Kim Dong-Chul, one of three South Korean Americans released from North Korea last year, admitted espionage for U.S. and South Korean intelligence agencies. Chang W. Lee/The New York Times
Seoul, South Korea-on Oct. 2, 2015, a 34-year-old veteran stopped Kim Dong-Chul, a 34-year-old veteran, a secret informant he hired, in economic District, near the Russian border, when an American businessman, Kim Dong-Chul, leave, a local government office, stopped him.
The man, on the side of the "Chairman Kim, this is the information you need,", threw a yellow envelope into his car, and then hurried. The envelope has a computer memory stick, some files, and a photo of a ship that docked in the nearby port. Mr. Kim's car has not opened a few meters, and is again stopped by an official from the National Security and Security Department of the notorious secret police.
Kim Dong-Chul knew he had fallen for it, but it was too late.
It was the beginning of his 31 months in prison in North Korea, during which he was sentenced to espionage by cruel torture, and forced labour in a labor camp. When American Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (Mike Pompeo) flew to North Korea in May last year, Kim Dong-Chul was the longest-held American in North Korea. Pompeo brought Kim Dong-Chul and two other American hostages back to the United States, giving President Trump a moment of complacency.
Kim Dong-Chul, 65, published his memoir, (Border Rider), in South Korea in June about how he became a foreign investor awarded a medal by North Korea, later espionage for the central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the South Korean National Intelligence Service (National Intelligence Service), and ended up as prisoner No. 429.
"I'm trying not to blame anyone for what's happening to me. I'm lucky to be alive, leve,". "But I'm sorry for the six North Koreans who have been a spy for me and then executed.", in an interview in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, said.
Kim Dong-Chul was born in Seoul in 1953. His father, a civilian who works for the American garrison in Seoul, urged him to emigrate to the United States in 1980. When Kim Dong-Chul arrived in the United States, he became a baptism priest and started a cleaning company.
In 2000, Kim Dong-Chul went to Northeast China with his Korean wife from China. He was a missionary. The following year, Kim Dong-Chul used his wife's relative relationship, a relative of North Korea's authority elite, to apply for entry into North Korea. In 2002, Kim Dong-Chul became a resident of Luo Xian, where North Korea is eager to attract foreign investors. Kim Dong-Chul invested $2.8 million in total savings to build and operate the Tumen River Hotel (Tumangang Hotel), a five-story hotel that is open only to foreigners.
He quickly realized that to succeed, he needed to win the trust of the brutal totalitarian regime party and government elites and military elites through regular cash donations.
In 2016, Kim Dong-Chul was tried in Pyongyang for espionage. Kim Kwang Hyon/Associated Press
He gave North Korea $400000 to government, which is 1/3 of the hotel's annual income. He also works with military-run trading companies to help them open up fishing exports. He donated money to build buildings for schools and hospitals. Kim Jong Il, the late father of North Korea's current leader Kim Jong-un and former leader Kim Jong Il, has been rewarded three times by government after providing German-made massage equipment, jade beds and other gifts.
"I had to do business with them in order to make myself firm among them, to achieve my original goal - preaching," said Kim Dong-chul. "But I have resistance to this. I'm walking a tightrope between the two worlds."
Kim Dong-Chul said that as he established relationship with the upper echelons as a rare American living in North Korea, U.S. and South Korean intelligence agents began to approach him when he went to China and South Korea.
He said agents provided him with espionage equipment, such as cameras hidden in his watch, eavesdropping equipment, and operational funds. In return, they want information about North Korea's nuclear and missile programs. Kim Dong-Chul pays informants and uses his relationship with the military elite to find retired nuclear scientists and former and active service officers working at the military facility to meet them.
"the more I know about North Korea, the more confused and curious I am, and I want to know why this regime exists," Kim Dong-Chul said. "I decided to do everything I could to learn more and eventually share my knowledge with intelligence officials. I never thought it might end like this."
