Taking the North Korean line.

John Hensley comments:

I would appreciate it if this could be mentioned in the blog.

Junichiro Koizumi made a trip to N. Korea recently to negotiate permission for the children of Japanese kidnap victims to join their parents in Japan. A side story, written by Sarah Buckley, was about US soldier Charles Jenkins, who married a kidnap victim and is still in N. Korea:

link.

In the article is this remark:

“The [kidnap victims’] homecoming was supposed to be brief, but Tokyo never allowed the five to return….”

I politely asked the BBC to consider whether there are grounds for claiming that the victims are in Japan against their will. After 3 days there has been no correction. I challenge anyone to find a news source other than KCNA [the North Korean news agency] for this claim.

The word “allow” is about as unambiguous in this sentence as it can be. Either Buckley is a careless writer or she believes that the victims really are eager to return to the Korean gulag state. If the latter, I’m inclined to allow her to return there herself, with extreme prejudice.