Durihana, Inc

115. Durihana acknowledged by mainstram US society

File :

Name : durihana

Date : 2011-05-18 오전 9:30:41

The 26th Annual AEAC Awards Ceremony hosted by the Denver Public Schools Asian Education Advisory Council (DPS AEAC) was held at the Doubletree Hotel's Grand Conference Room on May 1st, 2011 at 9am. About 300 teachers, administrators, parents, paraprofessionals and community volunteers attended the event.

Pastor Ki-won Chun of Durihana, a North Korean missionary organization located in South Korea, was awarded the Community Award by the DPS AEAC (Chairperson: Priscilla Shaw).

Pastor Ki-won Chun said in his speech as the keynote speaker, "Thank you for the hope and courage you have given the North Korean youth so they may spread their wings and plan their futures like the students of the Denver Public Schools. These youth are tired from their loneliness in a foreign country for they had to leave their country in search for food." He also requested to continue to have interest in the North Korean defectors until they can be educated in such environments like that of the Denver Public Schools.

"Durihana" has branches in the US, Japan, New Zealand and Taiwan etc. Celebrating the "North Korean refugee week" held by US Durihana in Denver, Colorado Governor Bill Ritter had named July 17, 2009 as "Durihana Day."

May 11, 2011 Durihana Inc

About 300 guests attending the awards ceremony

Flag raising ceremony and parade by the students of the DPS announcing the opening ceremony.

Opening Introductions by Priscilla Shaw and board members

Keynote speaker

Reverend Chun Ki-won, Durihana, Inc.

Reverend Chun Ki-won is President of Durihana and a South Korean NGO who has devoted his life to rescuing North Korean refugees from China and other countries, and who operates underground homes for children of female North Korean defectors.

Pastor Chun is a graduate of Back Suk Theology College. In 1995, while as a missionary in the Yanji region, Chun met his first North Koreans in hiding. “These people had lost all their rights,” he said. “The most important thing I could do was revive their humanity.” In October of 1999, Reverend Chun founded Durihana.

This South Korean pastor has been called the “Asian [Oskar] Schindler,” after the famous World War II industrialist who saved hundreds of Jews from the Nazis, and “the Robin Hood of the North Korean refugees” for his role in leading more than 900 North Korean across China into countries like Cambodia, Thailand, Mongolia, South Korea and the United States.

In December 2001, Chinese authorities arrested Chun as he attempted to smuggle a group of refugees across the border into Mongolia. Their journey was captured on film and is featured in the documentary SEOUL TRAIN. Chun spent nearly eight months in a Chinese prison for this “crime” of helping North Korean refugees.

In 2009 Chun met with two American reporters, Lisa Ling and Euna Lee, in Seoul and was instrumental in helping them plan their trip to the border to report on North Korean refugees. That same year, in July, Colorado’s Governor, Bill Ritter, issued a proclamation designating July 17, 2009 as Durihana Day.

Welcome Annie Chung, Violinist