“Some of these regimes have been pretty quiet since September 11, but we know their true nature. North Korea is a regime arming with missiles and weapons of mass destruction, while starving its citizens. . . States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.”
- George W. Bush, State of the Union Address, January 29, 2002

“I loathe Kim Jong Il. I’ve got a visceral reaction to this guy, because he is starving his people. And I have seen intelligence of these prison camps — they’re huge — that he uses to break up families and to torture people. It appalls me. They tell me, well, we may not need to move too fast because the financial burdens on people will be so immense if this guy were to topple. I just don’t buy that. Either you believe in freedom, and worry about the human condition, or you don’t.”
- George W. Bush, Interview with Bob Woodward, December 2002

“They initially wanted to go to the United States, but Washington rejected their demand, citing its position that it does not accept North Korean defectors.”
- “4 N. Koreans arrive in Seoul”, Korea Times, July 9, 2003

“We should authorize the resettlement of some North Korean refugees in this country, and press our allies to do the same. If this sparks a greater flow of North Koreans from their gulag-like country, some would argue, that could help keep pressure on North Korea or even hasten the fall of the Pyongyang regime, much as the flight of East Germans in 1989 helped undermine the Communist system there. International steps to help North Korean refugees would also be an unmistakable signal to Pyongyang that the world community will not turn a blind eye to the regime’s systematic human rights violations and its unconscionable neglect of its people’s basic needs. Regardless, we should offer resettlement options to North Koreans because it’s the right thing to do.”
- Sen. Richard Lugar, “A Korean Catastrophe”, Washington Post, July 17, 2003

Newsweek: “Can defectors and the human-rights issue play a more powerful role in resolving the Kim problem?”
Hwang Jong Yop: “Absolutely. Have you ever read “The Art of War” by Sun Tzu, the Chinese warrior-philosopher? It says, “The superior militarist foils enemies’ plots; next best is to ruin their alliance; next after that is to attack their armed forces.” I would add a few words before the last option: “Destroy the enemy’s spirit with a great cause.” North Korea’s human-rights and refugees issue can be a much more effective weapon to remove the regime. Its importance is incalculable. Did the old Soviet Union collapse because of the nuclear issue? No, it was the people who finally did it in.”
- Hwang Jong Yop, “How to Deal with Kim”, Newsweek, August 11, 2003

“Kim Jong Il, of course, has not had to endure the consequences of his failed policies. While he lives like royalty in Pyongyang, he keeps hundreds of thousands of his people locked in prison camps with millions more mired in abject poverty, scrounging the ground for food. For many in North Korea, life is a hellish nightmare. . . We believe that some 400,000 persons died in prison since 1972 and that starvation and executions were common. Entire families, including children, were imprisoned when only one member of the family was accused of a crime.”
- Undersecretary of State John Bolton, Speech at Seoul, S. Korea, July 31, 2003

“I don’t know of a worse human rights situation in the world today. North Korea’s gulag recalls the horrors of the Soviet Union under Stalin. Beatings, assaults, abuse, malnutrition and forced labor are the threats that always seem to link the story of one survivor to another. Christians who refused to renounce their faith were lined up and shot. [The prisoners’] tales are so powerful, so horrible that once you come across [them], you cannot not do something.”
- Sen. Sam Brownback, Speech in Los Angeles’ Koreatown, August 20, 2003

“Carl Gershman: And I want to ask if you think an international campaign to support human rights in North Korea is consistent with the sunshine policy, and would you encourage such a human rights campaign?
President Kim Dae Jung: Of course I would not have any objections to such global movements and campaigns. We know that there are severe human rights problems in North Korea. But for us, as we are just at the beginning process of advancing the cooperation and dialogue with North Korea on the one side, and having to continue with the war deterrence on the other side, when we are just beginning that process, to affront them with human rights issues publicly would not be a wise way to deal with them. And I think experience with the Soviet Union, East European countries, and China indicates that it is not an effective way to affront these governments with human rights issues in their face, with criticism. Such efforts have had little result, whereas efforts to induce them on the road to reforms and openness that — leading to movements for change in their society, that has had results for improvements in their human rights situation as well. And I would have to say that the greatest human rights issue on the Korean peninsula today is that of the 10 million members of the separated families.”
- President Kim Dae Jung, Remarks at AEI event, March 8, 2001

