The Impact of Theological Foundations of Restorative Justice for the Human Rights Protections of North Korean Stateless Women as Victims of Human Trafficking

Korean women who reside in China. The human trafficking experienced by stateless women causes moral injury that violates the human rights of the victims, leaving them \Vith physical, emotional, and spiritual wounds. North Korean female refugees residing in China can easily become the target of trafficking by those who attempt to take advantage of their illegal status-such as the brokers who aided their escape from North Korea and their employers in China. Their vulnerability is intensified by the politicized and exclusionary nature of citizenship that privileges citizens and discriminates against others. North Koreans generally stay in China temporarily before they escape to South Korea and are considered stateless due to their lack of membership in any country. They cannot receive legal support for the crimes they are victims of, nor are they guaranteed basic rights. As a response to the crime of human trafficking, I will address the rnlue of the foundations and practices of theologically-infonned restorative justice. Restorative justice, with its most prominent characteristic being rebuilding social relationships among victims. perpetrators. and the community that ,vas damaged by a crime, has been proposed as an alternative to the traditional retributive justice model to treat criminal acts. I will explore how a theologically-grounded restorative justice model can contribute to the thought and action of Christians and the larger public in the face of the moral injury caused by human trafficking against North Korean women in China. Its concern for the socially marginalized can aid the victims' healing from the crime by recognizing their dignity and helping their voices to be heard. Furthennore, I will address how this model, in its complementary relationship with other justice systems, can caII for cooperative efforts from local and global communities toward broader systemic change. This can protect the victims' rights, such as through the juridical implementation of improwd immigration policy and citizenship law.