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This article is devoted to the study of historical and demographic aspects of famine in Kazakhstan between 1921 and 1923. The victims of the famine numbered in the deaths of thousands and caused irreparable losses. The purpose of the article is to conduct a historical and comparative analysis of the demographic consequences of famine. The research tasks include a comparative analysis of famine using archival documents, census materials and statistical data. In addition, the method of demographic analysis of the consequences of the famine, the scale of the damage and their impact on the life of the indigenous population of the republic will be applied. The distinctive feature of the research methodology is the systematization of statistical data on famine in various dimensions and modules. The findings of the study showed that the use of a comparative method to study the demographic consequences of famine contributes to a deeper study of this topic. The results obtained through qualitative analysis using statistical data served as an empirical basis for compiling a more complete demographic picture of famine in the 1920s of the 20th century in Kazakhstan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines whether economic inequality intensified the adverse effects of harvest, price, and income shocks during a famine. Using a parish‐level longitudinal dataset from the Finnish famine of the 1860s, it shows that a substantial proportion of the excess mortality experienced during the famine resulted from a decline in agricultural production, a decline in incomes, and a surge in food prices. The findings indicate that the adverse effects of food output fluctuations were intensified by increasing income inequality and decreasing average income, while the market‐transmitted shocks were weakened by a contraction of disposable income. The results are corroborated with multiple alternative estimation techniques, including the introduction of spatial spill‐overs. The results show that even a pre‐industrial famine affecting an impoverished society was meaningfully defined by the distribution of incomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the discussion on languages in the region. Topics include finding sanctuary from economic, ethnic, racial, and religious persecution; and from famine, death, genocide, and dispossession; and languages being now endangered or lost due to the genocide by mostly English and Dutch-speaking Christian immigrants.

According to domestic and international epidemiological investigation, the proportion of substance involved sexual assault has the trend of ascent. In the past, laboratory methods that investigated urine sample of the sexual assault victims was to screen with enzyme immunoassay and then confirmed with mass spectrometry. The objective of the study is to simultaneously identify abused drugs in 126 decoded urine samples of sexual assault victims by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. The instrument was operated in multiple-reaction monitoring with an electro-spray positive ionization mode. Chromatograms were separated with ACE5 C18 column on a gradient of acetonitrile. After liquid-liquid extraction, samples were passed through a 0.22μm PVDF filter before injection into the system. The limits of quantitation ranged from 0.2 to 10ng/mL. The precision (CV) results were below 12.9% (intraday) and 15.0% (interday). The intraday accuracy ranged from 84.8 to 121.0%, interday accuracy ranged from 72.0 to 117.3%. We found that 29 (23.0%) were positive for drugs. The most common drug identified is flunitrazepam (11.1%), followed by nimetazepam and ketamine (7.9%), some new psychoactive substances, such as 2C-B, mephedrone, methylone, PMA and PMMA were also identified. We identified abused drugs, benzodiazepines, and new psychoactive substances in urine of sexual assault victims by using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines criminality and the use of the criminal justice system during the Finnish famine of 1866-1868. The main research objective of the study is to provide insight on how and why famine affects crime. To provide background for the examination, a description of the trends in crime and crime control during the years 1842-1890 is presented. The latter half of the century and the nascent urbanisation of Finland brought about a considerable increase in the number of criminal convictions for minor crimes but the convictions for serious crimes were on a downward trend. The crime trend was interrupted by the famine when property crime rates quadrupled. Interestingly, the levels of recorded violence and homicides remained stable or even reduced slightly. In order to provide explanations for the phenomenon, theories of modern criminology are used in conjunction with an analysis of individual, structural and cultural factors affecting hidden crime. The conclusion of the analysis is that the reduction of violence is most likely a statistical illusion caused by a multitude of factors discouraging the exposure of violent crimes. After the famine, the downward trend of serious crimes halted and stabilised to a level slightly higher than before. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an interim report, and gazetteer, on the enumeration and categorisation of memorials to Finland's Great Famine Years, an element of the Academy of Finland's 2012-17 project, "'The Terrible Visitation': Famine in Finland and Ireland ca. 1845-68 - Transnational, Comparative and Long-Term Perspectives". To outside observers, it can sometimes seen as though Finland's famine of the 1860s has been "forgotten", particularly in comparison with catastrophes in Ireland (1845-51) and Ukraine (1932-3). In the latter cases, political circumstances have infuenced historic narratives, and placed the Great Famines at the centre of a national narrative that emphasises the baleful role of an external other. In Finland, which was responsible for its own economic and political administration by the 1860s, commemoration has been more local in focus. The memorials nevertheless highlight the existence of an idealised national autostereotype, which stresses stoicism and forbearance, along with a persistent belief that the nation could be crystallised by shared suffering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the Ottoman famines of the 1870s - that killed tens of thousands of people in Anatolia due to starvation and disease - from a global comparative perspective. It focuses on two famines in particular that struck the central and eastern provinces of the empire in 1873-75 and 1879-1881 (just following the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877-78), respectively. They were triggered by climatic causes, yet their devastating effects were also a product of the global and domestic economic and political environment of the decade. Local, imperial and global man-made reasons exacerbated the severe impacts of nature and climate. The article addresses these famines as significant traumatic disasters, the memories of which were overshadowed by later catastrophic events in Ottoman history and historiography, and which have been almost invisible in European and global famine historiography of the nineteenth century. It summarizes the political- economic environment of the decade, attempts to investigate Ottoman famines in a global historical context and outline a comparative research agenda for an Ottoman history of famine and empire in the late nineteenth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an essay into the history of famines faced by Irish Canadians in the 20th century. Topics discussed include the recognition of Marianna O'Gallagher's book " Grosse Île: Gateway to Canada," the commemorative history of the Great Irish famine in Canada, and excerpts from famine literature published in Canada.

