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The Unification Ministry is considering a West Germany-style offer of economic aid to North Korea in return for the release of South Korean prisoners of war. Before unification, West Germany cajoled East Germany to hand over political prisoners for economic aid. Seoul believes that there are some 560 South Korean POWs and 480 abduction victims in the North.
An official said his ministry reported to the presidential transition committee four or five ways of offering economic aid to the North to ensure the safety of South Korean POWs and abductees, promote meetings with their relatives in the South, and ultimately achieve their return. The West German government gave some W1.7 trillion (US$1=W937) to East Germany and brought 34,000 political prisoners to the West between 1963 and 1989. Bonn first gave cash but later provided coffee, oil and copper.
A ministry official said in addition to the West German way, Japanese and U.S.-style solutions were being suggested to the transition team. Japan exercised political pressure and offered rice to the North to bring back some of the Japanese kidnapped by the communist country in the 1960s and 1970s. The U.S. traded the remains of its soldiers in North Korea killed during the Korean War for cash.
North Korea officially denies there are South Korean POW there, using the ambiguous expression ¡°people whose fate became unknown during or after the war" instead of POWs or abduction victims.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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