A Quote by Lee Hyeon-seo

Staying in China provided me with the opportunity to adjust to life outside of North Korea and to gain a sense of perspective, most importantly, by learning that so much of what I had been taught about my country was a lie.

Lee Hyeon-seo

Quote Topics

About Adjust Been China Country Gain Had Importantly Korea Learning Lie Life Me Most Much North North Korea Opportunity Outside Perspective Provided Sense Staying Taught

Quote Author

Lee Hyeon-seo
South Korean - Writer
Born: 1980

The solution to North Korea is the reunification of the Korean Peninsula. China could influence the North; it supplies 80 to 90 percent of North Korea's energy. The United States have to put pressure on China in order for China to pressure North Korea.

John Bolton

Living in China, I found out that the bright new world was not for me, not for defectors. My life in North Korea had been OK; suddenly, in China, I had to feed myself and earn money. Worst of all, North Korean defectors are hunted by the government.

Lee Hyeon-seo

I can't take anything off the table. Because you look at some of these countries, you look at North Korea, we're doing nothing there. China should solve that problem for us. China should go into North Korea. China is totally powerful as it relates to North Korea.

Donald Trump

China is ruthlessly pragmatic. It supports North Korea for its own selfish interests. And I believe that China no longer considers us an ally. The current president, Xi Jinping, cultivates close relations with South Korea. He has never met with me, the leader of North Korea, something that the leader of China has always done. At the grand celebrations in Beijing two years ago commemorating the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, he placed the president of Russia and the president of South Korea at his side. In North Korea, we pay a lot of attention to ceremonies and what they signal.

Fareed Zakaria

Our goal there, in my view, is to work and lean strongly on China to put as much pressure. China is one of the few major countries in the world that has significant support for North Korea, and I think we got to do everything we can to put pressure on China. I worry very much about an isolated, paranoid country with atomic bombs.

Bernie Sanders

I just wanted to see China with my own eyes. I wanted to see whether North Korea was the best country in the world or China was the best. I grew up believing that China was much worse than North Kore, because that's what the regime told us.

Lee Hyeon-seo

All North Koreans know the risk of all their actions. Yeonmi Park grew up in North Korea and says watching outside videos changed her perspective of the world. She says, as a child, all she learned from watching state-run media was love for the Kim regime and North Korea.

Kang Chol-hwan

China should go into North Korea. China is totally powerful as it relates to North Korea.

Donald Trump

It was very shocking for me to read newspapers that openly criticised the government in South Korea. That is impossible in North Korea and almost impossible in China. I was really impressed, and I became addicted to reading the news and watching the media so I could learn about the world. North Koreans would be stunned if they experienced this.

Lee Hyeon-seo

I think the fact that this was a essentially a person under [China] protection and the North Koreans went and assassinated [Kim Jong-nam], this made be the straw that really does it. And as you know, just a couple of weeks ago, the Chinese stopped all coal imports from North Korea.So there are signs that are getting serious. I guess from the policy perspective from the U.S., I mean, we got to decide what`s important to us with China?

Christopher R. Hill

If there's any country that has the capacity not to control North Korea, but to influence North Korea, it's still China. The Chinese always say they have very little influence. They have more than they say they do. We should put pressure on them to do it and there's finally, we're seeing the first signs of a little bit of Chinese disaffection. At some point they're getting tired of the antics of this country. This is a dangerous ally for China to have. And the more Chinese can pressure them and put the economic screws on them, the better it will be for everybody.

Richard N. Haass

I was in Korea. I've noticed all my life I see elderly people who have been close to death in an illness and they're absolutely cured and they say, now I know how to live my life. I've seen death. That happened to me when I was 19. It was a terrible, terrifying thing. And I live my life like those people decided to do when they were old. So, since I was 19, I've had the most fun possible every single day, even when I had a rough life. It was the army which taught me about life, and the theater which taught me how good it could be.

Michael Caine

One of the ways the North Korea regime has kept power is by keeping its people ignorant of the living standards in the outside world. That's the underlying lie that supports the regime - not that their country is 'normal' but that they are better off.

Barbara Demick

I worry very, very much about an isolated country. That's what makes me nervous. Russia lives in the world. China lives in the world. North Korea is a very, very strange country because it is so isolated, and I do feel that a nation with nuclear weapons, they have got to be dealt with. Dealt with effectively.

Bernie Sanders

The only country that can stop North Korea is China.