hankyoreh

The biggest worry of many defectors from North Korea is about the safety of their family members left behind in the communist nation. Mr. Lee, 38, is no exception. He arrived in South Korea with four of his family members on March 18 last year, having traveled for over nine hours on a small wooden boat from Tongcheon in North Korea to Goseong-gun in Gangwon Province. He requested that his identity be kept anonymous when his discovery prompted the Ministry of National Defense and the police to launch a joint investigation. If it would be difficult to do so, he urged the authorities to return him to the sea or to send him to a third country.

His concern was for the safety of his family remaining in the North, which is known to send defectors' remaining family members to labor camps as punishment if their identities are uncovered.

At daybreak the next day, however, his story and his personal records were revealed to the media. Even if his real name was not used, other facts including his age, job, military record, route used to flee from the North, and his family relationships were made known to the public. Later, Lee indirectly confirmed that his parents and relatives in the North are still alive, but all of them are now missing.

Lee submitted a petition to the National Human Rights Commission of Korea, claiming that his family in the North suffered damage due to the exposure of his identity in May last year. The commission ruled that the police had not observed a principle regarding treatment of defectors and demanded the National Police Agency to take due measures. According to a manual by the National Security Council (NSC), identity of defectors should not be open to the public and, in the case that such a leak would be inevitable, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) can reveal only a small amount of the defector's personal records under an alias.

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