12 north korean defector churches. i've been working to try to connect church here in the united states with these detector churches in south korea. seven, we need to put the elites in the regime on notice they will be held accountable for their crimes against the north korean people. last week a north korean was caught. his mission was to kill the head of the fighters for a free north korea. hock has been doing the balloon launches, sending up information. both park and another man have been argentinaed targeted -- regularly talladega by assays sans. this tells us they're doing the most effective work in 2009, radio korea started broadcasting interviews from inside the country. supporting this flow of information through radio broadcast, especially by north korean defectors, is the most effective way to reach the people because the internet is only available to the elites in the regime. recently the north korean people's liberation front was formed by former military, including officers, special forces, cyberwarfare specialist propaganda specialists. this is significant because there the only time there was opposition against the regime was from the military who studied in the soviet union and came back wanting reform. they operated against the regime not 198 4. because all north korean males must serve for ten years and the elites are exempt from service, this means the north korean military truly represents the people. we saw the army in romania turn against kim jong-il and a good friend cue chess sky when the people rose up against the dictate tar. right now the elites in power have no incentive to oppose kim jong-il because they're lives are based on the successful transition to lee myung-bak. we have to assure them they will have a stake in the future. because north koreans are citizens under south corear, south korea has an important role to play, and that they should convene a tribunal of respect judges to begin the prosecution of those in the regime responsible for the political prison camps and other atrocities. there are 23,000 eye witnesses now, and we should start naming the names of those who are committing these crimes. when north korea finally opens up, i believe we will be even more horrified at the atrocities that the kim regimes committed against the north korean people today that are beyond our imagination. we'll face the same questions the world faced when the allies librated the nazi death camps. what did you know and what did you do to help stop the tragic circumstances? thank you, mr. chairman. >> ms. scholte, thank you for your testimony and your leadership. all those year all these years, and for that very incisesive testimony. we'll now her from miss kim young soon. >> i'm kim young soon. i'm a north korean defector and a survivor of a prison camp. [speaking korean] >> translator: i want to thank the united states congress and related officials of the congress for giving me a chance to speak at this important venue. i want to thank mrs. scholte for her years of friendship and for listening to my story of the political prison camp experience. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: the camp where i was is known around the world. it was created in 1969 in south province in a region moan known for rough and mountainous regions. and they died silent deaths. [speaking korean] >> translator: i wrote of my time in a book. my friend was hidden mistress of kim jung ill. and i became a victim of this myself and was, therefore, sent to prison. i want to tell the world about the reality of what happened to me and the reality of the prison camp system. [speaking korean] >> translator: the workers parties establishment of the principle was instituted whereby the citizens were sent to prison camps for total isolation from the general society for the following crimes. the crime of defaming the authority and refrigerator of kim il-sung and kim jong-il. the crime of knowledge about the private life of kim jong-il and releasing information about it to the general public, thus defaming the prestige of the leader. i had no knowledge about these facts when i was sent to prison camp. ... >> i was a close friend having had gone to the same school and college and one day i heard directly from her that she would be going to the special presidents number five. at bat time a new special residence five new they meant qassam -- if kim sung il [speaking korean] >> translator: [speaking korean] >> translator: at the time i was taken to a political prison can i have no idea why i was being incarcerated and there was in the summer of 1989 after i was released that i find out the reason why from the state security agent read the security agent said the following to me colin quote she was not the wife nor did she dare him a son. these were all rumors. if you mention anything about this again you will not be forgiven. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> i would like to talk briefly about my interrogation before i was sent to the political prison camp. on august 1st, 1970i was forced into a car by state security agents taken to a secret location where i was interrogated for two months by the unit called unit 312 for preliminary investigation in a state security investigation room to read under fear for two months i was told to write my entire life story and to include everything and leave out nothing, so i wrote on and on. in my riding i confessed and wrote about him coming over to my house and telling me she would be going to the special residence number five and also admitted people around me knew this information as well. >> [speaking korean] bixby seven after the investigations were overall october 1st 1970 my entire family and i, seven people in total were sent to the political prison camp. the person who committed the crime was labeled the conspirators were the ringleader of for the yanna torian of workforce association were labeled monk principal, also and this is how the criminals and prison camp for classified. we book about 3:city in the morning to go to work before:40 a.m. and the labor was from some of until sundown. mills had to be provided by ourselves to self-sufficiency. i saw countless prisoners contract the disease and suffer from diarrhea. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: after work there would be the fifer ideology meetings for the prisoners. those were unfortunate to be called by the security agents during these ideology meetings sent away in shackles were never seen again. the first manual labor was beyond anyone's imagination and in case of falling short of work goals the whole group was punished. there were so many dead bodies that i saw of their coming enough to fill the field. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: my three sons, one daughter father and mother died from starvation. there were no coffins so their bodies were ruled in a straw mat and buried. when my son was 9-years-old at the time in the river near the prison camps. my daughter was given away for adoption after hours release so that she could have a better life to lead to this day i do not know her whereabouts what she is alive or dead. my youngest son was publicly executed by firing squad for trying to is good north korea after his release and attempting to go to south korea in 1993 at the age of 23. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: my husband was sent to another political prison camp in a total and complete controls on july 18th, 1970, and to this day i do not know whether he is dead or alive, so my original family of eight people, currently only to have survived and successfully he escaped from north korea. myself and another son. the rest of my family, six people, have all died. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: my older brother, who was the killer of our family was a criminal in the army during the north korean war serving the third infantry and why on a mission for the commander, she was killed in battle at the age of 25. accordingly, our family received favors from my brothers x and kim il-sung and we lived will allow our family was sent to the political prison camp and as a way of feeling betrayed, i escapes from north korea. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: even after i was released from the political prison camp, i was classified as an antiregime action mary and suffered by the state security apparatus. i.e. state number triet feb first come in 2001 and entered south korea in november of 2003. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: in conclusion i would just like to see that in the political prison camps of north korea, it is a place where the prisoners will eat anything that flies, crawls or grows in the field. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: bye wasted nine years in the prime of my life in that hell hole of a place where even animals will turn away, turned their faces away. i lost all my family members and have lived a life of years, blood and hardship. please save the 23 million people of north korea living a life of misery, not unlike what i have suffered. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: even though i am now over 70-years-old, i will fight for the freedom of my people, my countrymen until all of my strength is expended to read this is the reason why i have lived so far and also my purpose and on that note i want to deeply thank again the members of this committee for your interest in the human rights situation of north korea, especially the political prison camps. thank you. >> thank you so much. the brutality that you, yourself, suffered in the loss of your family members, including your daughter, who as you said, was adopted obviously without your permission, you have no idea where she is, your husband, you have no idea where he is and the loss of your other family members, just underscores the brutality of kim il-jung and the fact that the west united states and any country that has any sense of compassion needs to speak out against this terrific abuse and this shouldn't be a second-tier issues of human rights abuses that are commonplace of north korea so we think you for making us further aware of the extreme who barbarity that you have been made to endure and your family. we will now hear from another who has suffered three decades in the gulag of and we look forward to hearing her testimony. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: hello i am an earthquake per specter in political prison camp number eight team in the province for 28 years. and in 2009 i.e. skate north korea and entered south korea through china, laos and thailand >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: in february of 1975, for reasons that were unknown to me at that time i was tried with my parents to the prison camp. i was 13 years of the time. during my incarceration at camp number 18i lost my grandmother, mother, brother and my husband. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: i found out after i was out of that hell on earth can't 18 why i was sent to prison camp, because my father had dissented during the south korean war but by then i had nowhere to go and complain that the situation. i would like to say that the term of north korea is a living hell for human beings, a place where people have committed so-called crimes percent and incarcerated as a group and forced to work emanuel slave labor -- manual slave labor. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: there are prison camps where people have been found guilty of being against for those resisting the regime are sent intel whereas in places like camp number 18 where i was incarcerated in besides political prisoners, those were guilty of economic crimes are sent along with family members and forced to work in coal mines >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: in camp number 18 where i was in prison the whole prison camp was encircled by a 13-foot high the electrified fence and trying to ease get through this over 3,000 volts of the electrified fencing was unimaginable. when i first entered the prison camp, we were told to memorize ten rules of the prison camp. i still remember it vividly because i remember it from such an early age one of the rules was that the prisoners were not supposed to know the reason for ending up in the prison camp and those caught violating this rule would be a relentlessly executed by a firing squad. