Slain missionary honored for helping NK loggers

By Kim Se-jeong

The late Lee Ju-heon

A missionary who helped North Korean loggers in Khabarovsk, Russia, in the 1990s has won a National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) award.

Lee Ju-heon was killed in his apartment in the far-eastern Russian city in 1995, allegedly by a North Korean spy. He was 59 at the time of his death.

“We recognized his dedication to improving the lives of North Koreans in Russia,” a NHRC official said on Thursday.

Lee is among 17 winners of the 2014 Human Rights Awards, along with five organizational winners. The names of other winners were withheld.

Lee was born in Namcheon, Hwanghae Province, in 1935. He later moved to the United States, where he worked as a cardiologist for 30 years and became a citizen. From there he moved to Russia with his wife, Lee Gye-wol, in 1993.

He taught at the Far Eastern State Medical University as a visiting professor. As a Christian missionary, he helped Korean descendants and North Korean loggers.

The city had received many North Koreans since the 1960s, as the communist regime of Kim Il-sung sent them there to earn money. People called Lee the “father of North Korean defectors.”

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Lee and his wife stayed when many of the loggers tried to escape to South Korea or other countries. The couple risked their lives trying to help some get to South Korea.

A North Korean man, who claimed he was a logger, confessed to killing Lee and his wife because they would not help him escape to the South.”

Amid speculation that he was in fact a North Korean agent, Russian authorities transferred him to Pyongyang’s representatives in the city. The suspect was then killed and his body returned to North Korea.

An award ceremony is scheduled for Dec. 10. The award was launched in 2002 when the commission was founded and almost 180 people have since received the award.