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61-year-old Mr. Kim, a South Korean fisherman kidnapped to North Korea who had managed to enter a South Korean legation in China, suddenly said he would return to the North. Kim has succeeded in entering the consulate On March 31, only 15 days after escaping from the North with the intention of defecting to the South.
Kim said he was kidnapped by a North Korean patrol boat in the mid-1970s while catching squid in the East Sea. He and some 20 crewmates lived on a chicken farm near Pyongyang. As food shortages in the Stalinist country grew more severe, Kim made up his mind to defect.
From the South Korean legation, he rang his 82-year-old mother in Gangwon Province but later changed his mind and asked to be sent back to North Korea.
Diplomats say Kim rang his mother again, telling her he needed to return to North Korea "even if it killed him" because he was worried about his family there. Then he had another change of heart. "When I think that I might be separated for life from my parents and siblings, it's very sad," diplomats quoted him as saying.
Kim's mother phoned the legation and begged to see him at least once more before she died. Diplomats said Choi Sung-yong, the head of a group of families of abductees who helped Kim after his escape, told him to "get a hold" of himself and think about his family in South Korea. Kim has reportedly since been firm that he wants to go to the South.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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