A decade after leaving her family behind to flee North Korea, the defector was overwhelmed with excitement when she spoke to her 22-year-old son on the phone for the first time in May after he too escaped into China.
While speaking to him again on the phone days later, however, she listened in horror as the safe house where her son and four other North Korean escapees were hiding was raided by Chinese authorities.
"I heard voices, someone saying, 'Shut up!' in Chinese," said the woman, who spoke on condition of anonymity to protect her son's safety. "Then the line was cut off, and I heard later he was caught."