Refugees, and the fate of civilians in general, are critical to planning in case of dramatic political instability in North Korea. Most concerning strategically is that civilians attempting to flee to China would prompt the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to intervene in North Korea, and could lead to further internationalization because the South and its allies would also intervene in response.¹ Unfortunately, existing estimates of refugee flows are too vague to contribute to the careful contingency planning required.² Still, we can arrive at better estimates of whether, when, and where North Koreans might seek refuge by examining civilian flight from current civil wars, and by customizing the projections with country-specific demographic, topographic, and infrastructural data.

The initial results of my ongoing research in this area challenge much of the conventional wisdom about potential North Korean refugees. First, evidence suggests that few refugees are likely to attempt to cross the DMZ. Most refugees that arrive in South Korea would have to arrive via third countries. Second, the scale and pace of refugee flows across China’s border crossings is likely to be substantially smaller and slower than others have predicted. Finally, internally displaced persons (IDPs) are likely to be far more numerous than refugees, presenting a serious—and so far underappreciated—humanitarian emergency and assistance delivery challenge.

Young North Korean Seeks Asylum in South Korea

LEVERAGING DATA TO ESTIMATE REFUGEES

North Korea is an “information poor” state. We simply lack accurate, reliable data to help us answer many of the most important political and social questions about the country. To date, the most widely circulated estimates of potential refugee flows into South Korea in the event of the North’s collapse rely on simple rubrics, for example assuming that one out of every four household members decides to flee to South Korea (and arriving at 3 million).³

Estimates of potential flows into China are even less transparent (often arriving at more than 3 million).⁴ However, we do know important things about North Korea that can help us to estimate refugee flows. Taken from the civil war literature on refugees, these include both “push” factors within the country, such as the immediate threat of violence or familial persecution, and “pull” factors, such as connections abroad with the funds to enable flight or easy access to a porous international border.⁵

CROSSING THE DMZ

North Korea’s population is concentrated in the south (approximately 9.4 million resided in Pyongyang and further south as of the 2008 census, including at least 8 cities with populations over 100,000).⁶ The majority of the country’s wealth and military power is concentrated there and it houses the central government.

The DMZ is one of the most militarized border zones in the world…

In the event of violent instability and civil war, Pyongyang and other important southern cities such as Kaesong and Nampo are likely to be heavily contested. All else being equal, this immediate threat of violence makes human flight much more likely and the DMZ is the most proximate means of fleeing the country. However, the following factors suggest that massive flight to the DMZ is unlikely:

1. If conflict is concentrated in the south, populations will not flee toward the violence. Instead, they will head north or, if they are among the very few with access to a vessel, to the seacoast. There are not yet robust human-trafficking networks in coastal areas to ferry North Korean refugees abroad as there are in other ongoing civil wars in the Middle East and North Africa. Illicit trading networks could be reoriented, but this takes time—and most of the DPRK’s illicit traffic is associated with the Kim regime, so it may not be likely.⁷ The closest northern land border crossing is at Sinuiju/Dandong. From Pyongyang via roadways (the northernmost city in this area), Dandong is approximately 200 km away. From Kaesong (the southernmost city), the trip is over 485 km.

 

2. The DMZ is one of the most militarized border zones in the world and is becoming more so as the DPRK continues to lay landmines.⁸ Unless and until South Korea secures a passage through the DMZ, and is able to communicate that opportunity to would-be refugees in the North, populations are unlikely to displace in that direction. The lack of access to technology, and especially cell phones, means that even in the rare chance that such passage is possible, knowledge of the opportunity will spread more slowly than it has in other recent conflicts.

 

3. Populations in the areas closest to the DMZ are unlikely to have as much desire to displace. In most civil conflicts, the educated and socioeconomically advantaged are more likely to flee, and tend to flee earlier. These populations have “pull factors” including international social networks, foreign job opportunities, and outside money to gain passage out of the country and secure refuge elsewhere. While all of these pull factors are more compelling for the North Korean elite than they are for the general population, the intensity of the pull is weak. North Korea’s international isolation means few of its people have extensive international networks. Those most likely to have friends and family in the near abroad (with whom they are regularly in touch) are concentrated in distant Chinese border provinces such as North Hamyong (which contributed over 18,000 of 54,000 total documented defectors to South Korea as of June 2016) rather than the capital.⁹

Without very different conflict dynamics or South Korean contingency plans in place to secure and open the DMZ, it is difficult to imagine 25 percent of the regional population (as estimated) fleeing southward and successfully crossing into South Korea, even over the course of several years of conflict.

