Joseph Kim was 12 when his father died of starvation during the devastating famine that swept North Korea in the early 1990s.

“Then, one day, my sister and my mother disappeared,” he said.

Some time later he learned that his mother had crossed the border into China and, in desperation, sold his sister as a bride to a Chinese man. But she was caught as she attempted to return to North Korea and sent to prison, leaving Mr Kim alone on the streets of Undok, a town close to the Chinese border in North Korea’s far north-east.

Forced to fend for himself, he became one of the “kkotjebi” or flowering swallows – the poetic name given to North Korea’s homeless, most of whom are children who have been abandoned by their parents, or elderly people cast out by families no longer able to care for them.

Reports smuggled out by activist networks suggest North Korea’s homeless population is growing, with food once again in desperately short supply.

Mr Kim, who escaped from the country in 2006 and is now an associate at the George W Bush Institute think tank in Dallas, knows exactly what they are going through.

Struggling to survive

After his immediate family abandoned him, he was taken in by aunts and uncles but it was made clear that he was a burden on families who were already struggling to survive.

“I thought it was better if I was on the street, even if that meant that I was not guaranteed three meals a day”, he said. “I wanted freedom and I knew that I was unwanted.”

Mr Kim survived on his wits, begging from farmers or in markets or train stations. Grandmothers could often be relied on for their generosity, he said, along with – surprisingly – soldiers. Mr Kim says he suspects they took pity on him as they were also young and away from their families.

When begging failed, he stole. Markets and stations offered the richest pickings for a pickpocket, although there was always a possibility he could be caught.

In the early hours of one morning, he was stealing a metal grating from a street in Undok to sell for scrap when he saw a group of teenagers watching him.

Stealing coal from houses

“I knew I had to make a choice of running or staying”, he said. “If I ran, they would catch me and there were three of them, so they would be able to take everything I had with me. But I had nothing, so I stayed.”

One of the boys asked if he had a lighter and, in the light of the moon, he recognised a childhood friend. Mr Kim was welcomed into the gang and, on the first night, they broke into a house to steal coal.

Over the following months, they eked out an existence by breaking into homes and taking any food or items that they could sell. During the winter months – the average temperature in Undok is minus 11C in January – they took over abandoned buildings.

That first gang did not last long as three boys were caught and Mr Kim never saw them again, but he forged similar alliances with other homeless children.

Mr Kim survived on the streets for three years before making his escape after resolving to go in search of his sister.

Asked if he has been able to discover anything about her, Mr Kim’s reply was short: “Nothing.”

He said: “I didn’t survive because I was better at begging or stealing than the other boys; I survived because of the knowledge that I had been loved by my parents and my sister. That kept me going.”

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