[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 8]
[House]
[Pages 10889-10890]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        NORTH KOREA FREEDOM WEEK

  (Ms. LORETTA SANCHEZ of California asked and was given permission to 
address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. LORETTA SANCHEZ of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor 
and raise awareness of the 2009 North Korean Freedom Week.
  Currently, approximately 13 million people in North Korea suffer from 
malnutrition, and over 2 million North Koreans have died of starvation 
since 1995. In addition, over 200,000 men, women, and children are 
imprisoned in political prison camps in North Korea.
  North Korea is controlled by a dictatorial regime where human rights 
and personal freedoms are nonexistent. The region suffers from an 
extremely weak economy and is dependent on the international community 
even for its food. Unfortunately, about 30 percent of all the 
international aid that is provided to North Korea goes to the country's 
military and its elite, and very little of that ever gets to the real 
people of North Korea.

[[Page 10890]]

  Under the current regime, universal human rights do not apply to the 
people of North Korea, and freedom remains a foreign idea for the men 
and the women of this repressive country.
  I call on my colleagues in Congress and the Obama administration to 
take action to improve the deteriorating human rights crisis in North 
Korea.

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