Although the Kazakh famine of 1930-33 led to the death of 1.5 million people, a quarter of Soviet Kazakhstan's population, the crisis is little known in the West. However, in recent years a number of scholars in Europe and the United States have begun to research the issue. This article offers an overview of their scholarship, highlighting points of agreement and debate. But despite this new wave of scholarly interest, several facets of the Kazakh disaster still remain poorly understood. This essay concludes by suggesting areas for future scholarly investigation and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the significance of the unprecedented donations made by Cherokees and Choctaws in west of the Mississippi for the relief of famine victims in Ireland in 1847. Topics covered include Indian press' treatment of Irish famine and famine philanthropy, the forced removal of the Native Indians in the Southeast, inherent Native morality and sympathy, abuses of the Irish and Indians by their government, local and global politics, British imperialism, and U.S. Indian policies.

The article presents a report from a June 25-26, 2015 conference in Stuttgart, Germany hosted by the history of medicine department of the Robert Bosch Stiftung endowment on the historical relationship between gender, nutrition, and health. Topics of presentations delivered included the relationship between gender and patterns of meat consumption in the 19th and 20th centuries, gendered aspects of food preperation in antiquity, and gendered aspects of the English famine of 1315 to 1322.

The article discusses a study on demographic change including birth rate, mortality rate, and emigration rate of Ireland. Topics discussed include publishment of annual estimates of net migration from 1926 by the Central Statistics Organization (CSO); impact of the First World War over the birth rate across all regions of the then United Kingdom; and mentions that the Famine resulted in very large population movements, as emigration dramatically increased.

The article argues that the vision of a future world articulated by the U.S. media, government, and aid focused on transformation of Ethiopian famine victims in 1983 from unenlightened peoples into world citizens. Topics include the humanitarian aid provided by the U.S. to the famine victims in Ethiopia, the U.S. conservative Cold War ideology that underpinned much of the future world vision, and cold war and paternalistic discourse shaping the reception of the famine by audiences in the U.S.

The article reports on two main communist regimes, the Soviet Union (USSR) and China, that were affected by the greatest famines of the twentieth century. It compares the famines that hit the two countries in time of peace, the USSR in 1931-1933 and China in 1958-1962. It informs that in both cases, a similar development strategy led to excessive transfers of resources from agriculture to heavy industry.

