For Another Political Drama

By Choi Yearn-hong

Two American journalists, Euna Lee and Laura Ling, were dramatically freed by Kim Jong-il last week when former U.S. President Bill Clinton visited Pyongyang. Their return to California has drawn great attention from around the world.

Vice President Al Gore, greeting the two young ladies and Clinton on their safe return on the morning of Aug. 5, at Burbank airport, was at the center of the world's attention.

I hope Panmunjeom is the next center of the world's attention for a Hyundai Asan employee who has been held in captivity by the North Korean authorities for six months, and crewmembers of a South Korean fishing boat, 800 Yeonan, who have been in captivity for a week or more in the North.

Euna Lee reached the tarmac first and we saw a most touching scene as she threw one arm around her husband and the other around their daughter as she dropped to one knee to face the four-year-old.

Taking the girl's hands in her own, Lee wore an expression so intense that from a distance it looked like grief. She was out of her daughter's sight for 140 days.

Clinton stayed out of sight for a while, then appeared at the top of the airplane stairs, pressed his fingers together in that little clapping gesture of his, and descended to warm applause.

Gore, co-founder of Current TV, a San Francisco-based cable and Web network that employs Lee and Laura Ling, waited in a blue suit to embrace his former boss and friend Clinton.

Ling started to talk and her words were tearful when she uttered: ``Thirty hours ago, Euna Lee and I were prisoners in North Korea. We feared that at any moment we could be sent to a hard-labor camp.''

The Clinton staff, the White House spokesman, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were all on the same page: This was a ``humanitarian mission'' ― separate and different from North Korea's nuclear and missile issues.

Some South Korean politicians were confused over Clinton's humanitarian mission, and were hoping it would achieve the release of the Korean worker and the boat crewmembers from North Korean captivity.

But they appear too naive and idealistic. Clinton's mission was confined to the American citizens, and did not necessarily extend to the South Koreans.

They may say that humanitarian missions should be international, not national. But there is a clear visible distance between the national sea and the international sea even in humanitarian missions.

A majority of the American people do not know or are unaware of the fact that some South Korean citizens are prisoners in North Korea.

They do not know that many South Korean people captured by the North during the 1950-53 Korean War died there without exchanging even one postcard during their lifetime.

Many South Korean soldiers who were made prisoners of war could not return to the South. The international community does not know about North Korean crimes against humanity.

The freedom of South Korean citizens from captivity in the North should be through South Korean efforts. I have two suggestions to my fellow Koreans:

1. Former President Kim Dae-jung or an associate can visit Pyongyang to free his fellow citizens in North Korea as Bill Clinton did.

2. South Korean humanitarian organizations that have been helping North Korea over the past 10 years or so should pressure North Korea to free their fellow citizens.

The conservative South Korean government under President Lee Myung-bak has been helpless, but South Korea has many forces that can influence the North Korean regime.

They are the so-called ``pro-North'' politicians in Democratic Party and the Democratic Labor Party in the National Assembly, and many nationalistic humanitarian organizations.

They can be helpful in obtaining the freedom of their fellow citizens: They can effectively and productively wield their power and influence to bring innocent South Korean people back to the South.

I believe they have done many good things for the North Korean regime and people, thus they can do something good, more dramatically than Clinton just did.

South Korea is pluralistic. The pluralistic society tolerates pro-North Korean and anti-American nationalistic political groups and forces. They exist as meaningful political forces in South Korea.

I don't know why they are careless about their fellow citizens who have been taken into captivity by the North Korean regime. Their evaluation of their power or influence toward North Korea must be high, and Pyongyang may be awaiting their demands.

Kim Dae-jung himself does not know his potential or possible power and influence on the North Korean regime. He claimed that he suggested Clinton visit Pyongyang several months before.

I hereby suggest Kim visit Pyongyang to free his fellow citizens there. If he is ill, he can send his close associate. This may make him great. President Lee does not know of the resourcefulness of Kim and the opposition parties.

Now is a time for the opposition and humanitarian organizations to create another humane drama at Panmunjeom and Seoul. Who knows? Pyongyang could be the site for the next possible drama.

Dr. Choi is a poet and writer based in the Washington area. He can be reached at yearnhc@hanmail.net.