Court punishes NK defector for trying to return home

By Park Jae-hyuk

A female North Korean defector who tried to return to the country has been handed a one-year suspended jail sentence and given two years’ probation.

According to the Suwon District Court, Tuesday, Kim, 24, attempted to return to North Korea in March after her mother, who lives there, suggested it.

Kim fled North Korea and went to China in 2006, when she was a high school student. She came to South Korea in 2009. She sent money to her family in North Korea while working as a waitress for seven years.

Earlier this year, Kim got a message from her mother via an asylum broker, asking her to return home and stay for a while. In March, she bought a ticket to China.

Investigators arrested Kim at Incheon Airport on March 15. She denied she was attempting to return to North Korea.

“I was on my way to China to meet my relatives,” she said.

But Judge Park Pan-gyu did not accept her claim.

“Her testimony was inconsistent and we already have her phone records,” the judge said.

A prosecutor who investigated the case said: “It seems that the State Security Department of North Korea lured Kim’s mother to extradite her back.”