This article develops a constructivist, non-metaphysical, non-essentialist conception of human dignity using Jeremy Waldron, Michael Rosen, Ernst Bloch, Jürgen Habermas and Axel Honneth. This constructivist conception of dignity is then related to the communicative or reflexive conception of freedom developed by discourse ethics. Then, these two conceptions are demonstrated to be foundational for the development and implementation of human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article studies hunger as a cultural category through a close reading of two appeals for alms from the Paris area in the year 1662. It explores how the nature, causes and solutions of hunger are perceived in the texts. In the appeals we do not encounter hunger as the absence of food but in the form of unworthy eating and shameful foodstuffs. The food that the hungry consume threatens their humanity, but this threat changes in nature depending on gender, place and rank. The signs of hunger vary for men and women, for farmers and town-dwellers and for people of higher and lower estate. With the Counter-reformation, hunger is also brought into the centre of high-level politics. Hunger becomes part of a semantic field that is both political and religious and where God’s plan for human salvation is at stake. The article argues that the appeals can be read as part of a Counter-Reformation rhetoric that addresses the healing of Christ’s earthly body – the Catholic church. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the tragedy of the Holodomor (the Great Famine) of 1932 and 1933 figures prominently in public discourse and historical scholarship in Ukraine today, its gender dimension has not yet been examined. This article is based on an analysis of personal narratives of female survivors of the Holodomor, collected and published in Ukraine since the 1990s until now. It focuses on the peculiarities of women's experience of the Holodomor and explores women's strategies of resistance and survival in the harsh circumstances of genocide. It exposes a spectrum of women's agency at the grassroots and illuminates controversies around women's ways of coping with starvation. The article also discusses the methodological challenges and ethical issues faced by a Ukrainian female scholar studying women's experiences of famine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The principal obstacle to effective humanitarian response in the 2011 Somali famine was lack of access to famine victims. Poor access can be traced to five distinct bottlenecks: (1) Al-Shabaab''s obstructionist policies, which prevented most international aid agencies from operating in the famine zones; (2) US suspension of food aid into areas of Somalia controlled by Al-Shabaab, and other constraints on aid agencies related to counter-terrorism legislation; (3) chronic insecurity pre-dating Al-Shabaab and US policies, which led most aid agencies to suspend or close operations in south Somalia by 2009; (4) diversion of food aid by armed groups and corrupt officials in the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) which controlled the capital Mogadishu; and (5) a “privilege gap” in Somali society, in which low status groups lacked the social capital to access relief aid, remittances, and lateral transfers from fellow Somalis. All five of these impediments must be addressed if humanitarian access is to be improved in the future. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Objective: On 20 July 2011, for the first time since 1991–1992, the United Nations declared famine in parts of Somalia. Here, we report the methods, data and analysis that underpinned this declaration along with the review of trends in mortality and malnutrition. Methods: During July 2011, 16 population-based nutrition and mortality surveys were conducted in southern Somalia. Data on food access, collected through seasonal assessments and monthly monitoring, were analyzed using Household Economy methods. Results: In 11 of 16 survey locations, the prevalence of Global Acute Malnutrition exceeded the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification threshold for Phase 5 (Famine) of 30%. In five areas, Crude Death Rates exceeded the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Phase 5 (Famine) threshold of 2/10,000/day. In agro-pastoral zones of the south, where access was most limited, more than 20% of households faced extreme food shortages. Comment: Survey findings and analysis confirm that a famine occurred in parts of southern Somalia during 2011 and raise the question of why strong early warning analysis did not trigger an earlier, better funded and more effective, response. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article analyses Australian efforts on behalf of victims of the 1876–8 Indian famine as complex articulations of colonial identity and loyalty in the British imperial world. Focused on the Victorian Famine Relief Fund, which made extensive use of vivid photographic images of sufferers, the article also examines the public campaigns on behalf of Indian famine victims in other colonial cities and towns. It suggests that the language of filial duty most commonly associated with later military commitments had a humanitarian pedigree, and that the settler colonial ability to express empathy for non-white British subjects was enhanced by the capacity to see photographic images of them. Despite their promise of drawing the viewer closer to witnessing suffering, photographs of famine victims served rather to emphasise the distance between the viewer and the viewed, in ways that were productive for the fund-raising effort. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A revisionist literature on the Great Chinese Famine has emerged in recent years. These revisionists focus primarily on the question of agency. They claim that that neither poor weather nor the excesses of local cadres can explain the extent of mortality; rather, responsibility lies squarely with Mao and the CCP leadership. Using county-level data on mortality, output, rainfall and temperature for Sichuan province, I argue that this revisionist view is unconvincing. Weather admittedly played only a minor role, and the zealotry of the Party centre contributed significantly to the death toll. However, variations in mortality between Sichuan's counties appear to have been essentially random – suggesting that differences in local cadre responses to central government policy were decisive in determining the scale of famine. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Research suggests that a significant portion of victims of interpersonal violence do not acknowledge or label their experience as a criminal victimization. Studies exploring unacknowledged victimizations have found that individuals are more likely to acknowledge victimization when the experience meets certain, often stereotypical criteria. This study addressed this issue by integrating literature on victim acknowledgment and stalking victimization to identify correlates of victimization acknowledgment among stalking victims. Data were drawn from the 2006 stalking supplement to the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), and the sample included both female and male victims of stalking. Findings revealed support for a "classic stalking script," which included a reliance on stereotypical types of stalking behavior (i.e., being spied on) that were shown to increase acknowledgment for victims of stalking. Results also described gender based correlates of victimization acknowledgment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on a famine in Kazakhstan during the 1930s, and analyzes how the famine led to violent dynamics among civilians. Several topics are discussed, such as how the famine was caused by a forced collectivization campaign that destroyed the population's livestock and grain supply, how the famine caused over 1.5 million people to die and caused a mass emigration out of the country, as well as how the situation caused violence to spike among the three main people groups, the Bolshevik communist officials, the nomadic Kazakh people, and the European immigrants. The author mentions that the Bolsheviks were violent because they had more power and resources, and the nomadic people became violent because they were starving and had lost the animals that they depended on to survive.