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: the young people like me that in the that in the prison camp at a young age, we were given very rudimentary education, basic current language education and then when we turned 16 or 17 with exception everyone was set to decline and this goes without saying for the adults as well. we had to work 16 to 18 hour work days without rest or holidays and for food in our family of seven was provided only about 10 pounds of corn per month and this was supplemented by anything that we picked up from the ground, tree bark, grass, and that's what we ate, one meal a day, corn and the mixed grass we had to make for ourselves. >> if you could suspend for one brief moment. we are joined by the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee which justice issues and science, but is also the author of the international religious freedom act of 1998, and as we all know, north korea is a tier three countries and so congressman frank wolf can only say a brief minute. >> thank you. i want to thank you and the committee for having this hearing. i met with the witnesses earlier today. it was one of the most significant and moving testimony reports that i have ever heard, and i think certainly the state department should do everything they can quite frankly to bring about regime change in north korea. when this government falls, as it will fall the same way the east german government fell with regard to the berlin wall, the west will feel so guilty to know that it said nothing other than the hearings that the members here. they said nothing with regard to what takes place. this administration should do everything and lastly and with this. i think the church in the west to all of religious faith in the west should come together and support these people in every way that they can to see about the fact that hundreds of thousands are in these camps. it's totally unacceptable. as anyone within the voice can hear this, can follow this hearing ought to be advocating it. so i want to again, thank you and the other members and thank the witnesses for coming by my office to and i'm on my way to a 4 o'clock but i was just moved to come by because what i heard was just so powerful. with that, mr. chairman, i yield back to this too terminable, thank you very much. if you could continue. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] i was plagued with ponder by the time i entered the prison camp until the day that i was released, and by one which was to just eat one bowl of white fleiss for one meal and after i became an adult and after lifetimes of working at coal mine walking to and from work i would look for anything to eat and it became a habit to scrape or pluck anything the was green and make soup whether it was from a tree bark or grass. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: i cannot even begin to describe how many people suffered and died because of starvation in the prison camp and how many people were killed without reason for not listening to the 40's or not showing enough repentance through a public execution by execution by firing squad through public execution by firing squad their bodies were riddled and i saw countless bodies that ended up like this. the was a time i saw the bodies of people who were killed by firing squad rolled up in straw mats and carried away on carts, and i said to myself even dogs will not die so pitifully. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: in this place where human lives were worth less this is where my brother and husband died also. their deaths were classified as due to accidents, but they were intentional deaths carried out in the atmosphere of the prison camps, where nothing was normal. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: and as a result of working declines for over 12 years, i contacted black lung and faced death many times, but in place of my mother who passed away before me i vowed to survive and live on and look out after my siblings, my remaining siblings and that devotion is what allowed me to survive that hell. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: and my siblings are still incarcerated at camp number 18. my brother and sister. in december of 1974, before our family was sent off to prison camp number 18, my father was pulled away by the state security bureau never to be heard from again. i do not know what happened to him to this day. even at this moment as i speak, there are over 10,000 -- 20,000 people who are in camp 18 without knowing the reason why. people who are dying of abuse and lack of rights at this very moment. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: and this is not just happening in camp number 18, but i would like to say that this is the suffering and sadness that 23 million north korean citizens are going through and suffering and experiencing right now. not only that, but besides the human rights violations going on in north korea is now the cruelty end of misery inflicted on the refugee women have the state north korea into china for the terrible situation of human trafficking happening in different places. after nearly is getting def coming out of of korea and into china, and then becoming victims of human and sexual trafficking, i can say with authority that the tragic situation of the north must be told again and again in the international community. i, myself, was sold for different times in four different cities in china and the indescribable suffering that these women go through and china being sold like commodity still keeps me awake at night. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: please ended the existence of such a society and make it into a place humans can live as people. please, let the people without any rights in north 311 freedom and happiness. please get rid of the political prison camps and please tell those who do not know about freedom of freedom is about. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: i sincerely hope my earnest these will be delivered to the united states congress come to the united states government and the people of america. i also want to thank the honorable members of this committee to hear today who have made it possible to speak as well as the defense foundation. thank you. >> without a doubt, your message has been heard, and thank you for sharing what can only be described as the enormous suffering that you experienced being sold into sexual slavery, the last of family members, and so there will be positive consequences in your testimony. we will work hard to promote human rights. i can assure you of that. before going to mr. scholte have the combating of his and that 2011, so i will leave briefly but without objection i would like to point out basically -- key will take the committee now. >> this is a picture of the camp that she was in. we will now hear from our final witness. good afternoon mr. payne. thank you for inviting me to speak about the human rights situation in north korea and about the apparent increase in the amount of the information getting into the country. it is an honor and a privilege to have the opportunity to discuss these issues with you today. mr. payne, i would like to begin by informing you that i will be presenting a brief summary of the views included in my prepared statement. >> thank you. without objection. >> after the emotional comprehensive testimony and after the hard pricking testimony ms. kim hye-sook, there is barely anything i can have on the human-rights situation of north korea. the human-rights situation in north korea remains abysmal according to experts and testimony by the recent north korean defectors there is no evidence that the human-rights sedition and north korea has improved as the regime proceeds with steps towards leadership succession. on the contrary, it appears the border crackdown aimed at preventing the north koreans from defecting to china has intensified, and the political prisoner camp population has been on the increase. in may of this year, amnesty international released satellite imagery and new testimony shedding light on the horrific conditions of north korea's political prisoner camps. according to the organization, the prisoner population detained at such camps is up to 200,000, and it compares in the latest satellite photographs of satellite imagery from 2001 indicates a considerable increase in the scale of the camps. moving on to the flow of information and getting into north korea, although officially all personal radios must have a fixed dial and be registered with state security offices, programming by stations including voice of america, radio free asia and broadcasters based in south korea may have a listenership of around 40% in north korea. the number of radio's smuggled from china has been on the increase. the north korean authorities continue to attempt to jam the foreign broadcasting and it's a serious limitation in their efforts as jamming is energy intensive and north korea is experiencing in chemnick energies shortages. in the recent years, we have found out that there has been a significant increase in the amount of information entering north korea. this development is the result of the marketization that has taken place in that country. such is by no means and intended top-down reform program, but rather the function of state failure. small and informal markets provide ordinary people a coping mechanism that enables them to survive. during the marketization of north korea, supply chains have developed from china to north korea's defense capital city of pyongyang and in pt plater, ct rahman tvd and some drivers have been entering north korea. statistical data, including the the 2010 survey of north korean refugees and travelers by the broadcasting board of governors indicates 27% of respondents have listened to foreign radio. 48% have come in contact with foreign dvds and other material while 27% have watched foreign tv. information is also being passed from one member to the next along such supply chains. it appears that the korean wheat consisted of south korea soap opera and musical, exceptionally popular asia and beyond has also reached north korea. according to japan's one member of a group of nine north koreans who recently sailed for five days before being picked up off the west coast of japan one a week ago on september 13th this gentleman a squid fishermen said that he was inspired to leave his home by south korean selwa press. in january, 2008, the egyptian companies telecom holding was awarded a license to establish a 3g mobile network in north korea when it launched in december, 2008, the audio link had 5,300 subscribers. in its half year earnings report for january, june, 2011 published on august 10th they stated the number of subscribers in north korea had reached 660,000. separate from the expansion of the network, citizens of north korea have also been using a chinese cellphone smuggled across the border into north korea. we have indication that the intent to launch 3g internet service by the apple ipad in pyongyang this fall by a special card. nevertheless, internet access is likely to continue to be restricted to foreign residents and those close to the regime. there are also those north koreans that possess computers not connected to the web and their estimated to represent about 3% of the entire population. based on the data collected with interviews in the north korean defectors and proven track record of success in winning the tautological confrontation during the cold war, radio broadcasting will continue to be one of the few media available to grant the people north korea access to information from the outside world. computers not connected to the internet, some drives from the disease from a cd rom's and m p3 players have become increasingly available although access to such devices is still relatively limited. efforts to increase the flow of the information into north korea should take into account the increasing availability of such vehicles. i wish to thank the subcommittee and the staff for the opportunity to testify before you today. and i will now be pleased to try to answer any questions that he might have. