Adrian Hong
Adrian Hong currently serves as Director of the Pegasus Project, an initiative that uses cutting-edge technology to penetrate closed societies and empower people in those nations to communicate amongst themselves, and with the outside world. Adrian was selected as one of the twenty 2010 TED Senior Fellows from across the globe.
Adrian was previously co-founder and former Executive Director of Liberty in North Korea, or LiNK, an international NGO devoted to human rights in North Korea, and the protection of North Korean refugees all over the world.
In December of 2006, Adrian was arrested along with 2 LiNK field workers and 6 North Korean refugees in the People's Republic of China and imprisoned before being released and deported. The PRC refuses to recognize North Koreans as refugees despite international, independent and UN findings to the contrary, and does not abide by it's treaty obligations under the 1951 Refugee Convention, which it is a signatory to. North Koreans repatriated to the DPRK face severe interrogation and punishment, and those caught attempting to defect, converting to Christianity or meeting with foreigners face imprisonment in labor and concentration camps. The refugees were released in July of 2007 in an unprecedented move by Chinese authorities and sent to South Korea.
He was a Visiting Lecturer in 2008 teaching "America, Human Rights and Foreign Policy" at Korea's Ewha University. He was selected as a 2009 Arnold Wolfers Fellow at Yale University and a 2009 TED Fellow. Mr. Hong was chosen as a 2007 Asia Society Asia 21 Young Leader, a group of the top 200 leaders under 40 from Asia and the US, and was a 2007 NetKAL Fellow at the University of Southern California's School of Social Work. Adrian was Executive Director of KASCON at Yale University.