It has been revealed that two South Korean POW family members were arrested by the Chinese police late last month in Shenyang, China, because their accommodation was insecure and not within Consulate General grounds.

The news was revealed on Tuesday by Choi Sung Ryong, the representative of Family Assembly Abducted to North Korea, and subsequently confirmed in a National Assembly hearing today.

According to Choi, although the two escapees from North Korea successfully penetrated the South Korean Consulate General in Shenyang in mid-September, they were subsequently housed in an insecure residential dwelling near the building. According to the Consulate General, there was no room for them within the consular building proper.

In a hearing regarding the activities of MOFAT in the Diplomacy, Commerce and Unification Committee of the National Assembly today, Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Shin Kak Soo admitted the story, saying, “It is true that they are the family of POW’s, but the Consulate General only placed them in an unprotected location due to a lack of facilities.”

The South Korean government has officially requested that the Chinese government not send the two back to North Korea.

Later, Yoon Sang Hyun of the Grand National Party stated that the South Korean government ought to attempt to bring POWs home via a policy similar to “Freikauf,” the method by which West Germany paid for the freedom of political prisoners from East Germany throughout the 1960s, 70s and 80s. He added, “POWs are different from defectors; the government should bring them here through negotiations between the National Intelligence Service and North Korea, even by military means.”

He also pointed out, “In October, 2006 nine POWs’ families were arrested and sent back to North Korea by the Chinese police while staying in residential housing prepared by the Consulate General in Shenyang. Such things should not happen. It was a real shock.”

From 1963 to 1989, West Germany brought 33,755 political prisoners back from East Germany at a cost of 3.4 billion Marks under the policy of “Freikauf.”