North Korean spy and terrorist skirts Immigration, gets to stay in Hatoyama summer home, due to Yokota Megumi Case

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Hi Blog.  As a friend most poignantly pointed out to me yesterday evening, something’s very wrong with Japan’s current top news story:

“Have you been following the reaction to the treatment given that ex-North Korean spy who blew up a plane and murdered 115 people, yet came to Japan as a VIP and is now staying at Hatoyama’s Karuizawa retreat? David McNeil and Justin McCurry did pieces with a hint of outrage, especially David, who noted that, if Japanese authorities had bothered to follow the immigration law, she would have been arrested. To be fair, some Japanese journalists noted last night (on TBS, I think) that something isn’t quite right.

“You may be interested to know that the group “Bring Abducted Children Home” is pretty upset as well, noting that the Japanese government rolls out the red carpet for a mass murderer just because she might have some information on Japanese children who were kidnapped out of Japan but doesn’t want to deal with anybody seeking a meeting about Japanese children kidnapped back to Japan by a Japanese parent.”

Quite.  As far as I recall, not a peep about the terrorism on NHK 7PM last night.  Only the meeting with the Yokotas and all the smiles.  Elite politics indeed trumps all.  Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Former North Korean spy who bombed jet welcomed by Japan
By David McNeill in Tokyo
The Independent, Wednesday, 21 July 2010

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/former-north-korean-spy-who-bombed-jet-welcomed-by-japan-2031254.html

It has all the ingredients of the most far-fetched spy story: a beautiful North Korean woman destined to become an actress opts instead for a career in espionage. Brainwashed to despise the North’s southern neighbour, she bombs a Korean Air jet in 1987 reportedly on the direct orders of the North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, killing 115 people. When captured, she attempts to kill herself by biting into a cyanide pill but is stopped by a guard. Her accomplice dies from the same method.

Yesterday, this exotic product of the Cold War touched down in Tokyo under heavy police guard. Kept isolated from media scrutiny by government handlers, Kim Hyon-hui will spend the next few days briefing them on her extraordinary career and facing the families of Japanese people who were abducted by Pyongyang in a bizarre military programme to train spies. Among them is the son of Yaeko Taguchi, her Japanese teacher who was whisked away by North Korean spies in 1978 and never returned home.

Ms Kim’s story, her direct connection to the Japanese abductees and her unlikely redemption, enthrals Japan. Such is the interest in her here that the authorities have waived rules that should have prevented her from setting down in the country at all. She will spend much of her time here staying in the holiday home of the former Japanese prime minister Yukio Hatoyama.

ENDS

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Ex-North Korea spy to help solve Japan’s abduction mystery
Kim Hyon-hui may have information on Japanese nationals kidnapped by North Korean spies during the cold war
guardian.co.uk Tuesday 20 July 2010 16.26 BST
By Justin McCurry

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/20/north-korea-spy-japan-abductions

A former North Korean spy who carried out one of the deadliest plane bombings of the cold war has arrived in Tokyo to help solve the mystery surrounding Japanese nationals abducted by Pyongyang.

Kim Hyon-hui was sentenced to death after being convicted of bombing a South Korean airliner in 1987, killing all 115 people on board, but was later pardoned and went on to write a bestselling autobiography about her life as a secret agent.

She flew in to Tokyo after the Japanese authorities waived strict immigration controls to allow her to meet the relatives of two Japanese citizens snatched by North Korean agents in the late 1970s.

Hyon-hui says she was tutored by a woman who is among several Japanese abducted by North Korean spies at the height of the cold war. She may also have information about Megumi Yokota, who was taken from near her home, aged 13, in the late 1970s.

Kim’s visit comes at a time of heightened tensions on the Korean peninsula, coinciding with reports that a North Korean cabinet official who led talks with the South, has been executed, and as Seoul and Washington announced a joint naval exercise designed to remind Pyongyang of the formidable military forces it would confront should a conflict break out.

Kwon Ho-ung, who headed the North’s negotiating team from 2004-07, was executed by firing squad, according to the Dong-a Ilbo, a South Korean newspaper. His death appears to be part of a purge of “impure” officials connected with policy failures. In March, the regime executed two officials responsible for a botched currency revaluation.

Next week’s naval exercise will send a “clear message” to the North following the sinking in March of a South Korean naval vessel, the US defence secretary, Robert Gates, told reporters in Seoul .

“These defensive, combined exercises are designed to send a clear message to North Korea that its aggressive behaviour must stop, and that we are committed to together enhancing our combined defensive capabilities,” he said.

Gates and the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, will tomorrow visit the demilitarised zone, the heavily fortified border separating the two Koreas, in a show of support for Washington’s ally.

Hyon-hui, who arrived in Japan before dawn under tight security, was due to meet the parents of Yokota, who was snatched as she walked home from badminton practice near her home on the Japan Sea coast in 1977. Her parents refuse to believe North Korean claims that she suffered from a mental illness and committed suicide in 1994.

Kim was also due to meet the relatives of Yaeko Taguchi, who was abducted in 1978, aged 22. Hyon-hui claims that Taguchi subsequently became her live-in Japanese teacher for more than a year-and-a-half in the early 1980s.

Critics denounced this week’s visit as a stunt designed to deflect attention from Japan’s failure to establish the fates of Yokota and other abductees. Hyon-hui has already spoken to some of the victims’ families and is not expected to offer any new information.

During a 2002 summit with Japan’s then prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, admitted that the regime had abducted 13 people and used them to teach spies how to pass themselves off as Japanese. It allowed five of them to return home later that year, but insisted the remaining eight had died.