Famines and food scarcities in the Highlands and Islands, apart from those of the 1690s and 1847, have been under-examined in Scottish historiography. This article considers an aspect of the serious famine of 1836-7: the public response to the famine as reflected by the committees set up to solicit public subscriptions, principally in Edinburgh, Glasgow and London and by the contemporary newspaper reportage. Three themes in particular are examined: the motive and role of the proprietors in seeking subscriptions; the extent to which the evangelical ethos of the day - that the most potent weapon of God's wrathful providence was famine - influenced the public response; and the highlander as a suitable recipient of public aid. The public response was generous, driven by a strong belief in Christian charity, benevolence, divine direction and philanthropic duty. The highlanders were seen as an object of charity for the debt owed to them by the nation for war time services rendered. The proprietors never shook off the criticism that their appeals to the public were self-serving. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese famine of 1959-1961 was the largest in human history. We used data on 35,025 women born in 1957-1963 to assess the impact of famine exposure on height, BMI, and hypertension at ∼32 y of age. The data were from the China-U.S. Collaborative Project for Neural Tube Defect Prevention. The famine varied in intensity across provinces and counties and affected rural areas disproportionately. We used a measure of famine intensity at the county level based on the size of birth year cohorts in a difference-in-difference model, which compared each cohort to the unexposed 1963 cohort, after correcting for age and time trends, and estimated impact for the average level of intensity across counties. The impact was confined to rural areas, but this could be due to small sample sizes in urban areas. Height was reduced in the 1958 and 1959 cohorts by 1.7 and 1.3 cm, respectively. This corresponded to exposures during 0.5-3.5 y for the 1958 cohort and late pregnancy and 0-2.5 y for the 1959 cohort. BMI increased by 0.92 kg/m² in the 1957 cohort, exposed from 1.5 to 4.5 y, but decreased by 0.3 kg/m² in the 1960-1961 cohorts, exposed during pregnancy and infancy. Famine exposure was associated with a 3-fold increase in the odds of hypertension for the 1958 cohort. In general, postnatal exposure during the first 2-3 y of life reduced height and increased BMI and hypertension, whereas exposure during pregnancy and infancy reduced BMI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Soviet government's response to international offers of assistance for Soviet children affected by the 1921 famine in the Volga region. Emphasis is given to the social conditions of children removed to Czechoslovakia and the political aspects of their return. The author explores the traveling conditions for children transported by railroad, the outbreak of disease and sickness among the children, and relations between the children and their foreign guardians. Other topics include the refusal of children to return to the Soviet Union, nutrition and food for the children, and anti-communist propaganda.

