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Megumi Yokota, a Japanese national who was abducted by North Korea as a child in the 1970s, was seen in June 1994, two months after the Stalinist country claimed she committed suicide, the Mainichi Shimbun reported on Monday.
Yokota was abducted by North Korea in Niigata at age of 13 in 1977 and had been held there since. North Korean authorities claim she was one of eight abduction victims who have died, but the families of the victims and Japanese authorities do not trust the claim.
According to the newspaper, Fukie Chimura (52), another abduction victim, told Japanese authorities at the end of last year that Yokota moved in next door to her in June 1994. ¡°She lived there for several months, but I don't know her whereabouts after that,¡± Chimura was quoted as saying. "She was suffering severe depression and was mentally unstable." She added a senior North Korean intelligence official was monitoring her.
The newspaper recalls that North Korean authorities claimed Yokota committed suicide in March 1993. Following a witness account that Yokota was seen in March 1994, Pyongyang changed its story and said she died in April 1994.
The Mainichi says the latest testimony will have enormous effects on the way Japan approaches the abduction issue, which has been the main stumbling block to a thaw between the two countries.
In November 2004, the North sent to Japan what it claimed were Yokota¡¯s remains, but Japanese authorities conducted a DNA test they said proved the remains to be those of two other people.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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