Oh Kil-nam
Encyclopedia
Oh Kil-nam is a retired South Korea
n economist, who defected to North Korea with his wife Shin Suk-ja
and daughters, then left them behind to obtain political asylum in Europe.
, in the southern half of the Korean peninsula
, and then went to Busan
for high school. He graduated from Seoul National University
in 1970, where he majored in German literature
. After his graduation, he went to Germany
to pursue graduate education in economics. In 1972, he married Shin Suk-ja, a fellow South Korean migrant in Germany
; the couple had two children, Oh Hae-won (1976) and Oh Kyu-won (1979). He filed his doctoral dissertation at the University of Bremen
in 1985, on the topic of Japanese Marxian economist Nobuo Okishio
and the labour theory of value
.
and Yun Isang
; they later suggested that he could help his motherland by working as an economist in North Korea. His activism also attracted the attention of North Korean government representatives, who further attempted to entice him to defect, claiming that his wife could receive free treatment for her hepatitis
in Pyongyang
. Over the objections of his wife, Oh took his family to North Korea, arriving on 8 December 1985. Instead of receiving the promised medical treatment, he and his wife were held at a military camp and forced to study the Juche
ideology of Kim Il-sung
, then employed making propaganda broadcasts to South Korea. While there, he claims to have met South Korean abductees
who were also employed making propaganda broadcasts, including two of the flight attendants from the Korean Air Lines YS-11 hijacking
.
Oh was later instructed to return to Germany to recruit other South Korean students to defect to North Korea; though he initially intended to follow through with his instructions, his wife argued fiercely with him, stating that he could not have such acts on his conscience. According to Oh, she told him to leave North Korea and "think of her and our daughters as being dead from a car accident". On 21 November 1986, Oh arrived in Denmark, where he requested political asylum from the immigration officers at the airport. In 1987, North Korean representatives warned Oh that his family would face difficulties if he failed to return to the country. In the end, they would be imprisoned in the Yodok concentration camp
. Oh received letters from his family in 1988, 1989, and 1991. Yun Isang gave Oh the final letter personally on 20 January 1991; it contained not just a letter from his wife, but also tape-recorded messages from his daughters, and six photographs. According to the Democracy Network Against the North Korean Gulag, Oh is the only person to have obtained such information about people interned in camps in the North.
An Hyuk
and Kang Chol-hwan
, former internees of the Yodok concentration camp, who told him that his wife and daughters were still alive and being held there; they also reported that his wife had made several failed suicide attempt
s. After his return, he began working at a government-funded think tank. In 1993, he published a book about his experiences, entitled Please Return My Wife and Daughters, Kim Il Sung. The most recent news of his family was that they were alive as of September 2011, and had recently been relocated from Yodok prison camp to a restricted area in Pyongyang. He testified at the 2003 espionage trial of Song Du-yul.
His fight to reunite his family has recently experienced a resurgence in the media with the establishment of the Daughter of Tongyeong Campaign, which aims to petition UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon to address the situation.
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
n economist, who defected to North Korea with his wife Shin Suk-ja
Shin Suk-ja
Shin Suk-ja is a South Korean political prisoner held in a North Korean political prison camp. She is married to Oh Kil-nam and has two daughters Oh Hye-won and Oh Kyu-won...
and daughters, then left them behind to obtain political asylum in Europe.
Early life and education
Oh was born in Uiseong, Gyeongsangbuk-doGyeongsangbuk-do
Gyeongsangbuk-do or shortly Gyeongbuk is a province in eastern South Korea. The province was formed in 1896 from the northern half of the former Gyeongsang province, remained a province of Korea until the country's division in 1945, then became part of South Korea.The Gyeongsangbuk-do Office is...
, in the southern half of the Korean peninsula
Korean Peninsula
The Korean Peninsula is a peninsula in East Asia. It extends southwards for about 684 miles from continental Asia into the Pacific Ocean and is surrounded by the Sea of Japan to the south, and the Yellow Sea to the west, the Korea Strait connecting the first two bodies of water.Until the end of...
