Webcomic: Escape From North Korea
By: Ju Ok Jeon
This webtoon, created by North Korean escapee Ju Ok Jeon, reflects the real risks many North Koreans face when fleeing their home in search of safety, dignity, and the chance to live freely.
About the Artist
Ju Ok Jeon is a North Korean defector who escaped in 2013. Having lived under the Kim Jong Un regime in an oppressed land, she conveys—through webtoons and comics—how precious the values of freedom and dignity truly are, with both sincerity and storytelling power.
Support Ju Ok’s work: @unistudio_juok
From Artist to Activist
As a kid in North Korea, Ju Ok was famous at school for one thing—drawing portraits of people passing gas. Her classmates flocked to her, asking to be drawn in exchange for snacks and even small amounts of money. Nothing made Ju Ok happier than to see people’s faces light up with a big smile, and to laugh together over her creations.
But things came to a halt when a teacher pulled her aside for “disrupting the school environment” with her “unrevolutionary” drawings. Ju Ok’s art supplies were confiscated, and she was warned that her parents could be punished for failing to educate their children.
“I vowed to never draw again because my simple drawings could bring harm to my family. But no matter how hard I studied or worked, opportunities were limited because my family belonged to the labor class. After a relative defected, my social classification [songbun] fell, leaving me destined for a life of forced labor. Realizing there was no hope or future, I decided to escape.”
In freedom, Ju Ok found that there was a lack of public understanding and empathy about North Korean human rights. A few years ago, her husband, who is also an artist, encouraged her to try drawing again.
“After being severely scolded as a child, I hated anything related to drawing. But when my husband told me I have talent, I got chills—thinking, ‘Did I actually used to like this?’
Through illustration, I want to share the reality of North Korea I experienced, my journey toward freedom, and my resettlement in a free society—so the world can hear the voices of those who still long for freedom inside North Korea.”
Ju Ok hopes her art will reach more people and increase support for this issue. In 2025, she participated in the LiNK English Speech Program to hone her storytelling and English speaking abilities.
“The North Korean issue is not only a domestic matter on the Korean Peninsula but also a complex international issue. That is why it is vital to raise awareness globally—and for North Korean defectors to share their stories directly in English. LiNK’s program has played an important role in helping me move toward my life goals.”
Reimagining North Korea’s Future
Liberty in North Korea helps North Koreans reach freedom and reach their full potential through programs that build their capacity to succeed and lead change. With the right support and tools, they’re sharing their stories, utilizing their talents, and building their careers with unwavering purpose—to create a future where every North Korean person can live free and full lives.
Invest in the next generation of North Korean advocates, storytellers, changemakers, and entrepreneurs, like Ju Ok.
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Women in North Korea: At the Forefront of Social and Political Change
By Lindsey Miller
Lindsey Miller is a musical director, award-winning composer, author, and photographer originally from Glasgow, Scotland. From 2017-2019, she lived in Pyongyang, North Korea, while accompanying her husband on a diplomatic posting. For Women’s History Month, she shares a rare glimpse into the experiences of North Korean women, who are finding ways to live life on their own terms despite the circumstances.
Her name is Min Jeong*.
She’s bright, funny and has a dry and cutting sense of humour that rivals that of any professional stand-up comedian. The kind that makes you worry for the heckler in the front row.
‘Why do you keep singing? You’re terrible at singing!’ she says with a straight face to the regular punters at The Beer House, a bar in Pyongyang, before taking their glass and kindly refilling it. ‘And don’t wear those shoes, they’re ugly.’ The other punters burst out laughing while Min Jeong allows a slight silly smile to make its way across the corner of her mouth. That’s the thing about Min Jeong, she has a magnetic and honest energy about her. It was refreshing in a place where simple honesty and truthfulness felt so packed down.
Min Jeong and I spent a fair bit of time together over the two years I lived in Pyongyang. I would go to the bar mainly to just talk to her and spend time with her. She was interesting. She loved hair accessories and jewellery – an increasingly common way for North Korean women to explore self-expression. I’d show her photographs of me and tell her about my different outfits while she’d rate them. I didn’t fare very well in her opinion. I often gave her my wedding or engagement ring to try on and she’d pose with them, comparing them to other things she’d seen foreigners wear. She’d tell me about the cosmetics that she liked to wear and make herself.
One of her favourite things was a face mask which I remember involving eggs. I never tried it but she swore by it, telling me how important it was to look after my skin and reminding me that there was nothing more important than my health. Min Jeong was very bright and regularly bounced between speaking in Korean, fluent English and often Mandarin. She loved animals and we spent a lot of time looking at photographs of dogs on our phones.
Min Jeong was in her early thirties and unmarried. She’d twirl her half-tied-back beautiful shiny black hair in her fingers while telling me about how much her parents were desperate for her to ‘find a boy’. She wasn’t interested and she didn’t have much time given that she only had one day ‘off’ a week which would have been taken up in part by state-enforced self-criticism sessions among other things. Having gone on many dates, the outcomes of which she summarised with a simple wrinkled nose, she seemed to be quite content being single. It was an attitude which I was surprised to learn was shared by a couple of Pyongyang female urban elite whom I met; women who spoke openly about their lack of desire to have children, who wanted to pursue a career. This directly contradicted my understanding of North Korean women’s experiences.
But I forgot that the experience of women is diverse and North Korea is no exception.
It’s very easy to think that North Korea isn’t changing but that is not the case. To say that there have been no social changes in the country would be insulting to the creativity, tenacity and drive of the North Korean people, particularly women who continue to be a major driving force of change. Driven by necessity following the devastating famine in the 90s, ordinary women had to become more economically independent in order to survive. While North Korean men were chained to jobs in faceless party offices, women had the time to create their own economic opportunities which could feed their families and keep them alive. Even now, in spite of living in a country gripped by widespread and pervasive human rights abuses including the most extreme forms of sexual and gender-based violence, women are often the breadwinners, women are the ones driving the private markets, women are the ones winning back more agency over their own lives and futures.
I only had to go to Tongil Market to see it for myself. Every vendor standing behind every one of the stalls laid out in long rows across the indoor market hall was a woman. Every staff member taking payments from the vendors for selling in the venue was a woman. The people counting the money in the cash exchange office were women. The people unloading sacks of vegetables and meat were women. Most of the customers were women.
Through having no choice but to fight to survive, North Korean women have driven changes that few could have predicted would last.
I sit at the bar and Min Jeong passes me a cup of black tea. She starts to scroll through her phone and goes back into her own world. I think about what is going through her mind and all the things she is experiencing but cannot talk about. I think about the millions of other North Korean women with names, voices and stories to tell; who we, on the outside of North Korea, will never get to meet. I think about the world who will never get to meet this generous, kind, extraordinary woman in front of me - my friend.
Min Jeong lifts her head and looks at me,
‘You really shouldn’t wear those shoes, Lindsey. They’re awful.’ She waits a moment and that same slight silly smile starts to creep across the corner of her mouth. ‘I’m kidding. They’re only a little better than yesterday’s.’
Lindsey Miller shares more extraordinary photos and stories from North Korea in her debut book, “North Korea: Like Nowhere Else," a testament to the hidden humanity and dynamism of the people. She also joined LiNK for a virtual Q&A in 2021 and continues to be a friend and advocate for this issue!
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*Name has been changed to protect the privacy and safety of the individual
