2016年倫敦と1959年モスクワ - Living, Loving, Thinking, Again

承前*1

Andrei Lankov “Accusations and smear tactics: how North Korea explains defections” https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/23/accusations-smear-tactics-thae-yong-ho-north-korea-defections

倫敦駐在の外交官、太永浩（Thae Yong-ho）氏の韓国亡命を巡って、北朝鮮側は最初は韓国の陰謀による拉致だと喚き立て、韓国を非難した*2。その次は、一転して、「人間の屑」というお決まりの罵倒と〈罪状〉の列挙と相成った*3。記事では先ず、この「非一貫性（inconsistency）」を嗤っている。
そして、1959年のモスクワで起こった或る亡命事件が回顧的に言及されている。

This was the abduction of Yi Sang-gu, a North Korean musician who had been studying in Moscow. Unhappy with Kim Il-sung’s policies, on 16 October 1959 Yi applied for political asylum in the Soviet Union. His chances of success were high, since the Soviet government had previously granted asylum to North Korean officials and intellectuals who had run away from the wave of terror unleashed by Kim after the collapse of the opposition in 1957-58.
Yi went into in Moscow. After his disappearance, North Korean diplomats rushed to the Soviet authorities and began to feed them stories about Yi. Their claims – and their inconsistency – are reminiscent of what we have heard in the last few days.
MS Kapitsa, who at that time was the deputy head of the First Far Eastern Department, and responsible for North Korea, was visited by Pak Tŏk-hwa, an official at the North Korean embassy in Moscow.
Pak said Yi had broken all contact with the North Koreans and told Kapitsa that he was politically suspicious. He told the Soviets that Yi had been born in South Korea, and that he had also lived in Japan and Manchuria, hoping this would prompt the Soviet authorities to think twice about assisting him. .
Other claims soon followed, including that Yi had been proven to be a Japanese spy and that he was having an affair with a Russian woman whom he wanted to marry despite already having a Korean wife.
Days after his disappearance, on an early afternoon in downtown Moscow, Yi was ambushed by North Korean operatives, beaten and pushed into an embassy car. The next day he was sent back to Pyongyang by plane, never to be heard from again.
Back in Pyongyang, then Soviet Ambassador AM Puzanov met with Pak Sŏng-ch’ŏl, the newly appointed North Korean foreign minister, to object. However Pak provided the Soviet side with yet another story. He said the abduction was intended because authorities in Pyongyang had ordered the Moscow embassy to send Yi home, due to serious “irregularities” in his behaviour. But they allegedly did not expect that their diplomats would kidnap the musician.

旧蘇聯に亡命した北朝鮮人が多くいたということは一般的な事実としては知っていたけれど、このYi Sang-guという人は知らなかった。彼の場合、太永浩氏とは異なり、不幸にして、北朝鮮側が奪還＝拉致に成功してしまったわけだ*4。また、Andrei Lankov氏は蘇聯大使の抗議に対する北朝鮮側の言い訳は、金正日が小泉純一郎に対して行った日本人拉致に関する言い訳を想起させるとも述べている。

姜尚中 *5「北朝鮮公使の亡命」http://www.nishinippon.co.jp/nnp/teiron/article/268957

取り敢えずマークしておく。

*1:http://d.hatena.ne.jp/sumita-m/20160817/1471404465 http://d.hatena.ne.jp/sumita-m/20160818/1471492776 http://d.hatena.ne.jp/sumita-m/20160820/1471621240 http://d.hatena.ne.jp/sumita-m/20160821/1471795799

*2:See Julian Ryall “North Korean diplomat 'was bribed or coerced' into defecting, Pyongyang claims” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/08/18/north-korean-diplomat-was-bribed-or-coerced-into-defecting-pyong/

*3:See Chris Johnston “North Korea brands UK-based defector Thae Yong-ho as 'human scum'” https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/20/north-korea-brands-uk-based-defector-human-thae-yong-ho-scum Chad O'Carroll and Dagyum Ji “Defector diplomat accused of sexual crimes with minor: N.Korean state media” https://www.nknews.org/2016/08/defector-diplomat-raped-minors-north-korean-state-media-alleges/

*4:See also Andrei Lankov “North Korean victims of North Korean kidnappings” https://www.nknews.org/2015/12/north-korean-victims-of-north-korean-kidnappings/