, and then went to Busan
Busan
Busan , formerly spelled Pusan is South Korea's second largest metropolis after Seoul, with a population of around 3.6 million. The Metropolitan area population is 4,399,515 as of 2010. It is the largest port city in South Korea and the fifth largest port in the world...
for high school. He graduated from Seoul National University
Seoul National University
Seoul National University , colloquially known in Korean as Seoul-dae , is a national research university in Seoul, Korea, ranked 24th in the world in publications in an analysis of data from the Science Citation Index, 7th in Asia and 42nd in the world by the 2011 QS World University Rankings...
in 1970, where he majored in German literature
German literature
German literature comprises those literary texts written in the German language. This includes literature written in Germany, Austria, the German part of Switzerland, and to a lesser extent works of the German diaspora. German literature of the modern period is mostly in Standard German, but there...
. After his graduation, he went to Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
to pursue graduate education in economics. In 1972, he married Shin Suk-ja, a fellow South Korean migrant in Germany
Koreans in Germany
Koreans in Germany numbered 31,248 individuals , according to the statistics of South Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Though they are now only the 14th-largest Korean diaspora community worldwide, they remain the second-largest in Western Europe, behind the rapidly-growing community...
; the couple had two children, Oh Hae-won (1976) and Oh Kyu-won (1979). He filed his doctoral dissertation at the University of Bremen
University of Bremen
The University of Bremen is a university of approximately 23,500 people from 126 countries that are studying, teaching, researching, and working in Bremen, Germany...
in 1985, on the topic of Japanese Marxian economist Nobuo Okishio
Nobuo Okishio
was a Japanese Marxian economist and emeritus professor of Kobe University. In 1979, He was elected President of Japan Association of Economics and Econometrics, which is now Japanese Economic Association....
and the labour theory of value
Labor theory of value
The labor theories of value are heterodox economic theories of value which argue that the value of a commodity is related to the labor needed to produce or obtain that commodity. The concept is most often associated with Marxian economics...
.
Defection to North Korea and back
Oh became involved in political activism against the South Korean government in the early 1980s. He was influenced in this by a number of famous South Korean leftists in Germany, including Song Du-yulSong Du-yul
Song Du-yul is a professor of philosophy and sociology at the University of Münster in Münster, Germany. He has been a political exile in Germany from his native South Korea for over 40 years. Educated in South Korea, he left that nation for Germany in 1967 to pursue higher education...
and Yun Isang
Isang Yun
Isang Yun was a Korean-German composer originally from Korea. According to his official publisher's Boosey & Hawkes biography of him, he was granted political asylum by West Germany, eventually becoming a naturalised German citizen, following his abduction and torture in 1967 by the South Korean...
; they later suggested that he could help his motherland by working as an economist in North Korea. His activism also attracted the attention of North Korean government representatives, who further attempted to entice him to defect, claiming that his wife could receive free treatment for her hepatitis
Hepatitis
Hepatitis is a medical condition defined by the inflammation of the liver and characterized by the presence of inflammatory cells in the tissue of the organ. The name is from the Greek hepar , the root being hepat- , meaning liver, and suffix -itis, meaning "inflammation"...
in Pyongyang
Pyongyang
Pyongyang is the capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, commonly known as North Korea, and the largest city in the country. Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River and, according to preliminary results from the 2008 population census, has a population of 3,255,388. The city was...
. Over the objections of his wife, Oh took his family to North Korea, arriving on 8 December 1985. Instead of receiving the promised medical treatment, he and his wife were held at a military camp and forced to study the Juche
Juche
Juche or Chuch'e is a Korean word usually translated as "self-reliance." In the Democratic People's Republic of Korea , "Juche" refers specifically to a political thesis of Kim Il-sung, the Juche Idea, that identifies the Korean masses as the masters of the country's development...
ideology of Kim Il-sung
Kim Il-sung
Kim Il-sung was a Korean communist politician who led the Democratic People's Republic of Korea from its founding in 1948 until his death in 1994. He held the posts of Prime Minister from 1948 to 1972 and President from 1972 to his death...