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. let me once again thank each of the witnesses. your testimony is certainly very compelling. we of course have heard and we try to keep up with the situation of north korea, but it certainly brings it home whenever we have a hearing and to hear especially from individuals who have lived through the horror of this regime, and of course we appreciate our experts from the defense foundation and the committee for human rights in north korea. perhaps to either one of you who are working with the organizations that deal with that, mr. scarlatoiu, i have that closely >> the special envoy for north korean human rights ambassador robert kaine has said that the united states government would engage in and in that dialogue on human rights issues at the six-party talks. the six-party talks are at an impasse and in the absence of the six-party talks, first of all what do each of you feel that the six-party talks have achieved in the past and whether there were any real gains for word first of all and second, if indeed you feel that it is ann password there is really not a real effort on the part of north korea would with the obama administration consider employee for the human rights dialogue with pyongyang? so whether the talks past and the have been going on a bit through the several administrations come and if their scrapped in absence of that could there be anything else or should we continue, if you would like to comment. >> well, first of all, i think that regarding the six-party talks, this is an effort by the bush administration to rein in the nuclear ambitions, and they made the decision that they would just focus on the nuclear issue and not entered as any of these concerns to kick the human rights concerns down the road. we can tell the history that north koreans are brilliant at manipulating the talks and using the talks to gain aid and support and make promises they never intend to keep. they did the same thing to bill clinton during the framework and i think before president clinton could be excused from that because he was dealing with a new dictator when he was president, but the bush administration i think should have known better. they should have known the history of how this regime is and what you see during this talk the result has been north korea has developed nuclear weapons, it's a reactive and the weapons and the exact purpose was never realized, but at the same time, millions of north koreans have died, and so i think that talking with says regime is useless. the only use these talks to extract concessions and support and legitimize the regime. i think instead we need to take a new approach. i think that president obama is in a unique position to do that. i see that we should make human-rights the number one policy of our government. i think that we should reach out to the north korean people and i think president obama should be talking about the fact that i think we should say we want to give north korea as much aid as the need so that people are not starving, but we want to be able to see that it is consumed. i think that we should be talking about the fact that we want to help the people. we want to improve conditions and we would like to see the international red cross people to go to prison camps. number triet denies the have camps refine it, let's let the independent agency like the international red cross go to these camps. and i think that we need to be focusing on the human rights issues and policies that at the same time, do everything we can to support the kind of things the defectors themselves are doing in the radiobroadcasting because the impact the free north korean radio has that has been on the internet broadcast in 2004 and then went on the shortwave in 2006, the impact that it had was amazing. it set the pace for all the broadcasters because it was the defectors themselves and as you know they were raised to believe that south korea, the united states cost the korean war. they are brainwashed with stuff we would think is completely ridiculous, but they believe that. so when the north koreans themselves are talking in broadcasting these views and opinions and to north korea, the north korean can't can't dismiss them. so it's a tremendous impact and we have to do everything we can to reach out with that message to the north korean people and use the defectors especially. >> the reason why nothing has been happening on the six-party talks for a while now is that north korea has refused to act as a responsible member of the international community. north korea has continued to proceed with the nuclear developments. north korea engaged in very serious provocations' last year in march it launched a torpedo attack on the south korean that killed the sailors in that attack as it has already been been mentioned as you mentioned on november 23rd, north korea showed of the south korean territory the island and this attack resulted in the military and civilian casualties. we have already heard about assassins sent to kill one of the very active north korean defectors and south korea a few weeks back. the deep concerns about and the alleged assassination plot targeting the defense minister of south korea cut and before the most high-profile north korean defector castaway last year, late last year, but only a few months before that we've heard about the plot that was stored on him for assassination. that being said, north korea has also continued to press its own people. north korea has continued to refuse to abide by the international obligations they are supposed to abide by given its the party to the international covenant on civil to the kosovo and political life and economic, social and cultural life in the convention against all forms of discrimination against women, the conventional the rights of the child, and as a u.n. member stated it's supposed to be bound by the u.n. declaration of human rights. as to whether the human rights should be on the agenda, it is a firm belief of the committee for human rights in north korea that human-rights, the improvement of the human rights of korea should be a top of our priorities and personally, as i hope that one day we will see the complete irreversible and very dismantlement of mr. rhea's nuclear program. i also hope that we will see the complete irreversible and verifiable dismantlement of the political prisoner camps as well >> thank you very much. what me ask you, ms. kim hye-sook, there is -- and i know that your experiences in north korea was years ago and you have a very compelling testimony. i'm just curious to know in your days as a young person and as a child, as a teenager growing up, what type of society, what type of programs does the government impose on children it's supposed to be a time of life when people are happy, they are growing, they are learning. to your best recollection, if you can explain what is life like for a young child and a young teenager and young adult and growing up in north korea? today if you can sort of transpose your experiences. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: in answer to the question the liberation from japan of 1945 and until the 70's, north korea is actually a little bit better, was better than south korea in terms of the economic situation, and as for myself, when i was young i went to school and i attended at the university of fine arts and i majored in her dance and i learned under the teachings of a very well-known dancer and before i went to the prison camp i could say with assurance i was happy, but my happiness quotient to speak was very high in terms of living in the north korean society. >> thank you -- [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: before i was sent to the can buy a life where i had no worries about food or eating. i went to school, i live a normal life but because i was sent to the prison camp at such an early age that's all i can share in terms of my experience in relation to your question. >> thank you. >> another question that i'm just curious about as we know in world war ii there was the question of the brothels that were created in korea, and i wonder whether it was in the north of korea or was that primarily in korea itself if anyone recalls as you may know we are still working on the a policy of the government of japan. there's been some apologies but this has been an initial five house played to to the to -- plea to the world since that time and i wonder whether it was prevalent throughout korea. >> [speaking korean] >> translator: my answer to you, sir, is before the liberation of 1945, even in the north of the peninsula there were instances are places where these women were her based in north korea and i believe that even if this issue were to be addressed with the japanese government, we would not be getting a satisfactory answer in regarding your question, sir. >> i will yield to the gentle lady from california. >> thank you very much mr. chair. i would like to follow on a question that mr. payne said about your childhood until you went into the camp, and you said that until the 70's and i realize that is when you went into the camps, but did things drastically change in north korea? and when? >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> to answer the question colin the propaganda was set in place between the liberation, years of liberation and until the korean war those years were known as the best years in terms of the efforts and prosperity of north korea, and after the korean war there were various economic plans instituted to try to help the economy and help people who live better. but in 1987, in the late 80's after the soviet union collapsed and after the help from that part of the region that's what brought on the change in terms of the economics and the downtrend the conditions for the people in north korea. >> first of all, let me also just thank you sharing your testimony. i think it's very important that people in this country here learn what is going on in north korea because i don't think much is known here about what is happening there. and the pan and the suffering that you described, the life of your -- loss of your family members, not knowing where your children or your husband are, i think it is in a measurable amount of pain, and i appreciate you taking the time and sharing it with us. i think it is especially important because the need for foreign aid and for assistance has said, i don't want to pronounced your name, ms. kim hye-sook, when you talked about the need for there to the foreign assistance and food and all in times we are talking about cutting back so i think the message is critically important. but you were saying that you thought that we shouldn't have discussions, negotiations with north korea, but at the same time we should do what we can to, you know, deliver food and other things the population would need. by understand the communication part, but how would we get aid to people? >> if you could answer first that would be great ms. soon and ms. sook. [inaudible conversations] >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> i would like to say that the world as supporting north korea because they hear stories of people starving and suffering but as a defector, i believe the regime of north korea should be completely isolated and that's the only way to change the regime and unless number three at optus the market economy and changes drastically with the country is run, no change will come and as a defector, i would like to say that we are helping the regime to continue to be isolated and stop the aid that has been given to the regime. >> i agree except i was just making the point that if we are going -- i agree in a substantial amount of assistance but only if we can stay to the point of consumption because if we send any amount of assistance to north korea it will be diverted. when you talk to defectors than ever saw food aid and when you talk to defectors that serve another three they will tell you the world food program rolls into town, delivers rice to these families right after they leave the army comes back and takes it back. as was testified years ago about how she had gone to an orphanage and they handed out cookies and the kids just sat there with the cookies waiting for somebody to come back and take it away so of the diversion has been absolute, and because of that i think that is the kind of message the we can send that would be a very powerful message for the positive propaganda, which is that we are very much concerned about the starvation and political prisoner camps and the situation in north korea. we want to help you. we hear about these stories. we want to help you but we want to be sure that we are actually helping the people and we're only going to give that aid if we know that we can stay there. even from the very beginning with the famine first started, north korea put six stipulations on the food. they actually didn't want -- i never heard of this before, that -- i never heard about this before. in a challenging on this i don't think in any situation where there was a country where there was starvation or the country that was the intended recipient of the demanded that the aid delivers couldn't speak their language. i don't think that's ever happened in any place but north korea because usually to go to a country to deliver aid you are desperate for somebody that speaks the language but that speaks volumes from the very beginning of their intention to divert eight so because of the difficulty of preventing that's why we should only provide aid if we can be there at the point of the consumption. i can tell you all kinds of stories that if we were to go into the orphanages oliver we have to make sure those babies get that formula because actions against hunter did that and it ended up in pyongyang in the markets and of those babies were given watered-down goat's milk when they showed up late to the current leader to find out the tons of baby formula they delivered, that is just one example, but then in the second point i was making is that we should be looking