[1] After her grandparents defected to South Korea, she and her family were sent to a North Korean labor camp.

[1][2] In 1997, she ran away to South Korea after an American relative published a memoir stating that Lee's father was involved in anti-regime efforts.

[3] In 2008, she became the first North Korean defector to run for a seat in the National Assembly.

[5] Also in 2009, she founded the Hana Defector Women's Organization, an NGO that gives North Korean women living in South Korea job training, childcare, educational support, and human rights training.

[5] Also in 2012, Lee led an 18-day hunger strike in front of the Chinese embassy, against the repatriation of North Korean refugees held in China.