The Silencing of North Korean Defector and Author Lee Ju-seong For His Book about North Korean Forces Deployment to South Korea

2021-4-23, Tara O

An author and an escapee from North Korea Lee Ju-seong (이주성) is concerned that he could be incarcerated or get his house and assets confiscated by the government, unless he pays the reminder of the balance of a fine of ₩10 million ($8,950).  He was already sentenced to 6 months in jail with 3 years of probation.   He has been harassed for the past decade, and even stabbed. This is all because he expressed that North Korea sent its special forces to South Korea, specifically to Gwangju in 1980.  The National Assembly’s “5.18 Truth Commission,” which is supposed to investigate whether or not North Korea was involved in the 5.18 Gwangju incident, and the Moon administration appear to be more interested in defaming Lee through JTBC’s program discrediting him, rather than interested in hearing what he has to say.  This is yet another case of suppression of freedom of speech as well as academic freedom.

About Lee Ju-seong

Lee ju-seong escaped from North Korea in January 2006 and arrived in South Korea in June 2006.  His earlier years were spent at a mining town in North Hamkyung Province, where his family was banished after his father, who worked in weapons design and production, opposed Kim Il-sung’s public distribution system.  He worked in mining, then fishing, then later at the 5.18 Machinery Factory (5.18 기계공장)  [initially called Munchon Mahinery Factory (문천기계공장), but the name changed to commemorate the Gwangju incident or “5.18”] in Wonsan, North Korea.  After arriving in South Korea, Lee established a North Korean human rights organization NK Design Association (NK디자인협회), which has sent leaflets about capitalist and liberal democratic societies, socks, and t-shirts, via balloons to North Korea. 

The ruling party’s rush to criminalize leaflet sending—the anti-leaflet law, aka the Kim Yo-jung decree law–also impacted his NGO’s operations.  Lee stated, “The leaflets and digital information sent to a jail-like North Korea, a door which can only be opened from outside, is like an oasis in a desert.”  The Moon administration also cut off funding to all North Korean human rights organizations, including NK Design Association, soon after Moon’s inauguration.

Lee also is an author.  He wrote Purple Lake (보랏빛호수), which is about North Korean forces sent to Gwangju in 1980.  He specifically refers to Kim Myung-guk, former North Korean special operations forces member, who defected to South Korea.  Kim has provided materials and summarized his experience of deployment to Gwangju in 1980 with a group of other North Korean forces.  He went to South Korea in 2006, and told the National Intelligence Service (NIS) that he went to Gwangju during the Gwangju Uprising as a special forces operator. Kim thought that the NIS would find the information valuable, but to his surprise, the NIS agent advised him not to mention it in the future. It is extremely controversial to mention North Korean involvement, which is usually followed by lawsuits.

Lee also wrote numerous other books, including Sunhee, a book about the grim reality of North Korean women, who are sold in sex industry in China.  The book received an award from the Federation of Artistic and Cultural Organizations of Korea (한국예술문화단체총연합회).  His books, however, have been taken off the book store shelves and their distribution halted due to pressure from the government and the suing groups.

Yet another book he authored, titled Sarinjaui Poomgyeok [something like “Elegance of a Murderer’], is about the 22 defectors, including 2 children, who went to South Korea on a boat in 2008, but were forcibly sent back to North Korea via the DMZ.  The defectors were executed at a public field in Haeju, Hwanghae Province.  He exposed that Moon Jae-in, who worked at the Blue House under Rho Moo-hyun, was responsible for sending them back to North Korea to their death.  The book stores would not deal with the book at all, due to the Moon administration’s pressure.

Civil Court Cases for Libel

Lee was initially sued in 2017 in the Western District Court in Seoul by a man with last name “Im” after Lee posted on social media about his book on North Korean forces deployment to Gwangju in 1980.  Mr. Im sued author Lee not once, not twice, but four times for “defaming” and “spreading false information” about “Gwangju Democratization Movement.”  Lee was cleared on two cases, but was fined ₩3 million on the 3rd case case and fined ₩2 million on the 4th case.

In 2019 after he moved to Chungju for business, a person with the last name “Han” sued Mr. Lee three times for libel for defaming the “Gwangju Democratization Movement” after Han read Purple Lake.  On two of the cases, the court fined Lee a total of ₩5 million.  All these fines total ₩10 million.  The cases went to the Supreme Court.  By the time the Supreme Court rended judgment, Lee had moved to Seongnam City, thus it is now the Seongnam Branch of the Suwon District Court, Gyeonggi Province, that is handling the property confiscation enforcement.   Lee Ju-seong paid ₩5.5 million, but was unable to pay the rest.  The court sent him a notice of confiscation of his assets, and has already seized Lee’s bank account, so Lee is unable to conduct bank transactions, making it difficult for him and his family financially.  If the balance is not paid by the end of April 2021, then his house and assets could be confiscated or he could be incarcerated in jail.

Criminal Court Case for Libel

The Kim Dae-jung Peace Center, on behalf of Kim Dae-jung’s wife Lee He-ho, also sued author Lee Ju-seong for defaming long-deceased former president Kim Dae-jung, but this time at a criminal court of the Seoul Western District, in November 2019.  [Note:  In the U.S., a dead person cannot be “defamed” or “libeled,” and the survivors and descendants have no legal claims on behalf of the deceased relative’s good name. See here.]  Prosecutor Kim Sang-gyun (김상균) asked for 1 year incarceration for Lee, and on June 3, 2020, Judge Jin Jae-gyeong (진재경) sentenced Lee to 6 months in jail and 3 years of probation.  The jail sentence was not executed at that time, but Lee felt that the judgement was unfair and unjust, as his intention was to reveal the truth.   The case was appealed, but the judge upheld the original ruling and sentencing on November 5, 2020.   For more details, see here.

The National Assembly “5.18 Truth Commission”

The National Assembly created the “5.18 Democratization Movement Truth Commission” to “search for the lost truth” based on “political neutrality, objectivity of facts, and scientific rationality.”  Yet, this commission is pressuring Lee Ju-seong and Kim Myung-gook (alias), the former North Korean special forces operator, to recant what they have stated. 

JTBC has even made a documentary–“The Root of the Story of 5.18 North Korean Forces Involvement:  Track Down ‘Special Forces” Kim Myung-guk”–defaming Lee and Kim, blaming them for “dividing South Korean society” by raising the issue of North Korea’s involvement in 5.18.  JTBC took down the videos, apparently after Kim agreed to recant.  It is also possible that they do not want the issue of North Korea in Gwangju to be available to the people at all.  Only the preview of the JTBC documentary remains on line as of April 23, 2021.

Lee’s Observations, the Sense of Unjustness and Hopelessness

Lee has attended the court hearing some 30 times.  Lee lamented that even though he wrote Purple Lake, thinking he wanted to correct history, he realized that what has been labeled as a “democracy movement” cannot be touched.

Lee Ju-seong escaped North Korea, where freedom and human rights are suppressed.  In South Korea, however, he is facing suppression of freedom of speech so unexpected and so harsh, that he and his family’s lives have become miserable.  The legal, physical, and psychological harassment of Lee Ju-seong in order to silence him reflects the sad state of South Korean human rights and individual freedom.