at creative ways to get information and also through the north koreans that have defected that are sending in remittances to the country for helping to support their families. >> thank you very much. >> i will hold any other questions i have until later time. mr. trash. >> -- mr. chairman. >> thank you in ranking member pain for leading the committee. i had to leave because a bill of mine on the autism was on the floor and did it pass thankfully. let me ask a question if i could with regards to a few years back in 2002i chaired a hearing on the north korean human rights, one of several and we had a doctor, former medical doctor inside of north korea who actually was given a huge award by the dictatorship for his medical expertise and the fact that he helped cure a lot of people but he also then told the truth about the human rights situation, and he said that they are using food as a weapon, talking about a dictatorship for and against their own people they are treating the genocide, and i think we have to care as an international community we have to intervene. would you say that was in 2002 that the international community i heard in the opening comments that you had criticism that bush didn't focus on human rights during -- did pass the north korean human rights act and was one of the co-sponsors of that and it's an excellent bill and all of us strongly support it. has that legislation lived up to its promise, or reemphasizing sufficiently in our dialogue or whatever it is of a dialogue with the north koreans? >> guice been very disappointed after all the hard work that we did on the human-rights act. i've been disappointed right from the very start. the bush administration said we welcome these tools or helping on this issue but then they never really used the tools. one thing it did help i know the radiobroadcasting is expanding support which i believe was a result of that legislation and was a huge thing that happened that some important and also helping the independent broadcasters. the other thing too is the special envoy position. i think it's very significant that president obama has made it very clear the special envoy robert king will be a part of the discussions on north korea. that was in the case during the bush administration. it was cut out so i think that president obama is taking greater advantage of that legislation to try to do more with the north koreans act right by the very nature that he's elevated the ambassador king's position. on the comment you made about north korea using food as a weapon that is absolutely true. it uses food as a weapon against its own people and they have an apartheid side of system in north korea where people are classified based on the regime on the eletes and then you have what they consider the way during class which is a class that isn't considered to be to the regime and then you've got the hostile class and if you are in that elite you may get white rice but if you are down on that system you may never see any your whole life you may get corn meal so the thing that has happened with the food is because of the breakdown in the public distribution system which is how the regime will reward people for the apartheid system based on loyalty that system is broken down and that is why the markets are so significant that you have over 200 markets and these are just the ones we know by satellite, the ones we know by satellite. so there's probably many more are markets but some people are surviving they are chilling and the the to -- trading and selling and buying them on these markets. >> either or both can just comment. on the use of torture and the gulags we have had testimony before this committee in the past that christians and people of faith are even more selective out for repression especially in the women who are pregnant or often forcibly aborted in an absolutely crude -- they get beaten and around the abdomen and then miss carey so it is a horrible thing. we even have a testimony for its being put on how the women and soldiers were gulag security guards jumping on the boards on the abdomen of the pregnant women. did you experience torture -- you mentioned how both of you saw the littered bodies everywhere, but people were treated like animals. you said that a society where the whole country is a prison, society where does that the escape for cost and the prison and those that had the state become lost in the international community to the society where trust the and virginity which is more precious than life is sold teeth cheaper than the cheapest of things of course talking about the human trafficking. if you could speak to the use of torture and these terrible and despicable atrocities being committed by the dictatorship. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> in answer to your question, during the two months of interrogation i was stuck in a room with no calendar, no clocks, a black hole for two months and for somebody to come out of that and not go crazy is america and that's what i experienced and in terms of dealing with my experience there i saw violence. i was injured with my shoulder during work and my fingers were injured during work and in terms of torture that's what i experienced during my prison experience at the prison camp. >> thank you. >> [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> regarding my experience in the qu >> regarding my experience in the question, in some of the drawings i displayed what i went through, but at the prison camp number 18 there was no paved road, and there were many times when the prison guards would force prisoners would stop the prisoners walking back and forth within the camp they would stop these prisoners forced them to open their mouths and these prisoners from the prison guards would stick to -- spit into the open mouth as prisoners and told them if you swallow it he will not be beaten but if you throw up or resist you will be beaten. she experienced that torture during her 20 years there. and in 2005, in 2005 after she was released from the campus she went into china and during the detention period when she was going through that, she saw an instance where the women who were also tortured were forced to repeat sitting and standing up so that hiding the uterus would fall out and the other contraband the prisoners were trying to find, so that is about the extent of the torture she witnessed from her time in north korea. >> mr. scarlatoiu, if they are intensifying as they take steps towards leadership succession, could you speak further on that issue and perhaps some of the issues that you have that suggest that? >> mr. chairman, i should tell you that our organize asia and has published one quite well known report on the political prisoner camps in north korea called hidden gulags that happened in 2003 and i am in the process of putting together a second edition. towards that goal we have collected testimony by at least about 60 former inmates of political prisoner camps. the difference between now and then is that we have testimony from some of the guards. we have better satellite imagery. based on such testimony, we seem to see intensified political repression. we seem to see a crackdown along the border with china, and all indications are that the new nuclear power been created around the service on the gulf kim jong il is not proposed any type of reform. we have all indications in putting violent provocations against south korea while in military provocations discussion of assassins, intensified human rights violations in north korea. we have all the evidence that we are dealing with very hard liners. it's been a glut may ask a question -- i read a book some years back about of the self-reliance, religion and the cult of personality, the deification of kim jong il and kim il-sung before hand, and it was a very detailed heavily footnoted booklets how they brainwashed the people of north korea, and i'm wondering if all of you might speak to this and especially from the two kims, how did the overcome the brainwashing effort? do people in north korea really regard kim jong il as that? there was a national geographic peace recently and i watched with great interest, i watched it more than once, and a doctor went to north korea to do some surgery on the eye and he was having phenomenal success teaching other doctors and practitioners and north korea to do so, but i was astonished how the people who have been helped, especially at a group meeting, were looking at a picture of kim jong il and sinking him and getting on their knees and for shipping him and the intensity of it was quite unnerving frankly. .. god? [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: i would like to answer your question by saying in north korea from basicallyort childbirth fromh kindergarten oh little children are being -- brainwashed into believing kim jong-il and others are capable of superhuman accomplishments and kim il-sung are capable of words to praise, not enough for us to praise can il-sung and kim jong il that there is no words to think otherwise in north korea. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: and that the people in north korea -- the situation where their minds have been replaced with the brainwashed mind and there is no freedom to travel to a country where you need special color-coded passes to travel to a particular paste into niche activism site for hansard feet are part of the people so they cannot travel or be free of that society. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: two into your question, from my experience as soon as you are born in north korea, you -- the phrases is thank you, great leader. one might say about that to give you is in thousand nine, there is a woman with a young daughter, a young child who accompanied me and the chinese family that was helping us this starving child food. the first words out of the chance not when she received the food with thank you, cheerleader, kim jong il. this goes to the extent of the brainwashing from the day you're born until. thank you cheerleader, kim jong il. those words are just a brain washing into people's minds. >> just a few final questions -- did you want to -- >> that's one of the things about this whole idea. there is a woman i met who has been a defect dirt and she taught philosophy come as i casually asked her, who is your favorite philosopher? and she is like i only taught kim il-sung in marxism for the first years of my ear and then for the last, kim jong il. i said when you let to south korea, did you pursue philosophy? she said no, i was afraid the brain was too twisted to understand. the fact that she admitted that proved that it was sent. but her brain had opened up. she was actually studying north korean studies to take your way to help help her country. i wanted to say one of the programs that treat north korea is trying to do is we are reaching out to christian churches to help us, but they want to do a program explaining the concept of what we think of religious faith of self-sacrifice and helping others versus what they are brainwashed to believe to try to help north koreans open their mind to understanding the concepts of what we value in the western world, which is serving others and helping others is the complete opposite of everything they are taught. they are the servants of the regime and that's one thing important because the defect or sell how to articulate those kinds of things. there is an organization called the coalition for north korea appeared when an solitaire is a coalition north korean women, most of whom were the answer trafficking. when they first came to south korea, the whole concept of human rights was completely alien to them. you believe that the socialist societies try to say women are equal appeared in north korea, women are treated horribly. so this is something they are doing to restore the assignments and teach them the value they are assuming teams cannot tell you they are as women. >> mr. chairman, i think pirtle and birth are dictators such as the personality depends by far and large i'm denying the knowledge of alternative economic, social and political systems. you have mentioned that christians are subject to harsh punishment. we have also come across those forcibly pictured it from china have come in contact with christian missionaries for south korea's space particularly harsh punishment amounting to public executions. most likely come of the main reason beyond that is that christianity and south korea present alternative systems. one great advantage of eastern europeans have primarily through public rod casting they are receiving from the outside world was that it was clear to them that the capitalist liberal democracy is a west were clearly the opportunity now to focus on improving the information to persuade not only the overwhelming majority were so oppressed, but also why not the elites of north korea, that