OPINION — In September 2002, North Korea’s supreme leader, Kim Jong-il, admitted to Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi that North Korea had abducted thirteen Japanese citizens — saying that eight were dead and five could visit Japan and return to North Korea. The Japanese public was shocked. Eight dead? At Japan’s request, North Korea returned the remains of two, Megumi Yokota and Kaoru Matsuki to Japan for forensic analysis. The analysis determined the remains did not belong to either person.
In October 2002, President George W. Bush sent Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia/Pacific Affairs, James Kelly, to Pyongyang for meetings with North Korea’s Vice Foreign Minister Kang Sok Ju. During their meeting, Mr. Kang admitted that North Korea had an active gas centrifuge program to enrich uranium for use in nuclear weapons. He rhetorically asked what the U.S. was prepared to do about such a program. The meeting then ended abruptly.
These are the two issues that continue to poison relations with North Korea. The Mr. Koizumi visit to North Korea was done in the spirit of improving relations; the ideal outcome was North Korea apologizing and returning all the Japanese citizens they abducted and adhering to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and other nuclear commitments, given that in 1998 North Korea launched a long-range Taepo Dong missile that flew over Japan. Mr. Koizumi’s meeting with Mr. Kim was not the success it was meant to be. The Japanese public was irate with the results of the visit.
To date, the abductee issue continues to be unresolved, with a mandate from the people that there be closure on this sordid chapter of Japan-North Korea relations. Yokota Sakie, the mother of Yokota Megumi, who was a first-year junior high school student when she was abducted in 1977, recently had a press conference imploring the government to bring back the abductees. Ms. Sakie is the only surviving parent of the government-recognized abductees who remain unaccounted for.
Japan recognizes seventeen citizens abducted by North Korea in the 1970s and 80s; five returned to Japan in 2002, but the other twelve are unaccounted for. There are other estimates that there were hundreds of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea during that period.
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North Korea’s highly enriched uranium program continues to be the major stumbling block in resolving the nuclear issue with North Korea. When North Korea was confronted in 2002 with intelligence indicating a clandestine uranium enrichment program for nuclear weapons, Mr. Kang did not deny it; rather, he apparently made it clear that there was nothing the U.S. – and others – could do about it. It also speaks to North Korea’s long-held determination to be a nuclear weapons state. So, despite the Agreed Framework of 1994 that was meant to end North Korea’s quest for a nuclear weapon, Pyongyang decided to pursue a clandestine program to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons.
Indeed, North Korea is now quite open about this uranium enrichment program. The failure of the 2019 Hanoi Summit was due to Mr. Kim’s unwillingness to include his uranium enrichment sites, in addition to the Yongbyon plutonium site, in a deal to lift sanctions in return for a halt in all nuclear programs. In fact, Mr. Kim recently visited another enrichment site, apparently at Yongbyon, where he was shown pictures of shining centrifuges.
North Korea continues to produce fissile material – plutonium and enriched uranium – for nuclear weapons, while enhancing their ballistic missile capabilities, with a Hwasong-18, a solid fuel Intercontinental missile (ICBM) capable of targeting the whole of the U.S. Most recently, Mr. Kim talked about North Korea’s goal of having a blue water navy, which would give North Korea considerable reach in international waters, an obvious threat to Japan and other neighboring countries.
North Korea’s enhanced nuclear and missile programs and their mutual defense treaty with Russia, with over 11,000 North Korean troops in Russia for the war with Ukraine – in addition to ballistic missiles and artillery and rocket launchers – requires immediate attention.
On June 26 there will be an online symposium in the United Nations on the abduction issue. I and hopefully many others will tune in to this symposium, given that it’s an “ongoing problem and an international challenge that requires immediate resolution.”
This column by Cipher Brief Expert Ambassador Joseph DeTrani was first published in The Washington Times
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