Korean war 60 years on: Haven in South for young defectors from North

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Today marks the 60th anniversary of the start of what has come to be known as the war that never ended. After three years of fighting, in which as many as four million people died, the two sides agreed on 27 July 1953 to a shaky truce, though no treaty was ever signed. It is maintained by forces either side of the demilitarized zone , the world's most heavily fortified border.
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For Kim Yong-hee (17 years old, now living in south korea), the current crisis is a timely reminder of the country in which he spent his first 15 years, and of why he decided to embark on a journey that so many others have tried and failed. He says he was taken to the border by a go-between, who bribed a North Korean guard to take the teenager across the Tumen River into northeast China. "At one point the water came up to my neck," he said.
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The government-funded school opened in 2006 for youths among the 20,000 defectors in South Korea. Many of Kim's peers, who are aged 13-24, arrived with just one or no parents and bore scars of a childhood spent in one of the world's poorest and most repressive countries. Most had witnessed public executions and seen members of their family die of starvation, and some still require regular counselling.

"There are such big differences that they find it hard to take in at first," says the school's principal, Gwak Jong-moon. "Some had never seen a mobile phone, and they are not accustomed to thinking for themselves and competing academically."

the guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/25/korean-war-haven-south-defectors-north