there is life after the regime and alternatives are available. >> let me just make a note here to access the administration in hearings and other meetings to put china on human trafficking, not only because of the horrific rise in sex trafficking in republican china, but also because they north korean women thinks she has gotten to relative safety by crossing the border, she invariably sold into human trafficking a chinese government doesn't let the single singer to mitigate pain and crack down on the traffickers who got the border looking for women pleading for that country. they also represent a signatory to the refugee convention because they send back men and women who are most likely to be incarcerated in the gulags if not executed for leaving without permission. so china bears a huge responsibility for its enabling and complicity in the crimes of pyongyang. let me also ask a final question. how would you rate the international community's response including the u.s., europe and especially the united states. there's a high commission of human rights. there's a whole wrapper char system, but there's also the human rights council, which was supposed to speak truth to power regardless of the consequences and whole countries to account. now, i frequently, when it was the commission and not the council, which asked the council are commissioned to raise human rights in north korea and frankly there've been revolutions in the past, but it has struck me, flake pro forma resolutions. they have low expectations, no sense of shock or dismay over what kim jong il has been doing and his fellow dictators in pyongyang, but there is a sense that it's an obligatory chastisement and no one expects anything to change because of those low expectations, that country in no way is held to account. so is the international community so incredibly passive when it comes to what is equivalent to what the did in its gulags to its own people into jewish and other scum which is going on current day in north korea. if you can speak to that and find a way, i was in south korea recently, spoke to a number of lawmakers and others in seoul. i was surprised maybe i'm wrong and my impression, to glean from that experience that many people in south korea don't have the kind of understanding that the two camps here have brought to this committee. and that is what goes on in the gulags and the huge repression that is removed to tune by the dictatorship. the young people kind of trivialize in south korea. is that true? or is that a false impression i picked up on that trip? they know it's there, but it is not as bad and they just don't seem to take it at face value for the huge atrocity that it is. for any of you who would like to speak to that. >> chairman smith regarding your first question, at the committee for human rights in north korea, we are very familiar with the work and the reporting done by the u.n. special rapporteur's on north korea. both of the current repertory, professor dauber time and the previous from thailand are very dedicated scholars in very good human beings who have worked very hard to put together. >> testified before a committee to pass. >> said they done extraordinary work to shed light on the atrocities and violations happening in north korea. i think that organizations such as ours have a duty to inform the international community to conduct research to publish on the human rights violations happening in north korea and to engage in robust public information campaigns to inform the public here in the united states and beyond and also to inform north koreans have the right but they have that are being violated with such. >> i was going to say that you mentioned china. and i would say there is a correlation between the ability of the u.n. to do anything in china stating those efforts. what you mentioned about the refugees, does says the most vulnerable of human rights crisis going on today. it can be solved overnight at china simply followed the treaties that is signed. the u.n. has an office in beijing. these refugees have a place to go. the only refugees they know and the world that makes north korea unique that has a place to go because they are citizens of the south korean constitution and the access we will take some year and people are willing to resettle them. so there is no reason for china to continue this. brutal policy reputation has caused 80% of north korean women to be traffic in this basically modern-day slave markets. i believe you have a hearing tomorrow. one of the pressures on this is the fact that china has a shortage of women because they have been murdering unborn baby girls all these years. they've had this one child policy and that afflicted the shortage of women, so that's why you have north korean women that are vulnerable and been sold. china is the reason we can't get more action at the united nations because they actually block when everyone realized that north korea had caused the death of the south korean sailors, china was the one that was depressing that action on that. as long as you have tremendous influence in the u.n. but has evolved in perpetrating these kinds are happening in north america come you're not going to get any action by the united nations. i know you wanted to say something, too. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: i would like to have that north korea, currently the kim jong il regime committed by the regime is the worst in the world in. to totally isolate and the best way to go about prosecuting crimes against humanity to report into the international criminal court. it would do a good job of leading an international movement to make this -- to bring about this work of bringing kim jong il to the criminal court. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: i want to say as long as kim jong il exists, the people suffering will continue. at that to say once again that our earnest desires of the united states to take a lead in helping the world focus on the important issue of human rights issue and isolating that regime to not provide aid or help that would only go towards keeping the regime alive. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: i also would like to point out as i am sitting here before a media and for the congressman here that regarding food aid, i would like to plant a younger sister and brother who are still in the prison camp certainly all the food aid that has been given is not going to dad has not been sent to them with the people who need it the most common is starving and prison would need the food aid for most, but it is only going to be a leap, to the military and security apparatus and feeding them and empowering them, only giving them more life, more power to continue the abuse that i drew in maturing as you can see on display here. >> also about the attitude inside korea, right? you asked also about the attitude in south korea? >> especially the young people. >> i definitely think they might want to have a comment about it. >> it's almost a sense of disbelief to the crew tee of kim jong il. this is so important as the media who has downplayed it -- >> that's a huge issue. that's so important because you would think the country that should care the most has been the slowest to respond. the reason for that is during the years of the kim government and the roh government, they actually banned information to be reported about north korea because they have the sunshine policy, basically an engagement policy. and the award-winning documentary, soul train, which is popular today that was produced by americans that the refugee crisis in china. north koreans escaping in the whole situation was banned from being shown in south korea by the government. so there was a suppression of the horrors that were going on. they can tell you stories -- he wanted to speak before the south korean assembly, but wasn't able to do it. and what has happened now -- she was going to speak before this. they can share that with you, but what happened was what the provocations that it happened against south korea, by north korea, unprovoked attacks at 10 a weekend and i'm very pleased to see a lot of young people trying to this issue. have gone to a conference in 2000 to come an international conference in seoul, which people like this where people will speak in their students protesting against the conference. but that has changed a lot. young people are really getting john to the issue. it's been two very difficult to move the hearts and soul of korean lawmakers. they still have not passed the korean act, which has been done by japan and the united states and that has been the real source of contention. >> it brings to mind after world war ii, eisenhower said do not burn down the concentration camps because there were some germans who were disbelief that he was real and it seems to me when it's an actual policy of the government to suppress the truth, there is something inherently wrong with that because it creates a distortion, a gross caricature of what pyongyang is actually doing. i hope this hearing and it will be followed by additional hearings will further the information. i was telling -- and conversations, complete information about what i had read and learn from hearings and from and from terrorists who hide in my friends who were south korean, with whom i was meeting was met with disbelief, as if somehow i was exaggerating for engaging in some kind of hyperbole when the truth on the ground, as you have so ably witness to is even worse than what we can imagine in terms of the cruelty and mistreatment. >> by something else i need to share with you. in october i was at a balloon launch and i was with ken sung min, north korea signed and we were getting ready to do a balloon lunch. there is a former north korean who served in the military and he was so upset because they were south koreans trying to stop the balloon lines and saying they were pro-kim il-sung and almost had tears in his eyes. he said i came from that country. how can they deny the horrible things i've seen? i remember him saying we don't want to get in a confrontation. i said something like i know how you feel. i thought, i don't know how he feels, that he could have gone through these horrible things and then have people be denying it and trying to stop them from doing something to reach out to people suffering. >> translator: [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: of ms. kim would like to read what she said conscious about the people in south korea, the young people to the politicians not fully knowing or understanding or appreciation of situation north korea, she wholeheartedly concurs with that statement. because of the strong presence of the last days and the pro-north korean elements in society, mrs. kim believes the peninsula is not ready for unification. south korea is not ready to be unified and she would again like to ask for the united states to take the lead in increasing knowledge and awareness about the situation in north korea and hope that other nations to be able to do this. [speaking korean] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: and there are 23,000 north and korea and also a tf bat north korean set is better all over the world. if there's any sort of encouragement, financial help given to us, we'll stop at nothing and dedicate our very lives to bring about change and the regime in the korea. you can trust me when i say that. >> well, miss dane, i think you think about the left is truly enabling by either suppressing for denying that these atrocities are occurring, that makes you complicit in these crimes against humanity. i would hope that clear thinking people come in newspapers and other media in south korea were just tell the truth about what is going on in north korea because the truth is liberating. i would also add my endorsement to what you said about kim jong il and others being held to account for genocide at the international criminal court. they have committed barbaric crimes. and while there are some u.n. individuals who have spoken out, there has been no holding to account in any meaningful way. so i asked colin endorsement he said. >> thank you very much. i just had a quick question and might make a quick comment. with the prospect of the anticipation that kim jong il believes would take over a horrible prospect, what do you see the consequences and am like that happening? [inaudible conversations] [speaking korean] [speaking korean] >> translator: mrs. kim believes that kim jong il will never be the true leader, but if he were to become the next leader, mrs. kim believes that the areas a chance that he might open up and reform the country from her point of view in her opinion. >> thank you very much. i just want to comment and i think that an separated country like we see in korea, the fact that many instances the truths are cast from the people in the south, the total