Hyon-hui quickly gained notoriety for the attack on the Korean Air jet, which came as Seoul was preparing to host the 1988 summer Olympics. She and Kim Seung-il, a male spy, posed as a Japanese father and daughter and boarded KAL flight 858 from Baghdad to Seoul, planting a time bomb in a luggage rack before getting off at Abu Dhabi. The plane later exploded over the Andaman Sea near Burma.

They were arrested two days later in Bahrain, where they tried to kill themselves by swallowing cyanide capsules hidden in cigarettes. Kim Seung-il died, but Kim’s cigarette was snatched from her before she could ingest a lethal dose.

Kim was extradited to Seoul, where she was sentenced to death in March 1989. She was pardoned the following year after the then South Korean president, Roh Tae-woo, accepted she had been brainwashed into carrying out the bombing on the orders of communist North Korea’s founder, Kim Il-sung.

Kim, 48, married one of the South Korean intelligence officers who investigated her and donated the proceeds from her autobiography to the families of the bombing’s victims.

Last year, she told Taguchi’s relatives in a meeting in South Korea that the abducted woman may still be alive, contradicting Pyongyang’s claim that she died in a traffic accident in 1986.

The former spy, who is due to return to South Korea on Friday, is reportedly staying at the mountain retreat of the former prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, who resigned last month.
ENDS

4 comments on “North Korean spy and terrorist skirts Immigration, gets to stay in Hatoyama summer home, due to Yokota Megumi Case

  • “Yesterday, this exotic product of the Cold War touched down in Tokyo under heavy police guard.”

    “Such is the interest in her here that the authorities have waived rules that should have prevented her from setting down in the country at all. She will spend much of her time here staying in the holiday home of the former Japanese prime minister Yukio Hatoyama.”

    WoW…just WoW. Japan never ceases to amaze me. Exactly just as I expected. If you are 100% behind Japan, even if what it does is right or wrong, then you may be one of the most anticipated/ welcomed person ever in Japan. Hope this will be a lesson to us all foreigners. 🙂

    Reply
  • Debito, I know some of my observations of late have been a tad scathing of Japan and its politicians’ behavior, and I apologize for any offense given. This story here takes the cake. As I type this, and I kid you not, there are three teens (18+/-)hanging out right below my balcony on the street here in Andalucia, and they’re passing a joint around, getting gigglier and louder by the minute. The very pungent smoke is wafting my way. One side of me knows I should close the window.
    In reading this post, I can’t help but think it’s either me, or the pols in Japan who’ve had a tad too much of this stuff, first or second hand, and who think that “Everything’s gonna be alright” according to the Bob Marley line. Think about this, it’s exactly the same as if Obama invited Osama bin Laden to Camp David for the weekend to ask advice on how to hit “Eye-ran” and get away with it.

    Power, it seems, corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely……exhale! Time to close the window.

    Reply
  • Don’t know about the English news, but this subject has been thoroughly explored in the Japanese press. So much that they even gave the actual two laws relevant here multiple times:

    [Legal reason for not allowing immigration.]
    第二節 外国人の上陸
    第五条  次の各号のいずれかに該当する外国人は、本邦に上陸することができない。

    4 日本国又は日本国以外の国の法令に違反して、一年以上の懲役若しくは禁錮又はこれらに相当する刑に処せられたことのある者。ただし、政治犯罪により刑に処せられた者は、この限りでない。

    [Legal reason for allowing immigration.]
    第五条の二  法務大臣は、外国人について、前条第一項第四号、第五号、第七号、第九号又は第九号の二に該当する特定の事由がある場合であつても、当該外国人に第二十六条第一項の規定により再入国の許可を与えた場合その他の法務省令で定める場合において、相当と認めるときは、法務省令で定めるところにより、当該事由のみによつては上陸を拒否しないこととすることができる。

    Besides having the support of those high in the government, there does not seem to be any problems in her arrival.

    Several days ago there was also quite a bit of talk about her terrorist activities. Still in my cache, for example: 「金元死刑囚は死者115人を出した大量殺人テロ事件の実行犯であり」…
    http://mainichi.jp/select/jiken/news/20100720k0000e040045000c.html
    This was all reported several days ago, so there is little repeat it all again everyday. It’s old news now.

    As I recall, she was initially questioned by police upon arrival as well as having constant high security following her.

    金賢姫元死刑囚:入国、政治判断でクリア 「特例」で

     大韓航空機爆破事件の実行犯である北朝鮮の元工作員、金賢姫元死刑囚の来日には「入国」と「捜査」の二つの高いハードルがあるとされてきた。だが、いずれも政府の政治判断でクリアされる展開になった。

     金元死刑囚は死者115人を出した大量殺人テロ事件の実行犯であり、出入国管理法5条が定める上陸拒否事由にあたる。そのため、中井洽拉致問題担当相が2月、千葉景子法相に特例で招致したい意向を打診。田口八重子さんに日本語教育を受けたとされる金元死刑囚の話を聞く機会を得られることは、横田めぐみさんの両親ら拉致被害者の家族にもメリットが大きいなどとして、千葉法相は上陸拒否をしない判断をした。

     もう一つの来日の障害は、87年の爆破事件当時、金元死刑囚が「蜂谷真由美」名義の偽造旅券を所持していたことから、偽造公文書行使の容疑があることだった。しかも、金元死刑囚は海外にいたため、時効は成立していない。複数の捜査幹部は「警視庁が立件の可能性を捨てているわけではない。ただ、死刑判決を受け、事件から20年以上が経過している。可罰性の観点からどうなのかという議論はある」と話す。

     こうした現状を踏まえ、中井担当相は警察庁に対し、入国後も支障がない対応を要請。警察当局もほぼ同意しており、拉致事件についての情報収集も含め、滞在中に金元死刑囚から事情を聴くことはないとみられる。【千代崎聖史】
    ENDS

    Reply

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