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TOKYO - The Sankei Shimbun reported on Thursday, quoting a source in Seoul, that two ethnic Korean-Chinese persons were executed by firing squad and other two ethnic Korean-Chinese persons were sentenced to 25 years in prison. The four people attempted to smuggle artifacts from the Goguryeo Kingdom from China to North Korea in summer last year and were discovered by the Chinese authorities.
The artifacts were uncovered in the No. 4 and No. 5 tombs in Jian, Jilin Province. The remains of the Goguryeo Period are concentrated in the region. According to the Sankei Shinbun, the people insisted that they had tried to take out the artifacts to North Korea because China distorts the history of Goguryoe and ruins the relics from the kingdom.
The Chinese government, after the attempted smuggling, redesignated the area of the tombs as a ¡°history preservation zone,¡± and has prevented people from entering, a sign of how important China considers the Goguryeo issue, the newspaper reported.
(Choi Heup, pot@chosun.com )
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