Sloane Thor is a recent graduate of Wittenberg University, majoring in East Asian Studies with minors in Chinese language and literature, political science, and international studies. During her time there, she completed a senior capstone project on Repression, Punishment, and Genocide: An Examination of Human Rights Violations in North Korea, which is currently being prepared for publication in the Wittenberg East Asian Studies Journal.

Her interest in North Korea stems from her time studying abroad at Yonsei University in South Korea. During her time there, she took a class on North Korean Human Rights, Human Security, the UN System and International Civil Society taught by HRNK Executive Director Greg Scarlatoiu. Taking this class, along with reading North Korean escapee memoirs such as Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West and In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl’s Journey to Freedom, motivated her to pursue North Korean human rights violations as her main topic for her senior capstone project.

Through her internship at HRNK, Sloane hopes to gain more background knowledge on the situation in North Korea from a human rights perspective. She also hopes to study more about China and the treatment of escapees there, potentially using her Mandarin Chinese language skills to do so.