Is that Dokdo?
It was a touching day for a South Korea family yesterday, as Kim Young-nam, the South Korean abductee who is believed to have married Japanese abductee Megumi Yokota, was allowed to meet his mother:
A South Korean man allegedly abducted by the North met his mother for the first time in 28 years Wednesday amid concern the communist state is trying to use him as a tool to silence Japanese claims that his former Japanese wife is alive.
Kim Young-nam and his 78-year-old mother cried and hugged each other at the North’s Diamond Mountain resort, amid other reunions of Koreans divided by the world most heavily fortified border.
No details have yet emerged as to whether Kim Young-nam is still claiming that Yokata committed suicide in North Korea (a claim that many in Japan doubt), or whether he will be allowed to leave North Korea and live in the South. Some in Japan think that the North Koreans are allowing him to meet his South Korean family so that he can tell them Pyongyang’s story about how Yokata is dead.
The families of Yokota and Kim Young-nam had been working together recently in an effort to find out more about the fate of their abducted relatives. If Kim Young-nam tells his family that Megumi Yokota is dead, they will likely believe him and stop working with Yokata’s family (who believes she is still alive). Personally, I have my doubts about her being alive, but if some Japanese people want to think she is, they can.
After hearing about the above-mentioned news on TV, I did a little bit of extra reading on the internet. One one site I found the following image, which appears to be a screen captures from a Japanese TV show:
It appears to be am image from an ANN News broadcast earlier this month, in which Kim Young-nam’s mother and sister were discussing how they were looking forward to being able to finally meet him. They talk about how they would like for him to come back to South Korea with them and other related issues.
But wait, what is that image behind them? It looks like some sort of rocky island in some water…is that….Dokdo??
It sure looks like Dokdo/Takeshima. I can’t read Korean, but I am guessing it says something like “DOKDO IS KOREAN LAND”, or some other propaganda statement. I really hope I am wrong. I really hope that the Koreans involved would care more about the issue at hand, which has nothing to do with a territorial dispute, than saying ‘f-ck you the islands are ours’ to all the Japanese media assembled. I really hope I am mistaken and that really isn’t a picture of Dokdo or a propaganda poster… Somebody tell me what that image is, and what it says!
Update: There is a very good update about the abductee issue over at The Korea Liberator. Check it out!
