Seven Major Points of Suspicion!
A Statement Addressed to Relevant Authorities
Catholic Priests Association for Justice and the Catholic Human Rights Committee raise following suspicions about the cause of KAL858 plane's mysterious disappearance in 1987, and hereby call for a thorough new investigation of the event at the levels of government and the national assembly.
1. Investigation was mislead from the beginning:
On November 29, 1987, at 14:00, the plane was flying over Myanmar and sent a message to the control tower at Bangkok that the flight was all right and the plane was arriving at Bangkok in 45 minutes. Leaving the message in its final communication went the plane nowhere.
Normally, with such an event, the intelligence investigation would start seeking the cause of missing on all possibilities, including at least: aircraft shortcomings, hijacking, or explosion for some reason. Indeed, the aircraft had a record of two accidents, the last one involving emergency landing because of some trouble with its landing gear system. Why did the National Security Planning Agency (NSPA) exclude the possibility of aircraft shortcomings in its investigation? As a matter of fact, the KAL plane disappeared in mystery during its first flight after the repairs of its last accident.
1-1. At Abu Dhabi airport, altogether 15 persons left the KAL plane, including Kim Seuingil and Kim Hyunhee and two flight crew members off duty. NSPA has never mentioned who those other eleven persons were. Does NSPA have their personal data? Weren't there perhaps someone with an international terrorist connection among them?
2. The black-box was not sought by search crew.
The black-box is supposed to stay safe for 30 days on land or in deep sea at surrounding temperature as high as 1000¡É, and under the load of 100 times its own weight. For those 30 days it keeps sending out radio wave signal reaching half a mile in all directions. But the NSPA apparently neglected or ignored their efforts to search for the black-box during the early period of its investigation. The necessary equipment was not on hand, perhaps. Then it should have been requested from the Boeing Corporation, at once. But neither the Agency nor the KAL company did so. Did they think the black-box searching could be done without equipment?
There are good examples. One day before the KAL plane was lost, that was, on November 28, 1987, a Jumbo jet from the Republic of South Africa went crashed into the Indian Ocean near Mauritius. Its wreckages were found out 4000 meters deep down in the sea. And in the case of KAL007, which was downed by Russian missile, the wreckages were found floating on the sea for more than one year after the crash. In the case of KAL-858, however, the searching crew was ordered to withdraw from their task after only 10 days of working without anything found on hand, at all. Why did the Agency have to terminate the searching operation so hurriedly?
2-1. While nothing was found coming up, a lifeboat of the size of 25 persons showed up on the sea west of Myanmar on the 13th of December. The boat was found in its original, neatly folded form containing within it 50 pieces or 13 different kinds of objects. Among them was an air-pump which was the NSPA claimed a part coming from the lost plane. The Agency used the air-pump as a material evidence that prove that the plane went exploded.
It means that the boat remained safe amid the explosion while the air-pump alone, among many other things wrapped inside the boat, got damaged. Is it possible logically or in experience?
3. NSPA sabotaged collecting material evidences:
At its press interview on Jauary 15, 1988, the NSPA said that the plane went exploded by the acts of North Korean agents, including Kim Hyunhee. But the Agency had nothing in material to support the allegation, except for a statement of confession by Kim Hyunhee herself. It was such a catastrophic event that took the lives of 115 people so no one could make a joke with it. What was the background that made the Agency hasten its publication of the KAL plane event without the support of any material evidences, at all?
The story told by the Agency, including Kim's words spoken at the press interview, had many discrepancies within and between themselves. Knowing that her statement alone could not generate the power of evidence, how NSPA could stay inactive in the collection of material evidences? Does the Agency have other evidences than Kim's own statement that have not been disclosed so far?
3-1. According to Kim's statement, she began her journey from Pyongyang and came to Hungary via Moscow by plane, and then went to Vienna, Austria by train, and left the train at the Vienna's South Station. But Mr. Mineo Nota, a Japanese freelance reporter/writer, who had chased Kim's trace, says that she must have arrived at the West station, not the South, because the trains entering Vienna from the Western Europe come to the West and those from the Eastern Europe to the South. Kim Hyunhee later gave up her initial allegation and admitted Mr. Nota's opinion.
3-2. NSPA said that Kim Hyunhee lodged at Ampa Kling Hotel and her room number was 603. But the hotel was found to have a room with that number. The Agency also said that Kim Hyunhee's father was Kim Wonshick, then residing in Angola as fishery representative with the North Korean trade delegation. To this allegation by South Korean NSPA, the North Korean authority reacted at once saying they did not have a title of "fishery representative" on their table of government organization. So, NSPA did not know exactly who Kim Hyunhee was! How could the NSPA, the prestigious Korean intelligence agency, be so stupid as to publicize a story about the young lady not knowing who she was? Was the Agency determined to tell a complete lie?
