North Korean abductions of Japanese citizens
Abductions of Japanese citizens from Japan by agents of the North Korean government took place during a period of six years from 1977 to 1983.[1] Although only 17 Japanese citizens (eight men and nine women) are officially recognized by the Japanese government as having been abducted,[2] there may have been hundreds of others.[3] The North Korean government has officially admitted to abducting 13 Japanese citizens.[4][5]
Background[edit]
In the 1970s, a number of Japanese citizens disappeared from coastal areas in Japan. The people who had disappeared were average Japanese people who were opportunistically abducted by operatives lying in wait. Although North Korean agents were suspected, the opinion that North Korea had nothing to do with the disappearances was widely held.[8] Most of the missing were in their 20s; the youngest, Megumi Yokota, was 13[9] when she disappeared in November 1977, from the Japanese west coast city of Niigata.[5][10]
Some of the victims were abducted to teach Japanese language and culture at North Korean spy schools.[8][9] Older victims were also abducted for the purpose of obtaining their identities.[11] It is speculated that Japanese women were abducted to have them become wives to a group of North Korea–based Japanese terrorists belonging to the Yodo-go terrorist group after a 1970 Japan Airlines hijacking[12] and that some may have been abducted because they happened to witness activities of North Korean agents in Japan, which may explain Yokota's abduction at such a young age.[5][13][14]
For a long time, these abductions were denied by North Korea and its sympathizers (including Chongryon and the Japan Socialist Party) and were often considered a conspiracy theory. Despite pressure from Japanese parent groups, the Japanese government took no action.
There are claims that this issue has been used by Japanese nationalists, including former Japanese Prime Ministers Yoshihide Suga and the late Shinzō Abe, to "further militarize", push for revision of the Constitution to reduce constitutional limits on the army, revise the Basic Education Law, and pursue other political goals.[15][16] Such claims have been criticized by Kyoko Nakayama, the special adviser in Tokyo to the Japanese prime minister on the abduction issue, who said "This is about rescuing our citizens [from ongoing abduction] ... They deserve all possible support to regain their freedom and dignity. It is our duty to retrieve them."[17] (See Norimitsu Onishi.)
Controversies[edit]
There is controversy about whether the remains of Megumi Yokota returned by North Korea to Japan are genuine or not. The Japanese government tested them and claims they are not. But in February 2005, the British scientific journal Nature published an article in which the Teikyo University DNA analyst who did the tests, Tomio Yoshii, acknowledged that the results could be inconclusive. Likewise, the technique used is reportedly no longer used professionally in the United States due to the ease with which contamination can occur. According to the Japanese Foreign Ministry, the remains are not available for further testing.[73]
Another controversy arose when, in May 2012, Japan strongly protested when a top American diplomat linked the issue of North Korean abductions of Japanese citizens with the issue of abduction to Japan by Japanese parents away from non-Japanese parents.[74]
In fiction[edit]
The protagonist of the novel The Orphan Master's Son spends several years during the early part of the book helping with and organizing abductions of Japanese citizens to North Korea. These abductions and some of their victims remain an important secondary theme for the rest of the book.