The article discusses the perspectives of Ukrainian and Russian scholars on the Ukrainian man-made famine, or Holodomor, in Ukraine between 1932 and 1933, with particular focus on the legal aspects of the famine. The author addresses the criminal nature of the famine, the role of the totalitarian regime of leader Joseph Stalin in the famine, and the starvation of Ukrainian peasants. The recognition by Ukrainian scholars of the Holodomor as a form of genocide against Ukrainians is explored, as well as the refusal by the Soviet Union to recognize the famine as genocide. It is reported that the approaches of Russian historians emphasize the impact of the famine in other parts of the Soviet Union and that some deny the consequences of the Holodomor.

The famine in occupied Greece between 1941 and 1943 was a deadly one with important short- and long-term effects on society at large. This paper focuses on the effect the famine had on the operation of two hospitals, those of Hios and Hermoupolis. The unique availability of patients' registers for both hospitals means that questions relating to the hospital's role and how they were utilised by the population during the famine can be addressed. Thus the paper examines the identity of patients, how long they stayed in the hospital, the outcomes of their stay and the diseases from which they suffered. Comparisons are made with the pre-famine period in an attempt to establish whether any of the parameters changed during the famine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dense collections of eighteenth-century wills and death registers from Tekanto and Ixil, two towns in northern Yucatan, represent hitherto unexplored sources for documenting the relationship between natural disasters and mortality patterns among the Yucatecan Maya during colonial times. They provide detailed, sometimes daily, records of the impact of famines caused by multiyear droughts, hurricanes, and plagues of locusts on the agrarian population of the peninsula, which supplement the brief, impressionistic accounts of historians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reexamines English, Irish, and American demographic statistics to produce new estimates of the extent of mortality and migration during the well-known Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s. He concludes that there was significantly more emigration and significantly less mortality in Ireland than is commonly believed. The starting point is a homeostatic population series, which indicates that the 1841 English census population total was about 6 percent too high. Most scholars assume that the total population figure in that census is reliable, although many have questioned the numbers of people that the census assigned to each age group. The lower homeostatic population total for 1841, extrapolated from marriage data, implies that Irish migration to England during the two succeeding decades was at least twice as large as has generally been accepted. In addition to changing the migration totals, substituting the homeostatic population estimate for the 1841 census total would create greater consistency between the population and other English statistics during this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: During 1999-2000, great parts of Ethiopia experienced a period of famine which was recognised internationally. The aim of this paper is to characterise the epidemiology of mortality of the period, making use of individual, longitudinal population-based data from the Butajira demographic surveillance site and rainfall data from a local site. Methods: Vital statistics and household data were routinely collected in a cluster sample of 10 subcommunities in the Butajira district in central Ethiopia. These were supplemented by rainfall and agricultural data from the national reporting systems. Results: Rainfall was high in 1998 and well below average in 1999 and 2000. In 1998, heavy rains continued from April into October, in 1999 the small rains failed and the big rains lasted into the harvesting period. For the years 1998-1999, the mortality rate was 24.5 per 1,000 person-years, compared with 10.2 in the remainder of the period 1997-2001. Mortality peaks reflect epidemics of malaria and diarrhoeal disease. During these peaks, mortality was significantly higher among the poorer. Conclusions: The analyses reveal a serious humanitarian crisis with the Butajira population during 1998-1999, which met the CDC guideline crisis definition of more than one death per 10,000 per day. No substantial humanitarian relief efforts were triggered, though from the results it seems likely that the poorest in the farming communities are as vulnerable as the pastoralists in the North and East of Ethiopia. Food insecurity and reliance on subsistence agriculture continue to be major issues in this and similar rural communities. Epidemics of traditional infectious diseases can still be devastating, given opportunities in nutritionally challenged populations with little access to health care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The potato blight, Phythophthora infestans, was first recorded in Dublin in August 1845. Over the next five years the Irish potato harvest failed four times, triggering mass hunger and disease on a magnitude the European continent had not endured for centuries. During this period, over one million Irish perished and a further two million fled the land, never to return. Thus, in a relatively short period, three million people were dead or gone. The purpose of this article is to situate this story of human deprivation and suffering within the context of an evolving “colonial biopolitics” aimed at regenerating Irish society. Although recent writings demonstrate an interest in the regimes of power that produce famine, there has been little attempt to connect such arguments to the theory and practice of colonialism, especially its investments in the liberal goals of development and social improvement. Building on the perspectives of Michel Foucault, particularly his discussion of “biopolitics,” I argue that the Great Famine was shaped by a regulatory order willing to exploit catastrophe to further the aims of population reform. The article draws particular attention to the development of an Irish Poor Law system, arguing that this legislative debate exposes the growing perception that agricultural rationalization, fiscal restructuring, and population clearances were necessary to “ameliorate” and “improve” Irish society. This twining of relief and development facilitated dangerous distinctions between productive and unproductive life and allowed the colonial state to apply its own sovereign remedy to Irish poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the content of popular biographies of British politician Winston Churchill. The author states that biographies of Churchill remain relevant because he continues to be seen in Anglo-Saxon countries as the ideal leader illustrating decisiveness and moral courage. The author explains that these biographies usually ignore material concerning the failure to respond to the 1943 famine in Bengal, India. The author suggests this failure to respond is ignored due to racist Eurocentrism which places greater value on the lives of Europeans than those of Asians.

