On February 7, South Korea’s Ministry of Unification (MOU) announced a new support program for defectors, with a one-time subsidy of 4,000,000 KRW ($3457.60 at the time of publication) to be handed out to the parents of North Koreans living in the South. 

But this money was intended for a specific kind of defector family, those with children not born in either the North or the South: parents raising what have become known as “third-country-born” North Koreans.

It’s easy to forget that, amid high-profile defections which can take only a few months, that, in general, the process takes a long