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FM AMCONSUL HONG KONG
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 8912
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUEHBK/AMEMBASSY BANGKOK PRIORITY 9700
RUEHUM/AMEMBASSY ULAANBAATAR PRIORITY 1062
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HONG KONG 003970 
 
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DEPT FOR EAP AND EAP/CM 
NSC FOR WILDER 
FOR G/SENK SENIOR ADVISOR WHITON 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/06/2031 
TAGS: PHUM PGOV HK CH MC KN
SUBJECT: G/SENK VISIT TO HONG KONG AND MACAU 
 
Classified By: ACTING DEPUTY PRINCIPAL OFFICER LAURENT CHARBONNET.  REA 
SONS: 1.4(B AND D) 
 
¶1. (C) Summary:  Christian Whiton, Senior Advisor to Special 
Envoy for Human Rights in North Korea Jay Lefkowitz (G/SENK), 
during a September 29-30 visit briefed Hong Kong Legislative 
Council members and NGO representatives on United States 
policies toward North Korean refugees and the implications of 
the North Korea Human Rights Act of 2004. He also traveled to 
Macau to continue his dialogue with NGO activists working on 
North Korean refugee issues.  End summary. 
 
Meetings With Hong Kong Lawmakers 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (C) Christian Whiton, Senior Advisor to Special Envoy for 
Human Rights in North Korea Jay Lefkowitz, briefed 
Legislative Council (Legco) Members and rights activists 
Emily Lau, Martin Lee and Leung Kwok Hung ("Long Hair") on 
the role of the Special Envoy for North Korea and the work of 
the G/SENK office, during separate meetings on  September 29. 
 He noted USG concern over the human rights situation in 
North Korea and the estimated 20,000 - 200,000 North Korean 
refugees in the PRC, and noted our responsibility, under the 
North Korean Human Rights Act of 2004, to facilitate 
humanitarian assistance to these refugees.  According to 
Whiton, these refugees had fled North Korea to escape 
starvation and persecution, but the PRC generally viewed them 
as "economic migrants" and returned them to North Korea where 
they were incarcerated or worse.  Whiton told Lau, Lee and 
Leung that his purpose in visiting Hong Kong was to increase 
understanding of the North Korean refugee situation, in case 
any North Korean refugees ever reached the HKSAR.  While the 
Legco members were unaware of cases of North Koreans coming 
through Hong Kong, they professed sympathy for such cases, 
should they occur. 
 
¶3. (C) Lau said she would urge the Hong Kong Government (HKG) 
to treat such cases humanely.  Recently, she said, many 
asylum seekers from Africa and South Asia had arrived in Hong 
Kong, but these were largely the responsibility of the United 
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).  Lau urged 
the USG to consider providing more resources to the UNHCR. 
Long-time democracy advocate Martin Lee described his efforts 
over the years to try to protect and expand Hong Kong 
citizens, civil and human rights but noted the sensitivity 
with which citizens here, and the Hong Kong government, 
viewed refugees and undocumented migrants.  Leung Kwok Hung 
thought that Hong Kong, with its stringent immigration 
controls and political sensitivity toward refugees, would not 
make a good route for fleeing North Koreans, though it could 
serve as an information-dissemination and organizing base for 
NGOs from the region who sought to assist these persons. 
 
NGOs Unaware of North Korean Refugees in Hong Kong 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
 
¶4. (C) Whiton also briefed Kathi Zellweger, International 
Cooperation Director (strictly protect) of Caritas - Hong 
Kong, on the role of SENK, including its concerns about the 
human rights situation in North Korea.  (Background: 
Zellweger has traveled in and out of North Korea as an aid 
worker since 1995.  She is leaving Caritas and will head the 
Swiss Government's office for development based in Pyongyang. 
End Background.)  Whiton inquired whether Caritas was able to 
ensure that its deliveries of food aid and other commodities 
in North Korea reached the people in need, and were not 
diverted to the military or Government.  Zellweger said that 
Caritas had been successful in this regard, noting that 
careful planning for such deliveries was essential.  Some 
South Korean NGOs, whose "hearts head off common sense," had 
difficulties in this area.  She said Caritas, with long 
experience in North Korea, treated it like any other 
"difficult country": they signed an agreement for each 
program, then closely monitored implementation.  In the case 
of food aid, she observed that there remained a risk that the 
commodities would be bartered or sold by their recipients, 
but this was not necessarily bad in that the food aid 
"filtered down" and the practice encouraged development of 
the markets.  Regarding the recent floods, Zellweger said she 
was skeptical about the large number of casualties reported 
by South Korean organizations. 
 
¶5. (C) Zellweger said the North Korean Government (NKG) was 
"very pragmatic now" regarding economic policy.  The private 
 
HONG KONG 00003970  002 OF 002 
 
 
markets were "huge" and the Government could not close them 
because large numbers of people depended upon them.  She 
estimated that 75-80 percent of the goods sold in the 
markets, including food, household goods, and other items, 
came from the PRC. 
 
¶6. (C) Zellweger said Caritas has not operated any programs 
for North Korean refugees in China; doing so would have 
jeopardized their relations with the NKG.  In her many years 
in Hong Kong, she had never heard of any North Korean 
refugees arriving here. 
 
¶7. (C) Whiton and Consulate General control officers attended 
two meetings (in Hong Kong and Macau) of the Brussels-based 
group Human Rights Without Frontiers (HRWF), active in 
assisting fleeing North Korean refugees.  At the two 
meetings, HRWF representatives from around the region 
described their efforts to bring North Korean refugees 
through China and across borders into Southeast Asian 
countries.  The group,s consensus was that recent events, 
particularly disruptions caused by the coup in Thailand, had 
already begun to make the Southeast Asia route more difficult 
and expensive.  The group recommended that the &northern 
route8 through Mongolia be expanded as it seemed safer and 
more coherent. In Macau, Jill Ferguson-Rigg (strictly 
protect), Committee Member of the British Business 
Association of Macau, hosted a dinner for HRWF and Whiton, 
which Mark Taylor, the Senior Coordinator for the Office to 
Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (G/TIP), and poloff 
also attended, with Jim Thomas, Director of HRWF. 
 
¶8. (C) Comment: Whiton's visit helped raise awareness of the 
North Korean refugee situation among Hong Kong Legco members 
and NGOs.  Our contacts were unaware of any North Korean 
refugees coming through Hong Kong and the general consensus 
was that Hong Kong would not necessarily be a welcoming or 
easy destination for North Korean refugees to come through. 
End Comment. 
 
¶9. (SBU) G/SENK has cleared this cable. 
Sakaue