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A high level North Korean scientist who escaped to South Korea two years ago said he witnessed the North Korean government conducting chemical experiments on political prisoners, and human rights groups say his claims are reliable, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday.
In a dispatch from Seoul entitled, "North Korea's Use of Chemical Torture Alleged," the scientist said he directly witnessed a test in 1979, and heard about others up until the mid-1990s. Belated the testimony may be, but since this is the first time a top North Korean scientist has mentioned human experimentation in North Korea, the report is quite significant.
Last month, too, similar claims were made that political prisoners were moved to chemical facilities.
The chemist, who is in his 50s, requested that his name be withheld. During the three hour long interview with the LA Times, arranged by the Ashburn, Virginia-based human rights group, the Aegis Foundation, the scientist said he has kept his mouth shut until now because he fears retribution against family members still in North Korea. He decided to break his silence, however, because he felt the whole world needed to know what was going on, while cautioning, "It is not easy for me to speak about this because I am a criminal myself."
He witnessed the tests at a military prison near Pyeongseong, about 24 km north of Pyongyang. The prison was known to be a camp for political prisoners. A PhD candidate at the time, he was invited to attend because his dissertation dealt with the chemicals being tested -- potassium cyanide and ortho-nitrochlorobenzene.
The political prisoners were kept in "rabbit hutch-like" cages of concrete and wire. Two test subjects, men who were unshaven and emaciated, were brought by wheelchair into a chamber with a large plate glass window on one side. As the scientists and guards watched, said the chemist, the experiment was conducted on each subject separately. The chamber had bright lights, a speaker system that allowed observers to clearly hear the prisoners' screams, and a nozzle for spraying the chemicals at the subject.
He recalled how as he observed from behind the class, "One man was scratching desperately. He scratched his neck, his chest. He was wearing a gray prison uniform, and he tore it off. He was covered in blood... I tried to look away." He said it took about three hours for the political prisoners to die, and added, "It was horrible. They were screaming and yelling... They seemed to develop some superhuman strength before they died."
As soon as the prisoners were dead, prison guards in gas masks and protective suits pulled the bodies into another uncontaminated room for further experimentation, he said.
LA Times reported that the North Koreans are denying that they conduct gas experiments on political prisoners, but a member of a North Korean human rights group in Seoul said, "What he saw happened a long time ago, but he is a very senior scientist, and he is the first to describe human experimentation. We are hoping that more witnesses will have the courage to come forward and speak out."
Aegis Foundation president Nam Jae-joong, who arranged the interview, said, "He is a very credible person. He has a PhD. He was a respected scientist. His story is very consistent."
The South Korean Ministry of Unification confirmed that the chemist held a high position at a research facility in Hamheung.
After receiving his PhD, he served mainly in civilian research facilities, but learned through colleagues that human experimentation for chemical weapons took place at least until 1994, when famine rained disaster upon North Korea, LA Times added.
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