truth and it's difficult to know whose responsibility, the government, the press, and is it deliberate? one thing that usually happens in divided countries as beside eastern and western europe although you can't compare to eastern europe totally certainly not to north korea, but there is a strong move toward reunification as just a natural nationalistic move to reunite countries that were once united. and so, i could possibly understand why some of these younger people would be striving for unification, trying to of course have a change -- a regime change in the north. so i think it's just kind of normal nationalism, especially a country that may have felt that it has been, you know, abused or exploited by world wars and things of that nature. the other thing i remember clearly as i travel to eastern europe in the late 60s and i went to poland and germany and russia with eastern europeans and saw especially in poland, photos and news reels of the films taken inside of warsaw, with a warsaw at uprisings. and these were young adults my age at the time who could not believe how brutal their parents were when they were leaving the not see regime. they were talking in their own language, but i could kind of understand what the internal discussion was going on about in almost disbelief. so i think that as we move forward, we'll have to work with educating people to overcome some of these natural things. i also think that we should try to become even more active in the human rights council. there have been some progress made because of before the u.s. joined the council, when it was the committee before and then the council, issues like what is happening in syria, the brutality of bashir on his people, do some of the other issues would never ever be raised. and so i think sense because the u.s. has raised the issue scum and they to deal with them and that's why it's important for us to be in the room said that there could be answers when our allies are criticized for resolutions continually come criticizing them. we cannot now say, wait a minute, let me give you the other point of view. i do hope those agencies will also be strengthened as they move and then of course i guess not being part of the bronze statues, and makes us a little less significant in the icc, where we have difficulty pushing for indictments for war criminals who should be indicted and the cases should be raised. finally, i'd like to say that really commending the south korean government, several years ago i visited one of my hospitals they are that the south korean government does, probably the best hospital in sub-saharan africa just about. and they did it because they were appreciative of the ethiopian soldiers to fight in the korean war. and actually, most stunning is that for those veterans who were still alive who serve, they have been paying pensions to these ethiopian soldiers ever since the end -- i don't know exactly if it started right at the end of the war, but for decades and those that are still alive received a month away regular stipend from the government of korea. so i think if some of the goodwill in southern korea could kind of work its way out to the north, that would be a positive statement. >> thank you, chair for calling this important meeting. >> just to conclude, i'd like to ask unanimous consent that the testimony of kim sung min, director of free north korea be made part of the record. >> about objections to what are. >> await us to revise the extended remarks and make one comment with a related issue. and i to comment on receipt comports of the part tensioners from south korea to china. as is well known, they are persecuted in china and not forcibly return them to china what they were certainly face persecution. south korea should find appropriate means within the korean legal system in international conventions on torture and refugees that is ratified 2% these pyongyang practitioners to remain in south korea. i would note on thursday, the subcommittee will hear testimony. it will be the 30th hearing on human rights abuses in china. it is entitled china's one child policy, the government's massive crime against women and unborn babies. i mention this especially in light is essential to you and others. this and ask you between woodchopper policy, the dearth of females in the prc. estimates range from an excess of 100 million missing girls in china so that when north korean women make their way over the border, the traffickers are waiting to sell them into modern-day slavery and sex trafficking and china has not only not lifted a finger to stop and china has not only not lifted a finger to stop it but enabled it. it is attributable in part, may be large part to the policy we will hear from two victims of forced abortion who will tell their story. the tianment square activist who founded no child -- i want to thank this effective group of witnesses for shedding light on the egregious human rights abuses of kim jong il and thank you for bearing witness to the truth. we need to do more than we have done that goes where subcommittee and executive branch and the free world. and i want to thank all of our witnesses especially the two women who made their way to the u.s. who have come long-distance, suffered, lost loved ones for speaking truth to a very totalitarian power. i would like to give the last word to witnesses -- >> we are having at noon on thursday september 22nd approach test calling on people wherever you are in the world to go to the chinese embassy to protest repatriation of refugees that people are delivering. so far we have 25 cities in 13 countries participating. >> mr. chairman, i will tell you in addition to one report i mentioned we are working on on political prisoner camps in north korea we're also working on a report on circulation of information inside north korea and we will be happy to share these reports as soon as they are published. >> we will disseminate it widely among members of congress so thank you. the hearing is adjourned and thank you very much. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible of physicians] inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> we are not doing that as a matter of substance but there is -- we don't do nuclear energy. we might get language on another bill, motions that we could put on the floor for being clear as a legislative tool. >> publicly support -- the ability -- [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> to the point of massive annihilation, we need to be given the time. my first two trips to moscow and when read, we simultaneously were engaged in the military so i think there needs to be much more balance in how we promote our foreign policy. human-rights need to be elevated to at least an equal basis of consideration. [inaudible conversations] >> i have known him for 20 years. i hope -- he assures me he is for human-rights. the only reason he is not here today -- i will ask him directly. how much emphasis, be specific, what has he raised, he is obviously a point man for the obama administration. as soon as he can arrange his schedule we will arrange a hearing. thank you very much. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> both in china, those who are band in china. i would argue their persecuted because people were trying to leave and now they're being deported. it is a violation of the refugee detention. people being sent back into their situation. i don't think the governments are required and yet -- [inaudible conversations] >> providing refugees status. [inaudible] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> thank you very much. appreciate it. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]] in a few moments a foreign debt and deficit reduction and the senate is back in session at 9:30 eastern to continue work on a bill regarding u.s. trade investment policy. >> several live events and c-span3. at:00 eastern the joint deficit reduction committee will focus on revenue options and changing the tax code. president obama will be in cincinnati talking about his jobs plan and the u.s. economy at 2:30 p.m. eastern. at 5:30 p.m. eastern live coverage of david cameron's speech to the canadian parliament. ♪ >> this weekend in charlotte, north carolina with booktv and american history tv. history of literary life from the site of the 2012 democratic national convention. on booktv on c-span2 charlotte's banking industry. and karen cox and dreaming of dixie. how the south was created in american popular culture. a visit to park road books to learn about the relationship between independent bookstores and publishers. un-american history tv for eleventh president james polk's birth place. a discussion with charlotte civil-rights leader charles jones and his experience in the 1960s lunch counter sit ins and visit the read gold mine where gold was first discovered in america. booktv and american history tv and c-span2 and 3. the joint deficit reduction committee meets again today focusing on revenue options and changing the tax code. yesterday the new america foundation host a forum to encourage the committee to go big and seek deficit reductions of $4 trillion or more compared to the proposed $1.5 trillion. this part of the event is a little more than an hour. ♪ >> our standard of living at home and equality. [inaudible] >> a long run. the long run budget protection coming out of this office. those are truly terrifying. >> national debt is an enormous threat that calls into credibility the credit of the united states and means we're looked at almost as a third world country. >> they get buried under their own debt. the consequences of failure to deal with this are literally catastrophic. >> the debt is a bigger threat to our national priority to the health of the economy. most people recognize that. >> if we allow the debt and deficit to continue as they are they will crowd out almost all other spending. that is not acceptable alternative for the country or our children and grandchildren. >> my good colleague erkine bowles says it is the most serious threat this country ever had. the largest and most difficult thing to resolve and the most predictable as to where we are headed. >> you can overstate the importance of this threat to the u.s.. it is a threat to the foundation of our economy. it could crowd out future investments in skills, technology and the joint chiefs of staff identified it as the greatest national security threat. >> there is nothing i can think of that will give the country and consumers more constant then to see a long-term plan of reform that restores fiscal sustainability. >> it is the idea of self-government and the notion that free people acting freely together can discipline themselves to the future of politicizing mitchell and's interest ahead of their own. >> this issue is not a singular issue of concern just to our country but to people who look to america for leadership. >> we need to do this for the world. >> need to think the debt is our single biggest problem. >> we have a large long-term deficit problem. we have to fix it. >> fixing former people in business and government have really come out and asked the committee to think about going beyond the $1.5 trillion mandate to. >> the day after the letter was sent, saying that i support that objective and it is critical if we are going to get to where we need to be and have a country on sound fiscal footing. >> the joint committee needs to go big. >> policymakers need to go big. >> we have to have a go big approach to this particular problem. >> i believe this committee ought to go big. >> we absolutely do need to go big because the problems we are facing on the deficit are big. >> shelley areas not an option. wherever you get off. ♪ >> welcome, everybody, to the supercommittee to go big and beyond. i am maya macguineas, president of the committee for responsible federal budget. as you heard from that video our first foray into digital technology in our events there are a lot of voices urging this new supercommittee of 12 men and women with tasks finding $1.5 trillion in savings over the next decade to go beyond that and go big. last week there was a letter released by 60 leaders from business leaders and treasury officials, outside well-respected voices all urging the supercommittee to go big. acknowledging they had different reasons for why and what a package should look like but it is important to go beyond admission and later last week there were 36 senators. of bipartisan group of senators and quite a sight. 