“I think it will take years before we can repair the damage done by that statement [by President Bush on the ‘Axis of Evil’]. It’s overly simplistic and counterproductive.”
- President Jimmy Carter, speech at Emory University, February 21, 2002

“In China, the plight of North Koreans who leave their country illegally remains a serious concern. For a number of years UNHCR has been making efforts to obtain access to them, but this has consistently been denied. An analysis of currently available information recently carried out by our Department of International Protection concludes that many North Koreans may well be considered refugees. In view of their protection needs, the group is of concern to UNHCR. For those in need of assistance, UNHCR is ready to work with partners in meeting their needs. Above all, the principle of non-refoulement must be respected.”
- Ruud Lubbers, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, September 29, 2003

“We seek to provide safe harbor for North Korean refugees and to provide ways to get information and food to those starving for both. We believe any negotiating with the North Korean regime that says ‘you can continue to starve and torture your people as long as you dismantle your weapons of mass destruction’ is as unacceptable as it is un-American.”
- Sandy Rios, President of Concerned Women for America, Testimony before US Senate Committee, November 4, 2003

“I think we ought to offer them a mega deal. Help with food, help with energy, help with becoming a self-sustaining economy… in return for total access to all the labs, all the sites, taking the plutonium rods out of North Korea altogether.”
- Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, Speech at a business forum in Hong Kong, November 6, 2003

“On the border between freedom and slavery, between democracy and communism, between prosperity and poverty - a divide so great that people in the North, repressed people to be sure, watch their children waste away and eat bark as that evil regime spends huge sums on weapons.”
- Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Elmendorf Air Force Base South Korea, November 18, 2003

“The only way we’re going to have any security with North Korea is by toppling his regime, which is one of the worst human rights violators on the planet. Liberating the people of North Korea has to be our goal. It’s not going to be easy. Entering into an agreement that props up that murderous dwarf in Pyongyang is not the way to go.”
- Max Boot, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, November 26, 2003

“I have been charged by the President with making sure that none of the tyrannies in the world are negotiated with. We don’t negotiate with evil; we defeat it.”
- Vice President Dick Cheney, December 21, 2003

“We South Koreans do not want abrupt change. We are not ready to
digest sudden change in the political situation in North Korea.”
- SK Foreign Minister Yoon Young Kwan, December 16, 2003

“Yet some are also pushing for the U.N. high commissioner for refugees to interview the North Koreans in China and offer asylum. As one person helping North Koreans here put it, that’s a Western solution to an Asian problem, and it would backfire. China would crack down further on the North Koreans, sending even more back to their homeland.”
- Nicholas Kristof, December 24, 2003

“Human rights and nuclear proliferation are intrinsically linked, but all we ever focus on is the nuclear issue — as if anyone born north of the 38th parallel does not deserve the same human rights as the rest of the world.”
- Suzanne Scholte, president of DFF, January 28, 2004

At one point, [Rumsfeld] appeared to choke up on the podium as he recounted seeing the name of a high school friend on a memorial to US dead in the 1950-53 Korean war.
He recalled being questioned later by a South Korean journalist who asked why Koreans should go all the way to Iraq to risk death.
“That would have been a fair question for an American journalist to ask. Why in the world should an American go halfway around the world to Korea to be wounded or die?”
“We were in a building that looked out over the city of Seoul. I said, ‘I’ll tell you why. Look out that window.’ And out that window you could see life, and cars and energy,” he said.
- Donald Rumsfeld, “Rumsfeld makes emotional defense of war on Iraq”, February 7, 2004

“Some refugees are fortunate enough to make it to South Korea. But their presence there flies in the face of that country’s official “sunshine policy,” which, however well-intentioned, is based on constant concessions and appeasement. The policy costs South Korea hundreds of millions of dollars, but it is not helping in the effort to save innocent lives. In the end, the policy only keeps the leader of Pyongyang in power.”
- Vaclav Havel, “Time to Act on N. Korea”, June 17, 2004

“In North Korea, it is not far-fetched to believe that almost every Korean who has expressed a decent thought has been murdered by the psychopaths running North Korea for half a century.”
- Dennis Prager, “The Best are Killed in Every Generation”, October 10, 2006

Asked why luxury goods were banned, Bolton said, “I think the North Korean population has been losing average height and weight over the years and maybe this will be a little diet for Kim Jong Il,” North Korea’s leader.
- John Bolton, “Security Council Agrees on Text of N. Korea Resolution”, October 13, 2006