Everett pastor recounts ordeal

Published 9:00 pm Sunday, August 27, 2006

LYNNWOOD – The Rev. Phillip Jun Buck was deprived of sleep for the first couple of days after being arrested in China last year for helping North Korean refugees.

Thinking he could be an American spy, Chinese authorities interrogated him while he was in a state of exhaustion.

Suffering from a chronic ulcer, the only prison food Buck could eat was rice porridge – three times a day for 15 months, he said at a press conference in Lynnwood on Sunday.

But Buck’s difficulties were nothing compared to what happens to many of the North Korean refugees the Everett man has dedicated his life to helping. Those caught in China are tortured and most are sent back to North Korea, where they inevitably are executed, he said.

Buck called on the media and the U.S. government to pressure North Korea and the People’s Republic of China to improve conditions for North Koreans and those who flee the country. Many who leave do so out of hunger, he said.

“It’s very important for us to help North Korean refugees, to save them,” Buck said through translation by his daughter, Grace Yoon of Lynnwood.

About 50 people, including Korean pastors from around the state, came to Lynnwood’s Morning Star Korean Cultural Center for Buck’s press conference and celebratory dinner Sunday.

Buck, 68, was released from prison earlier this month and ordered deported. He returned to Seattle Aug. 21.

The retired Rev. John Park, former pastor of the Korean United Presbyterian Church in Edmonds, has known Buck for several years.

“He did a good job for the refugees,” said Park, who added that he visited Buck in China and contributed money to the cause.

Buck fled his home and family in North Korea as a child, his daughter said.

Buck has spent most of the past nine years in China, feeding and sheltering at least 1,000 refugees. About 100 of them have made it to South Korea.

When Buck was caught, nine North Koreans were under his watch, he said. Chinese officials claimed it was 10 – which meant the difference between deportation and 20 years in prison.

He was shown to be correct at his trial, he said. But he still had to spend 457 days in prison when Chinese law calls for such cases to be dispatched in a month and a half.

Chinese authorities told Buck he had been a wanted man since 2002.

“After they arrested me, they said, ‘I have caught a really big fish,’ ” he said.

Buck believes the U.S. government was very influential in securing his release. A consulate official who often visited him in jail told him the American ambassador and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice were very interested in his case.

The Chinese, Buck said, “were being very careful when they tried me in their court.”

Buck’s three daughters and one son waged a quiet campaign with members of Congress to help free their father. Between them, they visited him 10 times.

When asked his future plans, Buck – wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses at the indoor press conference – stopped short of saying he’d go back to China. But he made his intentions clear.

He was never told how long he has to stay out of China, he said.

“What do you think I’m going to do?” he said. “I’m not doing this to make money. I am risking my life to save them. If they do escape from North Korea I will somehow find a way to help them.”

Reporter Bill Sheets: 425-339-3439 or sheets@heraldnet.com.