, then employed making propaganda broadcasts to South Korea. While there, he claims to have met South Korean abductees
North Korean abductions of South Koreans
An estimated 84,532 South Koreans were taken to North Korea during the Korean War. In addition, South Korean statistics claim that, since the Korean Armistice in 1953, about 3,800 people have been abducted in North Korea , 480 of whom are still being held by North Korea.- Two types of Abductees...
who were also employed making propaganda broadcasts, including two of the flight attendants from the Korean Air Lines YS-11 hijacking
Korean Air Lines YS-11 hijacking
The Korean Air Lines YS-11 hijacking occurred on 11 December 1969. The aircraft, a Korean Air Lines NAMC YS-11 flying a domestic route from Gangneung Airbase in Gangneung, Gangwon-do to Gimpo International Airport in Seoul, was hijacked at 12:25 PM by North Korean agent Cho Ch'ang-hǔi...
.
Oh was later instructed to return to Germany to recruit other South Korean students to defect to North Korea; though he initially intended to follow through with his instructions, his wife argued fiercely with him, stating that he could not have such acts on his conscience. According to Oh, she told him to leave North Korea and "think of her and our daughters as being dead from a car accident". On 21 November 1986, Oh arrived in Denmark, where he requested political asylum from the immigration officers at the airport. In 1987, North Korean representatives warned Oh that his family would face difficulties if he failed to return to the country. In the end, they would be imprisoned in the Yodok concentration camp
Yodok concentration camp
Yodok concentration camp is a political prison camp in North Korea. The official name is Kwan-li-so No. 15.-Location:...
. Oh received letters from his family in 1988, 1989, and 1991. Yun Isang gave Oh the final letter personally on 20 January 1991; it contained not just a letter from his wife, but also tape-recorded messages from his daughters, and six photographs. According to the Democracy Network Against the North Korean Gulag, Oh is the only person to have obtained such information about people interned in camps in the North.
Return to South Korea
Oh surrendered to South Korean authorities at the embassy in Germany in April 1992, and returned to South Korea. In October 1992, he met with North Korean defectorsNorth Korean defectors
A number of individuals have defected from North Korea. Since the division of Korea after World War II and the end of the Korean War , many people have defected from North Korea, mainly for political, ideological, religious and economic reasons...
An Hyuk
An Hyuk
An Hyuk is a North Korean defector. He formerly lived as an expatriate in China, and repatriated to North Korea in 1986; however, he was accused of spying, and imprisoned at the Yodok concentration camp. He escaped from North Korea together with Kang Chol-Hwan, whom he met while interned at Yodok...
and Kang Chol-hwan
Kang Chol-Hwan
Kang Chol-Hwan is a defector from North Korea. As a child he was imprisoned in the Yodok concentration camp for 10 years; after his release he fled the country, first to China and eventually to South Korea...
, former internees of the Yodok concentration camp, who told him that his wife and daughters were still alive and being held there; they also reported that his wife had made several failed suicide attempt
Failed suicide attempt
Failed suicide attempts comprise a large portion of suicide attempts. Some are regarded as not true attempts at all, but rather parasuicide. The usual attempt may be a wish to affect another person by the behaviour. Consequently, it occurs in a social context and may represent a request for help....
s. After his return, he began working at a government-funded think tank. In 1993, he published a book about his experiences, entitled Please Return My Wife and Daughters, Kim Il Sung. The most recent news of his family was that they were alive as of September 2011, and had recently been relocated from Yodok prison camp to a restricted area in Pyongyang. He testified at the 2003 espionage trial of Song Du-yul.
His fight to reunite his family has recently experienced a resurgence in the media with the establishment of the Daughter of Tongyeong Campaign, which aims to petition UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon to address the situation.