As Kim Jong-un’s recent 12,400-mile round trip to Moscow on a 35mph train demonstrated, the art of leaving North Korea can be an intricate business, requiring in his case bulletproof windows, an onboard helicopter and lobsters by the plateful.
By contrast Kim Seongeun, also known as Pastor Kim, oversees a different kind of departure from North Korea: highly dangerous, unsanctioned, clandestine escapes from Kim Jong-un’s totalitarian and often insane-seeming regime. Based in Seoul and founder of the Caleb Mission, Pastor Kim has been in the escape business since 2000. His exploits are now the subject of Beyond Utopia, a gripping film that won the Audience award for US documentary at this year’s Sundance festival.
