N. Korean group says gov't proceeding with search of abduction victims

Japan Policy & Politics, August 2, 2004

PYONGYANG, Aug. 1 Kyodo

A Pyongyang group in contact with a Japanese nongovernmental organization said Sunday the North Korean government is proceeding with a search for 10 Japanese who Japan says were abducted to North Korea, denying earlier remarks by a North Korean Red Cross official who said local people have refused to cooperate in the search.

The group told the NGO for humanitarian aid for North Korea and a Kyodo News reporter accompanying the NGO members on their trip to Pyongyang that the North Korean government is conducting ''with sincerity'' the search pledged by leader Kim Jong Il in a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.

The latest remarks by the North Korean group contradict the remarks by Ri Ho Rim, deputy general secretary of North Korea's Red Cross Society.

He told Kyodo News on Friday many North Koreans refused to cooperate, saying their family members and relatives went missing after being taken to Japan before and during World War II.

The Pyongyang group said Ri's remarks were actually about search activities conducted by the North Korean Red Cross Society at the request of the Japanese Red Cross Society on other missing Japanese and former North Korean residents in Japan. The North Korean government is directly conducting the search for the 10 Japanese, it said.

The group members said they heard North Korea's Red Cross is not taking part in the search for the 10 Japanese at this point.

The Japanese Red Cross Society has asked its North Korean counterpart to conduct a search for Koreans who used to live in Japan and then went missing after returning to North Korea as well as Japanese victims of abduction.

North Korea pledged to reinvestigate from scratch the cases of eight Japanese it says it once abducted but are now dead and two others it says never entered the country. North Korean leader Kim made the promise in the meeting with Koizumi in Pyongyang in May.

''We cannot conduct the search alone,'' Ri said earlier. Cooperation is necessary from the people, security offices and a committee in charge of resident registration, he said.

When Koizumi and Kim held their first summit in September 2002, North Korea admitted to abducting 13 Japanese in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Pyongyang then allowed five abductees to return to Japan but said eight others were dead. The five, kidnapped in 1978, have been repatriated.

The Japanese government has officially recognized two more as being abducted by North Korea, but Pyongyang says they never entered the country.