Ex-drug smuggler revealed as North Korea's defector hunter

Sunny Lee, Foreign Correspondent

Last Updated: April 16. 2010 12:17AM UAE / April 15. 2010 8:17PM GMT

BEIJING // A South Korean drug trafficker who was arrested when he entered the country from China has an explosive backstory that has left southerners enthralled and analysts dumbfounded. It turns out the 55-year-old man, currently being investigated by authorities, is a bounty hunter who divided his time between tracking down North Korean defectors living in China and smuggling them back to the North, and gathering information on South Korean intelligence operatives working in China. The man, surnamed Kim, had fled to China in 1999 while being pursued by southern authorities, but had to go back to the South again after Chinese security caught on to him. He was arrested trying to re-enter South Korea from China, southern media reported.

The Rev Chun Ki-won, of the Seoul-based Durihana Mission, points to a border village between North Korea and China where two of his people were arrested. Lee Jin-man / AP

The case is particularly strange given that South Koreans typically help people to escape from the north rather than send them back.

"This is such a bizarre case," said Chun Ki-won, a well-known South Korean Christian activist, who smuggled hundreds of North Koreans hiding in China to other countries, mostly to South Korea and the US. "This is the first case, as far as I know, in which a South Korean citizen did such a shameful thing."

South Korean media have spent the past week recounting the man's story.

Before 1999, Mr Kim was just a regular drug smuggler working mainly in China's coastal province, Shandong, according to South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper. In that year, he was approached by a female North Korean agent who promised to supply him with"high-quality" narcotics. He moved to Yanji, a Chinese city on the border with North Korea.

In February 2000, Mr Kim entered North Korea from China and travelled to Pyongyang where he received spy training for 15 days, plus 2kg of narcotics and an additional US$10,000 (Dh36,700) in cash for "activity fees", according to the prosecutor's office in Seoul, which is conducting a joint investigation with the South's main spy agency, the National Intelligence Service, the newspaper reported.

Mr Kim was dispatched back to China with instructions to kidnap both North Korean defectors and South Korean activists who help them to defect, and transport them to the North. During this time he lived with the female North Korean agent in Yanji near the South Korean border, according to the newspaper.

Starting from March 2002, he was also instructed to collect information on South Korean intelligence agents working in China, it said.

Now, Mr Kim is being investigated for kidnapping a 50-year-old North Korean male defector in China and sending him back to the North in 2006, working together with a "kidnapping squad" sent by Pyongyang. He is also suspected of two failed attempts to kidnap other North Korean defectors in China, the newspaper reported, citing prosecutors.

North Koreans wanting to defect to the South usually attempt to do so through China, as escaping through the demilitarised zone between the two Koreas is extremely dangerous.

After Mr Kim's arrest, the female North Korean agent returned to North Korea, according to a South Korean government official who deals with North Korean affairs.

Drawing from his own experience in China, Mr Chun, who is now in Seoul, said the case may be related to other cases of South Korean aid workers disappearing in China.

The South Korean official said Seoul keeps track of those incidents but does not publicise them, given the sensitivity involved.

Jang Sung-min, a former South Korean presidential aide for national security and member of parliament who follows North Korean affairs, said the case in no way indicates that other southerners may be working with Pyongyang to capture defectors from the north.

"This is quite an uncommon case," he said.

"This is also related to drug trafficking. And it may yet indicate the start of a new trend that we may have to know more."

The case has also drawn attention to the plight of North Korean refugees hiding in China.

China does not acknowledge North Korean defectors in China as refugees, but considers them "economic migrants" ? North Koreans who temporarily crossed the border seeking food.

The country has come under severe criticism for its policy of sending them back to North Korea where rights groups say they will face harsh punishment, including torture and even death.

Lu Chao, a Chinese expert on North Korea at the Liaoning Academy of Social Sciences, near the North Korean border, said the criticism is unfair.

"China and North Korea have a bilateral treaty under which China is obliged to send North Koreans, who illegally cross the border, back to their homeland. It's similar to the treaty the US and Mexico have. Illegal entry is not allowed."

The North Korean refugee matter, in fact, is an issue regularly raised by journalists at Chinese foreign ministry press briefings, to which the foreign ministry spokesperson invariably answers: "China deals with the issue, factoring into its decision domestic regulations, international law and humanitarian considerations."

"These three principles are correct," said Mr Lu. "And the humanitarian aspect is already there. The external human-rights organisations are exaggerating the situation."

Mr Jang said the issue ultimately requires the US government to take initiative and persuade the Chinese government not to repatriate the North Korean refugees.

"But that will be easily perceived by China as the US interfering in China's domestic human-rights conditions, [a subject on] which China doesn't feel very confident. So, it's an agenda difficult to push," he said.

According to South Korean government data, more than 18,000 North Koreans are estimated to have fled the starving country since the 1950-53 Korean War.

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