<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><HTML><BODY BGCOLOR="#ffffff"><FONT BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=3 PTSIZE=12 FAMILY="SERIF" FACE="Times New Roman" LANG="0">Dear colleagues,<BR>
<BR>
The death of the film director Shin Sang-ok has attracted <BR>
quite wide notice; e.g. an obituary in The Economist: <BR>
http://economist.com/people/displaystory.cfm?story_id=6849979<BR>
<BR>
It also reignites some nagging questions:<BR>
<BR>
1. Was his and Choi Eun-hee's memoir of their North Korean sojourn<BR>
ever published in English? If not, why not?<BR>
<BR>
An agent sent me a copy of the manuscript in 2003. It was dated 1987,<BR>
which already makes one wonder why it had not come out much sooner.<BR>
I believe it was long ago published in Korean and Japanese?<BR>
<BR>
2. (How to put this delicately; <I>de mortuis..</I>.) Is there any consensus <BR>
on whether either or both of them were indeed kidnapped to Pyongyang,<BR>
wholly involuntarily, as they afterwards insisted? I have heard rumours<BR>
that there may have been more to it - or is that just cynicism?<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
3. Similarly, in dissident circles in the ROK one used to hear claims<BR>
that the 1983 Rangoon bomb, and/or the 1987 downing of KAL 858, were<BR>
pepetrated not by North Korea but by either the KCIA or persons unknown.<BR>
<BR>
Given that in each case one of the DPRK agent perpetrators was caught and<BR>
confessed, can such doubts safely be dismissed as 'progressive' paranoia?<BR>
Case closed? - or do any genuine questions remain about either incident?<BR>
<BR>
(I recall, but cannot now trace, a website in English about KAL858 which <BR>
did ask what seemed some quite cogent questions about the matter;<BR>
notwithstanding the full and lucrative confessions of the "virgin bomber",<BR>
Ms Kim Hyon-hui.)<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
4. Finally, what of the mysterious bomb which killed five people at Kimpo<BR>
in September 1986? A US government website blames NK for this one too:<BR>
http://usinfo.state.gov/is/international_security/terrorism/terror_chronology.html<BR>
However, if I recall aright, the ROK never pointed the finger at Pyongyang<BR>
over that incident. Whodunit, then?<BR>
<BR>
Can any sleuths on the list close the file on these cases?<BR>
<BR>
cheers<BR>
Aidan<BR>
<BR>
AIDAN FOSTER-CARTER<BR>
Honorary Senior Research Fellow in Sociology & Modern Korea, Leeds University <BR>
Home address: 17 Birklands Road, Shipley, West Yorkshire, BD18 3BY, UK <BR>
tel: +44(0) 1274 588586 (alt) +44(0) 1264 737634 mobile: +44(0) 7970 741307 <BR>
fax: +44(0) 1274 773663 ISDN: +44(0) 1274 589280<BR>
Email: afostercarter@aol.com (alt) afostercarter@yahoo.com website: www.aidanfc.net<BR>
[Please use @aol; but if any problems, please try @yahoo too - and let me know, so I can chide AOL]<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
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