49 1) Continued flight from North Korea and structuralization of human rights violations against women From the mid 1990s until today, there has been a persistent flow of North Koreans fleeing the country. When considering the 17,134 North Korean émigrés who have entered South Korea until now (September 2009), adding the number of North Korean refugees residing in China, the annual numbers of people who are forcibly repatriated to North Korea, and the number of North Korean refugees who have sought asylum or are currently undergoing asylum procedures in the USA, Germany, and other third countries, the total number of North Korean refugees can be estimated to be of considerable size.18 As all these figures show a gradual trend of stabilization and growth and considering the invisible number of North Koreans who live ‘illegally’ in China and other third countries for some time, they can be considered as showing that escapes from North Korea are becoming structurally persistent. Although this phenomenon of continued flight from North Korea can be explained by various factors, it provides circumstantial evidence of the fact that the internal political and socio-economic situation in North Korea fundamentally lacks the capacity for the improvements needed to significantly lower the number of persons fleeing the country. 18 According to estimates, the number of North Korean refugees living in China amounts to approximately 500,000-100,000. Moreover, in 2007 Dr. Jeong Sinjeo of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences elaborated in his article “Effects of the situation on the Korean peninsula on the development and security of ethnic Korean areas”, contributing to the current issue of the academic university journal ‘Central and Southern Nation’ (妬ºゲ鎚) and based on an on-site fact-finding study, that the number of North Korean refugees who were forcibly repatriated to North Korea in 2002 reached 4,809. This statistical figure resembles estimates of US-American and Korean human rights NGOs which suggested a number of 5,000 persons annually. In the paper, Dr. Jeong revealed that in 2002 3,732 illegal bordercrossers were arrested and deported to North Korea by the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture: 2,040 North Korean refugees plus 1,692 North Korean refugees who were caught before. On this basis, it is estimated that the number of North Korean refugees who are forcibly deported to North Korea every year reaches around 5,000. At the same time, the numbers of North Koreans seeking asylum in the USA, Germany, and other third countries is reported to be increasing steadily. In a paper titled “Changes in the situation of North Korean Refugees internally and abroad and future problems” which was published in May 2009 by Yi Yeonghwan, Senior Researcher of the Citizens’ Alliance for North Korean Human Rights, the number of North Korean refugees who were officially granted refugee status and leave to remain according to the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees in the USA, Canada as well as in Germany and the UK, (among 7 European countries) was stated to have totalled 522 persons. Yi explained in his article that “because states regard small numbers or dozens of persons as of little weight, presented reports would often omit these from the report material; in fact, there will be more cases in which refugee status is recognized.”