3-3. Kim Hyunhee was sent to Salmanama Hospital in Bahrein for examination and emergency treatment. Later, Dr. Jacobian who took care of her at the hospital told the press that Kim Hyunhee had no poison trace as a result of her stomach wash. But NSPA publicized, as of December 15, she was still ill and yet to recover from poisoning. Were we wrong to have doubts about what NSPA had been telling to the public?
4. They did not try to run away. Why?
Between the time of their arrival at Bahrein (from Abu Dhabi), 16:34, November 29, and the time of their departure for Rome on December 1, those two Kims had two days time, but they stayed in Bahrein during those two day as if they had no intention to run for a safe hideaway. By November 30, they must have begun to have feelings of being chased, with increasing number of telephone calls at the hotel's reception from some Japanese and Korean offices. Could the fugitives stay so relaxed after their horrible criminal deeds?
4-1 They enjoyed shopping and taking pictures in the streets of Vienna city where orientals are scarcely encountered, creating their own traces, perhaps on purpose. At the hotel in Bahrein, also, they left behind them 495 pieces of their belongings. From Abu Dhabi, where they left the plane with the explosives placed in the overhead bin, they did not go directly to Europe but went to the island country, Bahrein. And there they withheld their departure for 2 days though there were four flights a day between Bahrein and Rome.
Who would say they were spies who were anxious about carrying out such a dreadful, thrilling secret mission within a day or two, and successfully, or who were on the run after that mission had been fulfilled?
5. No, the girl in the picture was not Kim Hyunhee.
NSPA had a few pictures of, say, Kim Hyunhee in her days of higher middle school. Those pictures were used at the press interview by NSPA as a proof that Kim Hyunhee was a North Korean spy falsely named MAYUMI. One of them was a picture of schoolgirl Kim Hyunhee holding flowers in her hands getting prepared to present them to Jang Kiyoung who had just arrived at the airport of Pyongyang, leading a delegation to the South-North Coordination Committee meeting, in 1972.
Another was one which had been copied from a Japanese Communist Party magazine, showing the same schoolgirl almost in the same posture. But, according to recent reports, the flower-girl in the picture was not Kim Hyunhee: she was Jeong Huisun, now the mother of a few children living in North Korea. She was quoted as saying, "I have vivid memory about the welcoming ceremony that day as if it were yesterday."
5-1 The human face changes its appearance with age and the degree of changes varies by person. But there is one thing on the face that does not so change: it is the shape of one's ear, that of earlobe in particular. The expertise on this subject points out that the flower-girl and Kim Hyunhee differ markedly in the shapes of their earlobes: the former has a round, rather thick earlobe whereas the latter has a sharp and thin one that people call a "knife ear." Computer analyses have also drawn the conclusion that the girl is not Kim Hyunhee but looks very much like Jeong Huisun.
NSPA was anxious and hasty under some urging pressure so that it could not pay attention to such mistakes. Why was it so anxious and hasty?
6. Death registry of victims was in haste.
The family law of this country requires that a minimum limit of time set by law must expire before administrative offices declare the lost be dead. Accordingly, those lost in the KAL plane event were supposed to be alive pending the expiration of their legal contingency. The government nevertheless hastened the administrative procedure to declare those, who were still "legally" alive, dead. Can you explain why the government did not mind taking such an illegal action?
7. Suzie Kim's Hong Kong Spy Case has the likeness.
It was an event also from 1987, the year when the KAL plane went lost. Suzie Kim was known as a North Korean spy killed in an event of North Korean spy connection. But the true story of the event has been unveiled, recently. Suzie Kim was not a spy, not at all, but was simply killed by her own husband. NSPA knew what was the event all about, but made use of it for its own cause. We suppose that the NSPA also knew all about what had really happened with the KAL858 plane.
7-1 Suzie Kim's husband, named Yun, went reporting to NSPA after he had killed his wife. But that simple murder case had been reconstructed by NSPA into a spy case of North Korean connection in which Yun was named not a killer but a victim, and when the "drama" showed up to the public the world was just shocked. Suzie Kim's bereaved family deserve the public compliment for their painful yet tireless efforts of chasing the truths of the event during the last 14 years, which have led to the unveiling of a true story about the Suzie Kim case, finally.
The year 1987 marked a politically very sensitive period of time for Korea. People were on their high tide of expectation for democracy after their "Resistance of June." In the meantime, the military regime was anxious and fearful of their future under the popular voting system reintroduced for the forthcoming presidential election. Under these circumstances, Kim Hyunhee was brought to Korea on the eve of the Presidential election, with the vast influence on votes, in consequence.
Date: November 2001
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