CHINA REFUGEE ESTIMATES

Human flight out of North Korea and into China is likely to be concentrated around three border cities. While individuals could theoretically cross at any point along the still-porous border, there are numerous obstacles to their doing so. Most pressing among them are the Yalu and Tumen rivers, which create a natural boundary between the two countries along most of the official border. The rivers are most passable during the winter, but of course, getting there is also more difficult in the cold. Man-made impediments to border crossings exist at various points, including fencing, walls, and military and police patrols. Additionally, even those who might veer off of well-traveled roadways in order to evade capture are likely to take roads on their way to the border and, therefore, are not likely to stray too far. The average North Korean does not have access to motorized transportation, so walking is the most likely form of transportation (some may bike as well).

There are three major border crossing city pairs, DPRK side (China side): Sinuiju (Dandong), Manpo (Ji’an), and Namyang (Tumen). Four North Korean counties are adjacent to China and two are adjacent (one province and one special city) to Russia.¹⁰ Those along the Chinese border have a total population of 7.1 million. Assuming a brisk walking pace of approximately 5 km per hour, unladen, and with no depreciation in speed over time, it would take between 2.34 and 80.1 hours to walk to the nearest border crossing from those provinces.¹¹ Among those provinces that are not adjacent, the closest walk is over 24 hours and the farthest is nearly 195 hours, or nearly 20, 10-hour days of walking without rest or slowing. The true rate of travel for most refugees would be significantly slower, especially considering the age and health of the North Korean population.

Human flight out of North Korea and into China is likely to be concentrated around three border cities.

The conflict in Syria, a full-scale civil war since the end of 2011, has produced 4.9 million refugees according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugess (UNHCR).¹² For various reasons, including its recency, population size, physical and socioeconomic characteristics, and the nature of the war (internationalized civil war including conventional and unconventional force), this case provides a more appropriate refugee analogy than the oft-referenced East German case. For our purposes, the significant differences between the two are access to technology, transportation, and the availability of border crossings. Syria’s population had widespread access to cell phones and mechanized transport. Its borders are also substantially longer and more passable. In sharp contrast to North Korea, there are at least 34 formal border crossings between Syria and its neighbors and only small portions have natural water boundaries like rivers or seacoasts. As with the travel time and distances presented above, the Syrian case should, therefore, err high with respect to North Korea.

The first refugees from Syria recorded by the UNHCR did not cross international borders until nearly four thousand wartime casualties had been recorded—nine months into the conflict. Nearly two years of fighting passed before 500,000 refugees were recorded. Afterward, at least 100,000, and sometimes over 200,000, refugees were recorded each month in the second and third years of the conflict. This was not due to dramatic increases in violence, though. Instead, it was due to the loss of basic services and sustainable livelihood coincident with the war.

Syria’s biggest prewar cities, Aleppo (45 km) and Damascus (56 km) are much closer to accessible international borders than are North Korea’s. Therefore, even given a similar scale of violence within its major cities, we should expect North Korean refugees to flee toward China over the course of several years of fighting, and even then, to arrive more slowly than Syrian refugees due to the distance and difficulty of travel. A critical “push” factor should also be the loss of sustainable civilian life in the major cities. Yet North Korea’s population has become inured to difficult living conditions (e.g., famine, drought, and economic sanctions) and may still not flee under conditions where other populations would.

INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT

Even where there is limited opportunity to cross an international border, as in North Korea, civilian flight from conflict zones is still likely to occur. In the event of major instability, internal displacement away from violence, short of emigration, is empirically the most common civilian response. ¹³ Even where the immediate threat of violence is small, internal migration is likely to occur when the population lacks food and other human necessities.¹⁴ There is also a strong disincentive for human flight to China due to its well-known tendency to deny asylum and send would-be North Korean refugees back.¹⁵ Civilians may therefore decide that being returned to the DPRK authorities makes internal displacement more attractive than attempting to become a refugee. Though the scale and location of human flight depend on a conflict’s characteristics, it is likely that internal displacement will significantly outpace any international flight in the event of North Korean instability. If this is true, populations stuck inside North Korea, without access to basic necessities, will also be exceedingly difficult for the international community and humanitarian agencies to reach. So long as the Kim regime has not collapsed entirely, outsiders will have to negotiate with the regime in order to provide help—a notoriously complicated effort even in the best of times.¹⁶

There is also a strong disincentive for human flight to China due to its well-known tendency to deny asylum and send would-be North Korean refugees back.

In sum, a refugee crisis in the event of dramatic North Korean instability is likely to be much smaller than most suggest, but the internal humanitarian crisis is likely to be substantial. In the event of major violence, civilians will flee, but there will be fewer opportunities for North Koreans to cross international borders, and the flight itself will be more arduous than what we are currently seeing from Syria. Insofar as international escalatory dynamics are concerned, this is good news because China would not face an immediate need to intervene to stem the tide of refugees across its border. However, this also means that internal humanitarian aid delivery should be the overwhelming priority in contingency planning, since most civilians will not displace across international borders.¹⁷