Truth behind abduction of Japanese spouses and Korean returnees
KCNA
Pyongyang, March 20 (KCNA) -- A spokesman for the Korean Lawyers Committee issued a statement on March 20.
It says:
Members of the fund for relief of North Korean refugees, a non-governmental organization in Japan, made their way to a Korea-China border area and secretly whisked off Japanese spouses residing in theDPRK and Korean returnees, at least 20 in all, to Japan. This fact was recently disclosed.
The chief of the fund was reported to have been arrested and detained by the Chinese security authorities last November and deported later as he was engaged in the operation to abduct Japanese spouses residing in the DPRK and Korean returnees to Japan and third countries.
If this is true, it is not only a crime committed in violation of international law which bans the abduction and kidnapping but an act of disregarding the DPRK's legal system which is guaranteed by the DPRK constitution and nationality law.
Therefore, those concerned should be held responsible for those acts.
Japan has long been engrossed in aggression and hostility toward the DPRK. In the period of its colonial rule over Korea Japan forcibly drafted more than 8.4 million young and middle-aged Koreans and hurled them into a war of aggression and forced them to do hard labor. It also kidnapped more than 200,000 Korean women, forcing them into sexual slavery for the imperial Japanese army. These crimes are well known to the world.
The committee is carrying on an investigation into the case of abduction committed by the fund, prompted by its responsibility to disclose crimes committed in violation of law and justice and indict their perpetrators.
The committee demands that the authorities concerned of Japan disclose the truth behind the above-said abduction case.