Aims Prenatal exposure to severe famine has been associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia and affective disorders. We studied the relationship between prenatal exposure to famine during the Dutch hunger winter of 1944–45 and addiction later in life. Design A case–control study. Setting The Rotterdam city area during the Dutch hunger winter lasting from mid-October 1944 to mid-May 1945. From February 1945 to mid-May 1945 the hunger winter was characterized by a famine peak. Participants Patients are native Dutch addicted patients from the Rotterdam Addiction Treatment Program and controls are native Dutch inhabitants of Rotterdam, born between 1944 and 1947. Measurement Exposure to the whole hunger winter (< 1400 kcal/day) and the peak of the hunger winter (< 1000 kcal/day) was determined for each trimester of gestation. For each trimester the exposed/unexposed ratios were compared between patients and controls and quantified as odds ratios (OR). Findings The odds of first-trimester gestational exposure to famine during the total hunger winter was significantly higher among patients receiving treatment for an addictive disorder [OR = 1.34, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.10–1.64]. Stratification by sex shows that the odds of exposure during the first trimester was significantly higher only among men (OR = 1.34, 95% CI 1.05–1.72), but not among women (OR = 1.26, 95% CI 0.88–1.81). The odds of exposure to the peak of the hunger winter during the first trimester of gestation were also significantly higher among addiction treatment patients (OR = 1.61, 95% CI 1.22–2.12). We did not find any significant differences for the second and third trimesters of gestation. Conclusion First-trimester prenatal exposure to famine appears to be associated with addiction later in life. The study confirms the adverse influence of severe malnutrition on brain development and maturation, confirms the influence of perinatal insults on mental health in later life and gives rise to great concern about the possible future consequences for the hunger regions in our world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The severe food crisis of the 1990s forced thousands of North Koreans to leave their country in search of food. Most of them crossed the border into China, to which the Government of the People's Republic of China (the PRC) responded by forcibly repatriating defectors to North Korea, thus placing many of them at risk of being subjected to inhumane and degrading treatment and, at times, even death. This article provides an overview of the situation of North Korean asylum seekers and analyses the legal protection available to North Korean defectors under international law. The article focuses specifically on the situation of North Koreans in mainland China and China's obligations under international human rights and refugee law. The aim of the article is to contribute to the elaboration of durable solutions for the plight of North Korean asylum seekers and to develop a range of recommendations for law reform and policy change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An interview by Harriet Martineau with a survivor of the famine in Ireland is presented. When asked how she lived her life during the famine, she recounted that she stayed at home and do her duty to give out the relief to hungry people in their neighborhood. She describes that donkeys and pigs and other worse creatures were scarce in their areas. The survivor points out that things in society were worse even when the money was gone since most of the money were only found in the hands of the rich people.