A survey by the Korea Hana Foundation, which helps defectors integrate southern society with dignity, highlights defectors' plight. The latter tend to be underemployed, work more hours at lower wages. The Catholic Church plays a leading role in helping them integrate.

Seoul (AsiaNews) - A survey by the Seoul-based Korea Hana Foundation, which helps North Korean defectors (known as Saeteomin) adjust to life in the South after fleeing the Pyongyang regime, shows that refugees still lag behind in terms of jobs, work and wages, compared to South Koreans.

Although there are no official figures for North Koreans in South Korea because, under South Korean law, they are counted as nationals, not as foreign immigrants, an estimated half million North Koreans live in the South. Of these, only 53.1 per cent were employed in 2014, 7.7 per cent less than South Korea's overall employment rate of 60.8 per cent.

Almost one defector in five (19.8 per cent) is a day worker, more than three times the rate of the population as a whole (6.1 per cent). Conversely, only 6.1 per cent are self-employed, about three times less than the overall rate of 16.2 per cent. For experts, this gap is due to red tape and defectors' inability to get loans because of negative perceptions held by southerners.

Wage earners among defectors work 47 hours per week, 2.9 hours more than the average of 44.1 hours, and earn US$ 690 less than the average. At the same time, the average employment period for a defector is only 19 months, compared to 67 months in the population at large.

Still, two-thirds or 67.6 per cent of the respondents said they were satisfied with their life in South Korea. Of these, 47.4 per cent said so because they can do what they want here, and 42.3 per cent because they are better off than the North.

Still, some 58.4 per cent of young defectors said they are reluctant to admit they come from North Korea, up four percentage points from 2012. Likewise, 25.3 per cent said they suffered discrimination or were ignored because they come from the North.

In Korean, Saeteomin literally stands for "people of new land," meaning refugee or settlers. The term is used in South Korea for North Koreans who flee the Communist regime to settle on the other side of the border. Over time, as the integration of many "new settlers" lagged, the term acquired negative connotations.

Acting against the situation, the Catholic Church in South Korea has led the way since the end of the Korean War (1953) through programmes designed to integrate the newcomers and raise awareness of the discrimination they suffer.

One Catholic organisation located near the border with the North stands out. Here refugees get their first exposure to southern customs, like Internet and job seeking, and can access various programmes that exist in the diocese for people who want to enter society in a dignified way.

• south
• north
• korean
• defectors
• refugees
• saeteomin
• economics