In 2019, two North Korean fishermen acknowledged that they had killed 16 shipping companies before they fled to South Korea and sought asylum. Then the progressive government in the south refused them the status of a refugee or a trial there and, in an unprecedented move, sent them back to the north.
That decision launched not only Political Fire Storm At that time, as well as criminal charges against four senior officials who prosecuted after the current conservative government, with a hard attitude against North Korea, took power in Seoul 2022.
On Tuesday, the Council of Three Courts in the District Court in Seoul proclaimed four top national security assistants to former President Moon Jae guilty of the abuse of their official power when they sent a return to the North Korean fishermen. The court announced prison sentences, but decided not to impose them immediately, pointing out in his judgment that he believed that the criminal complaint against officials was politically motivated under the heir of Mr. Moon, President Yoon Suk Yela.
Four former officials, Mr. Moon, Chung Eui-Yong; His director of the National Intelligence Service, SUH HONE; His staff chief, Noh Young-M; And his unification minister, Kim Yeon-Chul, is at six to 10 months in prison. But the penalties have been suspended for two years, after which it will be removed.
The criminal charges with which the four faced the first such species in South Korea and reflect the polarization of the two major political parties in the country when it came to dealing with its decades of the old enemy of North Korea.
When South Korea captured two North Korean fishermen, then at the age of 22 and 23, in their waters in 2019, they were not ordinary defects. They admitted that they had escaped after killing the captain and 15 other crew members on their boats, throwing their body into the sea.
South Korea did not have a contract with North Korea for the extradition of the criminal suspects. According to their Constitution, North Korean must treat as their citizens and until then accepted all North Korean asylum seekers, regardless of their background. But this time, Mr. Moon’s government decided to bring them back to the north, calling them “terrible criminals.”
The two of them were rejected access to lawyers or a chance in court to complain about the government’s decision to return them. Five days after they were captured, they took them, connected them to their eyes with their hands tied, on the intercovery border. One of them resisted when he saw what was happening, and South Korean had to pull him to hand them over to their North Korean counterparts.
The critics of Mr. Moon’s government accused him of neglecting two fishermen with a fair trial in the south and sending them to certain executions in the north to improve their policy of improving the ties with the north. The Government of Mr. Moon claimed that there was no way that South Korea was serving justice for the two North Koreans through his Judicia L system because all the key criminal evidence against them were north.
The prosecutors initially decided not to file allegations against Assistant Mr. Moon who were involved in the decision. But Things have changed After Mr. Yoon was a duty in 2022.
Mr. Yoon, a fierce critic of Mr. Moon North Korea’s policy, states the case of fishermen as a great example of ignoring the human rights of asylum seekers for political mitigation. Under Mr. Yoon, the Unification Ministry, which supported repatriation video And photos showing two northern Koreans that were guided, against their will, to the border.
In their verdict on Tuesday, judges said that former officials denied fishermen the right to a fair trial in South Korea. But they also doubted that the political motive was behind the charges, citing Mr. Yoon’s comments on the case and decision of the plaintiff to reverse their earlier position not to submit allegations.
In South Korea, sitting presidents have long been charged with prosecutor’s weapons to discredit the governments of their predecessors with criminal charges, creating A vicious circle of political revenge. Mr. Yoon himself is now suspended from duty and Faces a criminal complaint related to his unfortunate statement of martial arts law in December.
The judges said South Korea should develop guidelines that could help their officers deal with cases like two fishermen North Korea.
Without such rules, “there is no guarantee that a similar confusion will not happen again if the same or similar case repeated,” the judges said.
Prosecutors have a week to regret the verdict.