36 senators on stage together pushing to come up with a savings package that included entitlement, revenue and all areas of the budget. we have gathered leading voices in the budget area right and left. all different backgrounds to come together and talk about this whole thinking of why and if they believe and the supercommittee needs to go beyond finding $1.5 trillion to two or three times as much. the reason i would give that it is important is if you're going to do all this hard work and no question what their task with is very difficult. these are the policy choices policymakers have been ducking for the last decade of spending cuts and increaseds in revenue but if you are going to go through all that work and political compromise you want it to fix the problem. we are going to need something bigger to stabilize the debt and put it on a downward trajectory. we also have been saying it is important they go along. this isn't a short-term problem. the biggest problem is making sure the economic recovery takes hold and stays on track but this is a medium and long-term problem and is critical members of the supercommittee are supported for looking at long-term drivers of the problems of all the areas of the budget are going faster and sustainable. finally we have been making the point that there are ways you can cut the budget and that is what we have been doing where you mindlessly put caps to push things down but don't pick and choose what programs are working and which ones are outdated or unnecessary or not well targeted. if you go smart you look at the budget saying you need a budget that focuses more on public investment and less on consumption. as you go smart on revenue you look at how to overhaul the tax system. one thing we are lucky about with tax reform is our tax code is so crummy to begin with we can improve and simplify and make it more efficient. there is a lot of opportunity for that heavy lift. but go big and go smart needs to be what people are pushing and letting the supercommittee know they want them to succeed. that is the point of discussion today. for those of you who have your packets we have a list of phenomenal people who are coming to speak today. what i would like to do is invite my co-host, steve bell from the bipartisan policy center and bob bixby to say a few words before we start with our first panel. >> thank you. you have been toiling in these fields for a long time. you have done good work and we appreciate it. we are very glad to co-sponsor this today. our cochairs of the task force on deficit and debt reform and stabilization, i would like to thank all the work we have done with the budget control act. they have not essentially change. the debt should directory at all. trajectory has not changed. that brings the third point that maya macguineas made. this group of people, joined the select committee has an opportunity to go big. it is written into the law that establishedes our judgment and they can do similar things if they wish to bring about big changes in taxes and spending. it is their choice and only external pressure will make them make that choice. thank you very much for everything. >> pleasure to be with you. i too have three things to say. one is i thoroughly endorsed go big. i thoroughly endorsed go along and go smart wasn't on my list but i can accept those smart. i was going to say don't go it alone. by that i mean some of the work the coalition does in the field outside washington is a bit of political advice not just for the supercommittee but all members of congress. because of the political difficulties of these choices don't go it alone. do things like senator warner and senator chambliss did. go to each other's states and see why this is a bipartisan problem and there can be bipartisan solutions. don't go it alone also means bring the public with you. the last thing we want to have happen is the supercommittee make a deal and no one knows what is going on or understands choices and something comes out the eve of thanksgiving and everyone spends december trying to figure out what it is and arguing about it rather than having a good debate and going towards a vote that might get consensus. go big, go smart but don't go it alone. following my own advice i have to hit the road on a trip. stick around for the great advice. >> can we turn to the video? >> anyone who looks at projections of u.s. federal debt sees that we are at high levels of debt to gdp. 90% growth that. seventy% enhanced the public. those are high numbers and dangerous ones for the economy but even worth going forward gears quickly going to pass a 100% that to gdp and accelerate from there. that is an unsustainable trajectory that will lead to a debt crisis without question. we are almost at 100% of our economy in total and the gdp and tens of trillions of dollars of unfunded obligations that are off the balance sheet. we need to start dealing with these issues before we have a debt crisis in the united states. >> 20 or 30 years we're looking gets 16% of gdp and that is unsustainable. no country has ever run deficits like that and managed to stay solvent. >> economists agree on very few things but most agree the debt to gdp above 60% is not prudent. and debt to gdp of 90% has a very negative effect on growth yet the congressional deficit reduction committee fails we are in serious trouble. we will go into a tailspin almost immediately. we almost went into one this last time around but everyone was waiting for when they probably reviewed as something that would come in place and save everybody at the last minute but most people now recognize that can't happen any more. the consequences are so dramatic that even the failure to come up with something now will have enormous consequences economically and otherwise for this country and our standard of living will go down immediately. >> the first indispensable step in a growth and job strategy is to show for ourselves for united states does not intend to go bust. beginning now to scale down terrifying debt levels and deficit levels and putting in place long term measures that show we are going to deal with unfunded obligations that are not even encountered in these numbers the joint committee needs to go big if they want to provide assurance to they capital markets, especially our foreign investors that we are serious about putting our financial house in order. i believe this supercommittee needs to achieve $3 trillion in additional deficit reduction. >> we have high unemployment. fourteen million americans are unemployed and we have a terrible long run budget problem. the answer is we have to make progress on both of those things which is why i feel strongly that the right policy is to pair an aggressive jobs program which requires more government spending and tax cuts but pair that with a more serious reduction in our long run deficit. that is the right economic policy for of the united states. >> timing is the element. when do you start making the cuts? doing it in a phased approach positions as for growth in the long term. >> it is that two is that dance. in the short term they will not affect the long-term deficit. that question is separate from the short term recovery. if we correct long term deficit we put in place proposals which will lead to a fiscally responsible nation where we can afford the debt to one where our debt -- debt to gdp ratio is below 60% over the next 10 years that will help for medically the short term recovery because people have confidence in our nation again. they have confidence in our currency and our ability to finance our government but if we don't do that they won't have confidence or make investments and the short-term economy will slow and the long term will be disastrous. >> to give the economy and the business community confidence and the international community confidence we need to balance the budget and bring the debt load down. at the same time we need when we get that confidence to grow jobs and give enterprises and people who want to go into business the opportunity to do so and encouragement to do so and the economic wherewithal to do so. >> if this supercommittee came up with a solution that put us on a path or directed communities in congress on the path toward solving long term fiscal insolvency there would be a burst of enthusiasm and energy from the american people and the entrepreneurs in our culture that would cause a major economic expansion and create lots of jobs and make people feel good again. >> failure is not an option. we have to deal with our long run deficit. we have put a lot of weight on the soldiers -- shoulders of the supercommittee and they have to step up. >> if we could have the first panel. erkine bowles was the co-chairman of the fiscal commission. you don't have to wait for your introduction. senator mike crapo from idaho is on the fiscal commission. dave cote the ceo of honeywell. and alice rivlin, former director of cbo, vice chair of the fed on the fiscal commission and co-chair of the rivlin commission. we are putting together a bipartisan deal that did go bigger and could go big and hopefully will inform the work of the supercommittee. i will be joined by my co moderator, peter cook. i will turn it over to you for the first question. >> appreciate the invitation to participate in this all-star panel to talk about the issue. as a reporter covering the supercommittee, this is an important topic for our audience and not only for this audience but the audience at home and audiences around the country why going big is the right move. we heard other voices in washington and elsewhere going small is better. so let's hear about that. erkine bowles, you had the benefit of being the chairman of the deficit commission along with alan simpson. you came up with a package that did exceed that $4 trillion figure. give us a sense why going big makes sense for the country and is feasible. >> let's see if it works. >> it was a great honor to serve on that commission and work on a subject that is the most important work i have ever done in my life. why do i feel that way? why do i feel this supercommittee must go big? they have got to be bold and they had better be smart. if they don't go big and are not smart we face the most predictable economic crisis in history. i think it is clear the fiscal path our country is on is not sustainable and if we do nothing and take the ostrich theory and stick are heads in the ground future of our country is not very bright. what worries me is people who say we can grow out of this problem were simply tax our way out or simply cut our way out of this problem. it is too big to be solved by any one of those solutions. we have got to grow, raise revenue and cut spending. we have to cut spending wherever we find it whether it is in the tax code or the entitlement programs, defense or non defense. the reason it has to be at least $4 trillion is that isn't the number we made up. $4 trillion is the minimum amount you have to reduce the deficit over ten years to stabilize the debt and put it on a declining basis as percentage of gdp. the reason it has got to be smart is this is not at just an arithmetic game. we have to take into account the fragile economic recovery we have today. recommendations we made, we made sure we didn't have big cuts this year or next year but we did get back to pre crisis levels of spending. we have got to make sure we disrupt the fragile economic recovery. we have to take care of the truly disadvantaged and make sure we don't have cuts that affect the truly disadvantaged. cuts in things like food stamps or workers' compensation. we have got to invest. if we are going to succeed in a knowledge based economy we have to invest in education and infrastructure and hide the are you headed research but do it in a fiscally responsible manner. lastly as maya macguineas said you couldn't dream up a more anticompetitive, in effective tax code. if we simplify the code and eliminate tax expenditures we can reduce rates and supply a portion of the money we save in order to bring down the deficit by a significant amount. that is the kind of thing that makes sense and will generate dynamic growth and create jobs and put america on the road to prosperity. >> senator crapo. your the only sitting member of congress and this table. there are questions whether congress can go big get anything and going small as a more realistic option. use at on the deficit commission. why is going big feasible? why is it the right choice? >> i agree with everything erkine bowles just said. all four of a star on the fiscal commission together. we did reach those conclusions erkine bowles mentioned. $4 trillion is the minimum we can do. it is not the ideal. frankly i am a little more aggressive. i think we need to do it twice or three times. that we should be in fiscally. your question was can we go big? the short answer is gridlock is no longer an option. my answer to your question is yes. one of the reasons i answer it yes goes back to the fiscal commission and ultimately the gang of 6 other worked on the famous or infamous gang of 6 that was we republicans and three democrats who were able to come together on a very big option. the republicans and democrats in the group represented the farther side of the philosophical spectrum. the