Kidnapping Information Provided by North Korea: A Mess

On December 24, concerning the kidnapping of a Japanese by North Korea, the Japanese government announced that “through analysis, we have come to the conclusion that the information provided by North Korea lacks credibility and cannot be trusted,” and demanded an entire reinvestigation and an apology.

At a press conference on this day, chief cabinet secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said, “If North Korea does not act on this request, the Japanese government will have to make a difficult decision,” implicating that depending on North Korea’s attitude, it may move forward economic sanction against North Korea.

He said, “North Korea has maintained that concerning the 10 suspected of being kidnapped by North Korea, ‘eight are deceased and two did not enter.’ However there is no evidence supporting this claim, and in the investigation data, many inconsistencies have been uncovered,” and said he would strongly protest to North Korea.

Won-Jae Park parkwj@donga.com