06.12.2002

japantoday > national

Ship smuggled $2.5 bil from Japan to North Korea

File photo of the North Korean cargo-passenger ship Man Gyong Bong

"Man Gyon Bong" is the name of a 9,672-ton passenger liner that goes back and forth between Wong Sang, a city in northern North Korea, and Niigata, a city in the middle part of Japan approximately 30 times a year.

Each December, the passenger liner has a special mission — to smuggle cash from Japan to North Korea, eluding Japan's law enforcement authority.

Yuriko Koike, a female member of the Conservative Party of Japan who raised questions about the cash smuggling by the North Koreans, told Shukan Post, "The most troubling issue is that the smuggled money from Japan has been used to run a terrorist nation. The Japanese government has ignored the situation and does not know how much money has been transported to North Korea.

"The Japanese government liberalized foreign currency laws, easing restrictions on remittance of currency to foreign countries. Also, the Japanese government established a system for injecting public money into ailing banks, including North Korea-related banks in Japan which were seriously damaged by the burst of the bubble economy," Koike said.

"All these policies were taken to benefit the Japanese nation. However, the North Koreans took advantage of these financial policies and smuggled cash from Japan. The liberalized foreign currency laws have neither the power to stop the smuggling of cash to North Korea nor to stop the Japanese government from injecting public money into ailing North Korea-related banks in Japan."

Since the end of last August, Shukan Post has been conducting a special investigation into covert actions by the North Korean government including their smuggling of cash from Japan. The Post tried to contact powerful people in the North Korean community in Japan including executives of North Korea-related banks. In the beginning, the investigation team was immediately stonewalled due to their refusal to speak.

However, since Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi visited North Korea and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il admitted to the abduction of Japanese civilians and apologized, the North Korean community in Japan has changed. The event was a shock for them.

One North Korean living in Japan said, "I was very disappointed by the news. So far, I have been hoping for the unification of all Korean people and the prosperity of the united country. I have given all my support for achieving this,

"I never believed that Japanese were abducted by our spies. I could not imagine any reason for them to commit such a crime. It was beyond our belief that North Koreans living in Japan would see acts of terrorism committed by our country against the Japanese people because we have to live in Japanese society. I assume that Kim Jong Il betrayed us because he might have concluded that our community in Japan lost its ability to remit money to him. I believe that Mr Kim is cutting us out."

Most North Koreans whom Shukan Post interviewed expressed similar views. They had been faithful to their country, referring to Mr Kim as the "shogun." However, they have abandoned this. They are trying to separate themselves from a North Korea controlled by Kim Jong Il and are pushing themselves to affiliate with Japanese society more than ever.

Shukan Post eventually succeeded in interviewing an executive who had been remitting money to North Korea for many years. He said, "If we remit a large amount of cash to North Korea through banks, there were records due to Japan's foreign currency law. Therefore, we smuggled more than one billion yen (about $8.3 million) using a passenger liner, the 'Man Gyon Bong.' We avoided the ship during the season of school excursions by Korean schools in Japan. We used the liner in December when there were less passengers and the sea was rough,

"We bundled 10,000-yen bills into 500,000 yen or 100 million-yen rolls and packed them in color TV boxes. Those boxes were loaded onto the ship. Top executives of North Korean organizations in Japan always watched the loading."

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