Ruling party leader urges further investigation of NK repatriation case

Rep. Kweon Seong-dong, floor leader of the ruling People Power Party, speaks at a senior party officials meeting on Thursday. Yonhap

The ruling People Power Party warned about the possibility of a National Assembly investigation and independent counsel probe regarding a North Korean repatriation case on Thursday.

The Moon Jae-in government ignored the law and decided to forcibly send the defectors to North Korea through arbitrary judgment, said Rep Kweon Seong-dong, floor leader of the ruling party, at a senior party officials meeting on Thursday. “We will consider detailed measures such as conducting a state investigation and appointing an independent special inspector,” he added.

“Human rights are universal values, but for the former (Moon Jae-in) government and the Democratic Party of Korea, human rights were a tool of partisanship,” he added.

In particular, he strongly criticized former President Moon for using human rights as a political tool. “Which one is real, human rights lawyer Moon Jae-in or President Moon Jae-in?” he said, referring to Moon’s previous career as a human rights lawyer.

The contested repatriation of North Korean defectors occurred in November 2019, in which two North Koreans sailors -- who allegedly killed 16 co-workers on a fishing boat -- were deported to North Korea through Panmunjom. At the time, the Moon administration claimed that they did not leave the North to defect to the South, but that they were fleeing prosecution after killing their co-workers. The Unification Ministry and the military concluded that their claims of wanting to defect to the South were insincere, as they had initially attempted to run away before finally being caught by South Korean authorities.

The case reignited controversy following the Ministry of Unification’s reversal of its position from three years ago on Monday, claiming that the defectors should have been perceived as Korean citizens under the Constitution, and that the decision at the time was “wrong.”

The ministry also released a photo on Tuesday of the defectors resisting as they were being repatriated.

South Korea’s Constitution does not recognize North Korea as a legitimate country, and deems its “occupation” of the northern half of the Korean Peninsula illegal.

The opposition Democratic Party hit back immediately. “Even in the law, it stipulates that ‘a serious nonpolitical criminal such as murderer may not be determined as a subject of protection,’” said Kim Byung-joo, the head of a task force team investigating the 2020 shooting death of a Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries worker named Lee Dae-jun, on Wednesday at a press conference at the National Assembly. Rep. Yoon Kun-young of the main opposition party on Thursday denounced such an allegation in a radio interview, saying “it is a clear political attempt to tarnish the former government.”

By Lee Jung-Youn(jy@heraldcorp.com)