A North Korean defector living in South Korea shared her testimony with Open Doors USA in a blog post published Wednesday.
The woman described being beaten, raped, sold into slavery, and separated from her daughter in tragic circumstances in North Korea and China, but remained steadfast in her Christian faith.
The unidentified Christian had an abusive husband in North Korea, and became homeless to get away from him. She fled to China, but was arrested and sent back to North Korea, where she was tortured in prison. After being released, she returned to her husband and got pregnant.
The woman ran away from him again, and gave birth to her daughter at a train station. They were homeless for two years before she tried to enter China again.
"I could not take it anymore," she told Open Doors.
She tried to escape "with three other homeless mothers and their children, all below the age of three." They carried poison and fish hooks in case they chose to commit suicide.
They were stopped over the border by Chinese police, and were separated from their children. The woman never saw her daughter again.
Chinese authorities sold the defectors into slavery. The Christian North Korean said the experience was dehumanizing.
"We were auctioned off like cattle," she reported. "I'd never felt so humiliated. I was bought for a little less than a thousand dollars by a Chinese man and his father.
"They abused me and raped me daily, until I escaped from their farm through the hole below the outside toilet."
She made it to South Korea with the help of Christians and some Chinese police officers, although China is an ally of North Korea.
Now, she "lives for the glory of God, and firmly [believes] that God will one day reunite her with her now 11-year-old daughter," an Open Doors USA blogger wrote.
In February, the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights found North Korea guilty of crimes against humanity, including torture, deprivation of freedom of religion, abduction, prison camps, and other violations. North Korea has "totally and categorically" rejected the Commission.
