Kim Jong-un’s favorite lawyer group in South Korea continues its legal attack against the North Korean restaurant workers that defected back in 2016:
This image shows a North Korean group of defectors at the center of a controversy over their defection. (Yonhap)
A liberal lawyers’ group plans to lodge a complaint with prosecutors on Monday against former President Park Geun-hye and her top aides over allegations that Seoul’s intelligence agency engineered a 2016 mass defection by a dozen North Korean restaurant workers.
The Lawyers for a Democratic Society, or Minbyun, said it will lodge the complaint with the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office seeking an investigation into Park, her chief of staff Lee Byung-kee, ex-spy chief Lee Byong-ho and the restaurant manager who allegedly took the workers to the South against the will of some of them.
In April 2016, the manager and 12 female North Korean restaurant workers defected to the South. Park’s government said they came of their own free will, while Pyongyang accused Seoul’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) of luring them for political purposes and demanded their repatriation.
Rumors have persisted that the defection, which occurred just before the parliamentary elections, may be the work of the NIS. Minbyun has demanded the government allow its lawyers a face-to-face meeting with the defectors to verify the allegation.
The story took a new turn last week when a cable TV network aired an interview with the restaurant manager. He said that he had planned to defect with his wife but threatened his employees to come with him at the instruction of NIS agents. [Yonhap]
Here is more from Newsweek:
But last night, on South Korean television, Heo himself admitted that the women were unaware they were being sent to South Korea and that the whole operation had been orchestrated by him and South Korea’s spy agency.
“It was luring and kidnapping, and I know because I took the lead,” Heo told TV channel JTBCon Thursday, as translated by The New York Times.
At least three of the women also appeared on the program with their names withheld and their faces blurred. One of the trio said “I want to go home because living like this is not the life I wanted,” adding, “I miss my parents.” [Newsweek]
If these restaurant workers in fact did not know they were going to South Korea this is a serious incident. However, what we don’t know is what pressure are these workers now under to make these allegations? Is the Moon administration putting them under intense pressure and allowing the North Koreans to contact them with threats against their families back in North Korea?
Remember these restaurant workers could have easily have made statements to the media that they were kidnapped before Moon became President or even over the past year that he was President, but did not. This is only coming out now after the charm offensive was launched by North Korea.
“The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office seeking an investigation into Park, her chief of staff Lee Byung-kee, ex-spy chief Lee Byong-ho and the restaurant manager who allegedly took the workers to the South against the will of some of them.”
Park is in prison and has zero influence. Moon has been President for over a year. Surely finding out the actual facts regarding their defection only takes a phone call from the Blue House to NIS Headquarters. Why doesn’t Moon do that and settle this once and for all?
And with regard to the female defector who said, “I want to go home because living like this is not the life I wanted,” adding, “I miss my parents.”
That doesn’t sound like a statement from someone who got tricked into defecting – it sounds like someone who knowingly defected and now regrets it.
setnaffa
6 years ago
How many of those repatriated escape going to the death camps?
guitard
6 years ago
“How many of those repatriated escape going to the death camps?”
IMHO … I think if the North Korean authorities believe they really were tricked into defecting, then they would get a pass when they returned to the North because they are the daughters of Pyongyang elites. They would probably have to go through several months of “purification” training to unlearn everything they saw and heard while in South Korea though. But ultimately, they’d be OK.
AppeasingNorthKorea
6 years ago
This is a TV interview held with a former North Korean defector living in South Korea. He met with those waitresses who are wrapped up in this controversy.
He says in the interview, the waitresses’ words were taken completely out of context by the JTBC TV station and the waitresses were shocked to hear what was reported. The women were speaking as to missing their families back home, yearning to see their hometowns, and how they can make it better for their loved ones left behind. By no means did they say they regretted coming to South Korea. The interviewee is very concerned and worried that South Korean government is planning to send back all the North Korean defectors in South Korea.
Don’t believe anything what the South Korean media reports. They are firmly under a pro-North Korean South Korea government.
AppeasingNorthKorea
6 years ago
Except for few Conservative TV Stations like TV Chosun, most of South Korean media is now under leftist control.
“The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office seeking an investigation into Park, her chief of staff Lee Byung-kee, ex-spy chief Lee Byong-ho and the restaurant manager who allegedly took the workers to the South against the will of some of them.”
Park is in prison and has zero influence. Moon has been President for over a year. Surely finding out the actual facts regarding their defection only takes a phone call from the Blue House to NIS Headquarters. Why doesn’t Moon do that and settle this once and for all?
And with regard to the female defector who said, “I want to go home because living like this is not the life I wanted,” adding, “I miss my parents.”
That doesn’t sound like a statement from someone who got tricked into defecting – it sounds like someone who knowingly defected and now regrets it.
How many of those repatriated escape going to the death camps?
“How many of those repatriated escape going to the death camps?”
IMHO … I think if the North Korean authorities believe they really were tricked into defecting, then they would get a pass when they returned to the North because they are the daughters of Pyongyang elites. They would probably have to go through several months of “purification” training to unlearn everything they saw and heard while in South Korea though. But ultimately, they’d be OK.
This is a TV interview held with a former North Korean defector living in South Korea. He met with those waitresses who are wrapped up in this controversy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqvrqrHd2V4
He says in the interview, the waitresses’ words were taken completely out of context by the JTBC TV station and the waitresses were shocked to hear what was reported. The women were speaking as to missing their families back home, yearning to see their hometowns, and how they can make it better for their loved ones left behind. By no means did they say they regretted coming to South Korea. The interviewee is very concerned and worried that South Korean government is planning to send back all the North Korean defectors in South Korea.
Don’t believe anything what the South Korean media reports. They are firmly under a pro-North Korean South Korea government.
Except for few Conservative TV Stations like TV Chosun, most of South Korean media is now under leftist control.
http://freekorea.us/2018/05/14/then-they-came-for-the-defectors-but-i-said-nothing-why-the-unhcr-must-investigate-the-ningpo-13-case/#sthash.2KVdJ0r5.dpbs
commie moon working directly for his nk overlords. those 12 need to be in the US embassy right now. hell i will drive them there.