Kim Dong-Chul 's alleged espionage in his book cannot be independently confirmed. Neither CIA nor South Korean intelligence agencies responded to requests for comment.
While in North Korea, Kim Dong-Chul, like other hostages, appeared at a journalist meeting arranged by government to apologize for his crimes against the state. But after being released, the other hostages will deny the statements, saying it was forced to do so. Kim Dong-Chul said the results of the North Korean investigation of him are basically true, although he also said they forced confessions against him in order to find out about his espionage.
Mr. Kim was interrogated for nearly seven months, first in Luo and then at a security facility in Pyongyang. The interrogators forced him to knelt in the tub, cutting his hands back and pressing his head into the water. Kim said he had lost consciousness twice.
Jin Dongzhe was sentenced to 10 years of labor and education. On 29 April 2016, he was blindfolded and sent to a labour camp on the outskirts of Pyongyang. There, he was a No.429, forced to work on Saturday, from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. In the winter, the guard let him dig in the frozen soil and then fill it up. The menu of the prison has never been changed: brown rice, soy sauce, and three-piece pickled turnips. The eastern philosopher of the world uses the berries, roots, and even the skin to supplement the diet, and can provide the protein that he desperately needs.
Last year, President Trump and his wife Melania welcomed Kim Dong-Chul and other released prisoners in base, Maryland. Kim Dong-Chul did not know that Trump had become president of the United States.
Last year, President Trump and his wife Melania welcomed Kim Dong-Chul and other released prisoners in base, Maryland. Kim Dong-Chul did not know that Trump had become president of the United States. Doug Mills/The New York Times
"I tried to kill myself many times," he said. "but it's a place where you can't kill yourself even if you want to kill yourself. How do you kill yourself when eight heavily armed guards take turns watching you 24 hours a day?"
The dilapidated prison has nine cells and only two prisoners: Kim Dong-Chul and Lim Hyeon-soo, a Korean-Canadian missionary who was sentenced to lifelong hard work at the end of 2015. Only once did Kim Dong-Chul and Lin Hyun-soo whisper their names when they met under the tall corn stalks and the guards could not see them.
Later, one day in August 2017, Kim Dong-Chul was ordered to clean up Lin Hyun-soo's empty cell. A guard told him that Lin Hyun-soo, prisoner No. 36, had been released.
"I'm happy for him, but I feel like I've lost a brother," Kim Dong-Chul said.
He did not know that help to him was coming. One of the efforts of U.S. officials to arrange the first summit between Trump and Kim Jong un in Singapore last June was to negotiate his release.
But when the guards came to Kim Dong-Chul 's cell on the morning of May 9 last year and asked him to change into the civilian clothes he had worn, he did not know what had happened. He was taken to Pyongyang, where he was asked to write an apology and then escorted to a government plane in the United States.
When he boarded the plane with two other Korean-American hostages, Kim Hak-Song and Kim Sang-duk, a cheer broke out in the cabin. The next morning, after the plane landed on Andrews in the outskirts of Washington, another unexpected event took place: Trump boarded the plane and welcomed the hostages to the United States. Until he was released, Mr. Kim did not know that Trump was now the president of the United States.
After that, Kim Dong-Chul and his wife settled in New York, where one of their two daughters lived.
Kim Dong-Chul lost all his investment in North Korea after being deported from North Korea. Cruel torture curled his two fingers, chronic pain in his waist, and limped on foot. Since his release, intelligence officials for whom he has worked have not been in touch with him. His wife told him to "forget" the past and start from scratch.
Kim Dong-Chul plans to publish English and Japanese versions of his memoirs to help the world better understand the country he says he "loves and hates".
"North Korea is neither a socialist country nor a communism country," he said when asked about North Korea. "this is a country with the strictest dictatorship and slavery you can imagine."
< New York Times Chinese Network
CHOE SANG-HUN
27 August 2019