It has come to light that 19 defectors arrested by China’s Public Security Bureau in Shenyang in September were repatriated to North Korea in mid-October and are now undergoing National Security Agency interrogation.
A source from North Hamkyung Province told Daily NK today, “I saw more than ten defectors get transferred back over at Namyang Customs House by Onsung County NSA agents on October 15th. A grandmother who seemed to be more than 60 years old was carried away on a stretcher and there were young children too.” Namyang Customs House lies across the Tumen River from Tumen Customs House on the Chinese side.
According to the source, “The transferred defectors all come from different places, so they were interrogated by Onsung NSA then transferred to their local NSA. They are all in the middle of NSA anti-espionage interrogation.”
On the same group, one Yangkang Province source added, “I know that three people have been transferred to Hyesan NSA anti-espionage and are being interrogated now using various forms of torture.”
According to the sources, the North Korea authorities are keeping the matter top secret, because news of the group’s arrest in China was quite well publicized in South Korea and the international community at the time, and Pyongyang does not want it to turn into a diplomatic issue.
21 people were initially arrested by the Chinese security forces, but two were South Korean citizens and were not repatriated. One of the two is a broker who is still in detention in China for violation of local laws, while the other is a defector from Incheon who went to China to meet a family member. The second person has already returned to South Korea.
In the meantime, the South Korean authorities have yet to receive an answer from China on the whereabouts of the North Koreans, while some media outlets citing diplomatic sources previously reported that the defectors would be allowed to come to South Korea in November.
