Families ask Japanese kidnap victims to return
The families of Japanese kidnapped by North Korea today demanded their loved ones return home, despite their video-taped claims that they are happy in the reclusive communist state and do not want to leave.
The families spoke after watching the tapes of five surviving kidnap victims and the daughter of one who North Korea says has died.
Japanese government officials returned with the recording earlier this week.
The mission visited the North Korean capital Pyongyang to discover the fate of 13 Japanese nationals North Korea admitted last month to abducting in the 1970s and 1980s.
All the victims said on the video-tape that they were leading happy lives and expressed reluctance about returning to Japan.
But families in Tokyo said they doubted the isolated communist regime would allow their relatives to speak their minds.
“My position has always been that if she is alive, give her back. Bring her home immediately,” said Yuko Hamamoto, the older brother of Fukie Hamamoto, who went missing from a beach 24 years ago and was found last month to be among the survivors.
“She was speaking following a North Korea script. She can’t say what she wants to say,” he added.
“She can’t say she wants to come home.”