reason we came together is because the crisis is so real and so imminent. we have had these debate in washington d.c. and congress forever over whether we should tax the rich or not tax the rich or who is the rich. how much do they pay in relation to everything else and what programs are critical and what the safety net should be but the bottom line is as the fiscal commission concluded, we need a $4 trillion solution and we need to see everything on the table. that doesn't mean there aren't ways to protect the safety net for there are ways to make sure in the tax code we have the fairness and reform erkine bowles referenced but we have to put aside our partisan ship. it can be done and people from broad perspectives can come together. it is a very tough for right now with the political climate in washington d.c.. it is nothing short of toxic in terms of the nature of the political battles that are taking place but i believe that out of that comes an opportunity and perhaps one of the greatest opportunities we have had in the recent past to truly reform our fiscal policy and our tax policy in a way that will put us toward controlling our spending but also on a path toward developing a pro-growth package that will create the jobs and economic explosion we are capable of if we create the proper climate. >> david cote, there are a lot of skeptics that they can get anything done. it was a tall order. from the business community what is writing? >> let me put overview on this. honeywell is the $37 billion company with more than half our sales and have our employees outside the u.s. in 100 countries. beyond making a commercial for honeywell i travel a lot and i'd get to see a lot of other countries and what they are doing. is important to realize as a country that 20 years ago there were a billion participants in the global economy. now there are four billion participants from china and india to eastern europe and southeast asia that we are not participants before. but we act like we did 20 years ago and bragged about winning the olympics 20 years ago as opposed to what do we have to do to win today. we need american competitiveness agenda. we need to get our competitive mojo the way it used to be when our parents and grandparents got us in the position we are in today. there are a number of things we need to address. debt and energy policy, math and science education. the infrastructure. this is what we need to do to be globally competitive. the part that scares me is we are finding it so difficult to do what is the glaringly obvious problem in which we had a glaringly obvious solution. i agree on $4 trillion as a minimum because if you look at the baseline we used in simpson bowls we got $20 trillion in debt in ten years if we didn't do anything and that assumed the reduction of war spending. assumed 4.6% a year nominal gdp growth and assumed medicare growth would moderate from 10% in the last decade to 6% this decade. if you say i will be more realistic about those assumptions that $20 trillion is more like 25 or 26. using the $20 trillion base line you need four to get to the point that this can like -- erskine bowles and mike were talking about. these assumptions -- and what mr. crapo was talking about. if we do this in $1 trillion bites it is better than nothing but there is a good chance you will have to do it six more times. when you think of the ridiculousness of our situation, if you are trying to explain to a family what we are doing as the government when you start talking trillions it gets difficult to understand but when you tell the family what is happening is we are making $21,000 a year and spending 35 and we will do it for a long time. how long will that go on? most say we will have to declare bankruptcy and that is not a good thing. this problem will get resolved one of two ways. one is weaken do it now, thoughtfully and proactively and we grownups do things and when congress and the president of to do things. the other way is to wait until it gets to the point where the bond market decides they don't trust you anymore. there's a point at which they will say i want more -- i won't give more money unless you give me more price meaning a higher interest rate. if interest rates go up on government debt the tendency to think that is a wall street problem but the fact is the ten year bond goes to 7% for rich edson of home loans that are 10%. car loans are 13%. what happens to the economy and main street? we need to do this now which is why go big is the only way to go. we need $4 trillion to have a chance. i can't assure you that we won't have to do it again in a few years as senator crapo said because the issue is that big. >> you have worn every budget hat in the book. o m b, vice chair of the federal reserve. $4 trillion. there are suggestions it is not that hard and we should go bigger. your view on that and how much time do we have? >> i am more worried -- haven't spent much time at all. if you don't solve this problem, show the world -- sorry. thank you. i think we will get our comeuppance fairly soon. in the form of damaging our chances of recovering rapidly because we do need to spend more or tax less in the near-term to get the recovery back on track. it is worse than it was a few months ago. if we don't solve the deficit problem in points passed i think the world will look at us and we will look at ourselves and say we are not competent. this country we had so much faith in all these years wanted to buy their bonds is not facing ordinary problems and is this government doesn't work. that is damaging to confidence all-around world and the ability of our companies to make decisions that will help them invest and for individuals to think i have a problem with my mortgage but can't begin spending again. it makes the whole world very uncertain. this supercommittee has extraordinary power. you couldn't have written this into the constitution. no one wanted to give anybody that much power but the ordinary process never worked. here we are with a committee of 12 people which can write laws that change entitlement programs and tax code. get it voted on with no amendments or filibuster or anything. that is a huge opportunity and opportunity to rev up the recovery in the near term and folded into a form of entitlement and taxes that brings our debt to a more stable path. that will take compromise and courage and i thought we saw that on the simpson bowles group. i became a big fan of senator crapo. and his equally conservative republican colleague senator coburn. they were willing to think outside their usual box and worked through the arithmetic and realized this is going to take some revenue. i have always been a fan of senator durbin but he also came to the difficult conclusion that this is going to take raining in the entitlements. that is not really good for me. but i am going to have to join with the others. it was a display of courage and compromise that i hope will spread to the rest of the congress and the select committee. >> one point you have made or most of you made is $4 trillion is more like a minimum than a maximum. you stabilize the debt on a downward trajectory but well above the historical averages. historically debt levels were below 40% of gdp. if we pay $4 trillion that is closer to the high 60% of gdp and moving down. you don't want your debt level too high because you would find -- fiscal flexibilities your hit with more emergencies or other wars which we will be. it is important people understand as much as we wish we could balance the budget in the next couple years, we are so far off from that, is critically important that the debt not grow faster than the economy. if you talk about one of the problems of $1.5 trillion is it is not enough to insure credit markets. probably not enough to avoid another downgrade. to go through that political heavy lift and not have economic benefits fixing the problem it is lose/loose for a lot of work. the question i put to the panel is you see people in discussions as economic news is getting worse falling into one but it. we need to reduce the deficit or have more stimulus. the thought folding -- many of you have waited on doing both of them simultaneously and reducing the debt over a multi-year period, credible and gradual and thoughtful way is part of an economic growth strategy. i wonder if you could talk about how debt reduction affects economic growth and senator crapo may weigh in on tax reform because you worked tirelessly on making it pro-growth along with this as well. >> we need to remember something. this special committee was created as a result of the debt ceiling battle we had in congress. it was a battle over extending the debt ceiling by $2 trillion and that is how the $2 trillion figure was achieved. it was not to solve the debt crisis but to counterbalance the increase in the debt ceiling. it is important for us to realize that because i am concerned that as americans and as congress we may think that $2 trillion target was the solution to our debt crisis. one of the main reasons we are here today is to point out that is not the case and we have to move further. i will go one further step. a couple days ago we had before the subcommittee on the finance committee, five prominent economic figures. you will recognize everyone of them. one of my questions i asked was given all the differences of opinion how we should attack this problem, what do you think the minimum step should be? four five said a minimum of four. two set a minimum of six. the point i make, the reason i bring that up again is that we have a tremendous task ahead of us. all five also said one of the problems we have which dave referenced is the assumptions we are making about the performance of the economy and the impact of the demand for our entitlement programs are unrealistic and we are not even addressing the whole picture in our analyses and we have to recognize that. your question focused on where we need to head in terms of the balance between the austerity on controlling congressional excesses and growth package for our country and there's a huge impact on growth by controlling our spending and controlling the growth of our deficits and the cbo put numbers to show there are hundreds of billions of dollars of growth that can occur and will occur as a result of the control of our deficit. because of the drag our deficit places on the economy and add to that of pro-growth things this panel talked about. tax reform and energy policy and regulatory reform, litigation reform and the like. there are other areas where we know what we need to do and we could create a climate where we have a powerful pro-growth pro competition agenda accompanied by an austerity program with congress controlling its spending and we could put the united states in a position where the economic impacts of that would be the most phenomenally powerful part of the plan. >> to build on what senator crapo said. when we say $4 trillion would stabilize the debt that includes 4.6% year for ten years. we are already missing that and assumes medicare and medicaid vote -- goes to 6% year. you can get yourself into a position where doesn't stabilize but slows the growth of it. you can do the short-term stimulus and long-term intelligence plan at the same time. it is often times seems to be keyed up when i read things in the press or statements people make that those two are mutually exclusive but you can do both. medicare and medicaid, no politician really wants to discuss but the american public needs to have an honest discussion about the impact of medicare and medicaid and it is as fundamental as a demographic time bomb. my generation, the baby boomers are retiring and we are retiring at a high rate. we will crush the system. there isn't enough money going in to support it. the longer we wait for my generation to retire the worse it gets because it is difficult to take a benefit from somebody who is already getting it. if you can reduce the program before people enter it, you stand a chance. this problem has been coming for decades. medicare and medicaid over ten years grows from $700 billion a year to $1.5 trillion a year even with that reduced growth rate. you can't do that. >> it is not only feasible but necessary to the two things at once. the timing is actually good. one of the big things that has to be done to reduce the rate of growth of the title of programs but you can't fix them quickly. not much that you do on the entitlement reform front is going to affect the budget for quite a long time. maybe ten years or more. then you get the benefit spouse -- out further into the future. that has nothing to do with right now. that is true on the tax side. if you are going to have a comprehensive reform of the tax code that gets rid of popular loopholes like converting the mortgage deduction to a credit, you can't do it really fast. you have to phase it in