[USFK Forums] Japan demands N. Korea hand over agents via embassy in Beijing [Kyodo]

[C. Y. Lee]

Uploaded by C. Y. Lee on Saturday, February 25, 2006

LEAD: Japan demands N. Korea hand over agents via embassy in Beijing

Friday February 24, 6:48 PM

(Kyodo) _ (EDS: UPDATING WITH MORE INFO, BACKGROUND)
Japan, via its embassy in Beijing, demanded Friday that North Korea hand over two agents suspected of abducting four Japanese nationals in two separate cases in 1978, Japanese Foreign Ministry officials said.

The action follows Japanese police obtaining on Thursday arrest warrants for Sin Guang Su and Choe Sung Chol.

The police are also set to place the two on an Interpol international wanted list as early as next week. The four abductees returned to Japan in 2002.

A Japanese summary court issued the warrant for Sin, 76, on suspicion of abducting Yasushi Chimura, 50, and his wife Fukie, 50, from the city of Obama in Fukui Prefecture along the Sea of Japan on July 7, 1978.

The Niigata District Court meanwhile issued the warrant for Choe on suspicion of abducting Kaoru Hasuike, 48, and his wife Yukiko, 49, from the city of Kashiwazaki in Niigata Prefecture, also along the Sea of Japan, on July 31 of that year.

The Fukui prefectural police got the warrant for Sin while the Niigata prefectural police obtained the one for Choe. Both Sin and Choe are suspected of violating the Japanese Penal Code's Article 226 that imposes imprisonment of up to two years on those abducting a Japanese national with the aim of transporting him or her abroad.

Sin was arrested in South Korea in 1985 on suspicion of spying for Pyongyang and later sentenced to death. He was released in December 1999 under then President Kim Dae Jung's amnesty program.

The Japanese police put Choe on the international wanted list under the surname "Pak" in 1985 on suspicion he was involved in spying activities by passing himself off as Kenzo Kozumi, a Japanese man who was born in 1933 and went missing around 1961.

Diplomatic sources said North Korea is unlikely to meet the Japanese demand, particularly for Sin, who is treated as a national hero there because of his long-running loyalty to Pyongyang during his 15 years of detention as a spy in South Korea, according to diplomatic sources.

The two Japanese couples, who married in North Korea, and a fifth victim of North Korean abduction -- 46-year-old Hitomi Soga --returned to Japan in 2002 following a summit meeting between Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.



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