Kim Dae-jung and the Quest for the Nobel: How the President of South Korea Bought the Peace Prize and Financed Kim Jong-il’s Nuclear Program

245 Pages·2013·1.108 MB·English

by  Kisam Kim, Donald Kirk (auth.)

Kim Dae- jung and the
Quest for the Nobel
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Kim Dae- jung and the
Quest for the Nobel
How the President
of South Korea Bought
the Peace Prize and Financed
Kim Jong- il’s Nuclear Program
Kisam Kim and Donald Kirk
kim dae- jung and the quest for the nobel
Copyright © Kisam Kim and Donald Kirk, 2013.
All rights reserved.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2013 978-1-137-35308-5
First published in 2013 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United
States— a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York,
NY 10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the
world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers
Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-46954-3 ISBN 978-1-137-35309-2 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-35309-2
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data is available from the
Library of Congress.
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Scribe Inc.
First edition: September 2013
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Sang-m i and Sung- hee
With much appreciation for your patience and understanding
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Contents
Foreword by Janet Hinshaw-T homas ix
Preface xiii
Map of Korea xv
1 Asylum at Last! 1
2 Norwegian Base 13
3 Softening the Swedes 23
4 Spreading the Net 33
5 Eyes on the Prize 47
6 Shielding the Deeds 59
7 Courting the Bishop 71
8 Scaling the Summit 85
9 Beyond the Summit 95
10 Playing the Media 107
11 Swedish Connection 121
12 Easily the Winner 133
13 Sunshine Exposed 147
14 In History’s Glare 159
15 Legacy of Terror 171
Epilogue 183
Chronology 187
Cast of Characters 197
viii CONTENTS
Nobel Peace Prize Winners Cited in This Book 203
Glossary: Abbreviations and Acronyms 205
Notes 207
Bibliography 223
Index 229
Foreword
When Mr. Kim walked through the doors of our small office, I immedi-
ately felt that I had the privilege of meeting a fearless man who champi-
oned truth and justice. Many victims of persecution come to our nonprofit
(actually “for loss”) agency. Some can prove past persecution, some even
with bodily scars, while others have endured severe psychological trauma.
It is always a welcome challenge to help such people present their cases in
front of erudite immigration judges while facing well-v ersed government
attorneys.
Usually clients who were journalists are the easiest to coach in help-
ing them understand which elements within their often tragic or broken
lives are important to the case. Those with absolutely no schooling or
who are functionally illiterate commonly fail to distinguish between life-
threatening circumstances and those events that the law recognizes as past
persecution on the basis of one of the five legal grounds for asylum.
Mr. Kim’s case, however, presented a different challenge. He was from
South Korea, a country that has had a somewhat checkered past in auto-
cratic presidents, but not a country in which torture or persecution is rou-
tine. Yet he had diligently uncovered facts of gross governmental deceit.
And, almost like Don Quixote, he continued to reveal those facts in the
public arena through his articles, blogs, emails, and so on. Although his
email was hacked, articles were erased from the web, and publishers threat-
ened not to accept his writings, he continued because he was so outraged
by the facts he had been able to uncover.
Luckily Mr. Kim was not in the clutches of his government, as he
enjoyed the temporary protection of life and liberty in the United States.
But he always faced the prospect of being forcefully returned by our gov-
ernment to South Korea, where he would be tried for revealing the illegal
acts of his government and would also be well within the reach of North
Korean agents.
The life of a whistle-b lower is a precarious one. Some, like Deep Throat
of Watergate fame, have decided not to become public; others, even in our
democracy, have known ridicule, dismissal from jobs, destitution, and
sometimes even jail time. We were lucky in having an immigration judge