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Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(muffled cheering)

(siren wailing)

(Indistinct chatter)

Spokesman: Ladies and gentlemen of the press...

Man: Out of the way! Come on, down.

Give somebody else a break.

Spokesman: I have been provided

with the following background information.

Mr. Shin and Miss Choi are both nationals of South Korea

and are married.

Mr. Shin was a well-known director

and Miss Choi a famous actress

in the South Korean film industry.

Some eight years ago, Miss Choi appeared in North Korea

after having been in Hong Kong.

Subsequently, Mr. Shin travelled to Hong Kong

and later appeared in North Korea.

Today's conference is held at the request

of Mr. Shin and Miss Choi.

The Shin couple will have an opening statement

after I have finished my...

(chuckles)

(indistinct chatter)

(applause)

(camera shutter clicks)

(applause)

Narrator: Kim Jong-il's leadership of Korea.

Mount Paektu, the mountain that chimes

with the history of the Korean revolution,

carries the great history of the leadership of Korea

By Kim Jong-il.

Inheriting the qualities of president Kim Il-sung,

a peerless hero of Korea,

and Kim Jong-suk,

a woman hero of the anti-Japanese revolution,

Kim Jong-il has led the Korean revolution

for several decades.

In the mid-1960s,

when the situation in Korea and the world was complicated,

Kim Jong-il started working

at the central committee of the workers' party of Korea,

the general staff of the Korean revolution.

Whenever the us imperialists resorted to high-handedness

with regard to Korea,

he'd put them to shame, displaying the wisdom

and mettle of an iron-willed commander.

(applause)

(cheering)

In the 1960s, I was working

in a military-intelligence organization in South Korea.

But I didn't have any connection with the film business.

I was just in the audience.

My job was to interrogate North Korean defectors

and arrest North Korean espionage agents.

(cheering)

In the 1970s, the North Korean Workers' Party

recognized Kim Jong-il as his father's heir apparent.

So he started to build up his own power base.

During that period, there was a very severe power struggle,

to protect Kim Jong-il's power

and his succession to power after his father.

Many, many people were killed and purged.

(cheering)

All of them are brainwashed.

All of them are brainwashed.

But the interrogator's job is to crack him.

To make him understand the true story, the true facts,

of what's going on.

♪ (man sings in Korean) ♪

(chuckles)

(shouting)

Interviewer: Can you describe what you heard on the tapes?

Because you told us before that you have heard

Kim Jong-il's voice, and not many people have.

I cannot do that.

Interviewer: I know you can't explain how you heard it,

but can you explain that you knew they were real?

And that this was really Kim Jong-il?

I cannot tell you the circumstances.

Interviewer: Yes, of course.

Okay, let's... Let's start. Okay.

I mentioned five tapes

that were released to the South Korean authorities

and I recognized Kim Jong-il's voice.

(scratchy interference on tape)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(Kim's Jong-il's indistinct speech on tape recorder)

Choi: Okay.

Mm.

(train whistle blows)

(groaning)

(indistinct chatter)

Iain T.A. Hall: We received a phone call,

from the Furama Hotel,

that one of their guests had left the hotel without paying,

in circumstances which they were unfamiliar with.

I think it was a Sunday.

Just about to come off my particular shift.

And because Hong Kong is such a massive place

with so many people,

missing people, missing persons cases, were, as you can imagine,

happening quite frequently.

But because this case involved a foreign national,

i.e. not a local Hong Kong person,

we had to pay particular attention.

When we got to the hotel, everything was in its place.

All her suitcases, her personal belongings.

The bathroom had all the cosmetics that you'd expect

from someone who's staying there

and had no intention of leaving in a hurry.

So we soon realized that we were on to something here

which wasn't just a missing person.

Why has she come to Hong Kong?

Who asked her? Why was she there?

And why had she mysteriously just disappeared,

as it would seem, off the face of the Earth with no trace?

Yi: Choi was divorced...

with a big bank debt.

One Korean lady approached Choi Eun-hee,

and she said, "Well, we have a very rich person in Hong Kong.

She's also in the film business."

Her name was Lee Sang-hee.

At the time, the South Korean government didn't know,

Choi didn't know, I didn't...

Nobody knew she was a North Korean agent.

(ship horn blows)

(camera shutter clicks)

Hall: On the 30th February, 1978,

we searched Lee Sang-hee's apartment at Queen's Road East.

It was quite revealing what we found.

A used North Korean airline ticket.

And also, a film script called Woman Slave Ship,

which was one of Shin's film scripts.

I remember the first time I met Shin.

There was something quite distinctive about him.

He had a bit of a swagger, good-looking and very confident.

It's difficult to articulate instinct,

but we felt there was something about Shin

that didn't sit comfortably with us.

His answers were somewhat inconsistent,

and he appeared to be very evasive.

He was quite clear that he had nothing to do with it,

but wanted to have police protection.

He felt that Choi had been abducted by the North Koreans.

He was obviously quite concerned

about what was going to happen to him.

Yi: Many different stories spread.

Speculations.

Shin contacted Kim Kyu-hwa.

He was Shin's old friend and business partner.

But Shin did not know...

he was also a North Korean agent.

(projector whirs)

♪ (film soundtrack plays) ♪

(shouting)

(gunshot)

Pierre Rissient: I was in Hong Kong for the film festival.

And because I had heard about Shin Sang-ok,

I wanted to meet him and to see some of his films.

I do not remember exactly how it came about.

I remember that I found out that he was at this hotel,

that I was surprised that it was such a cheap hotel.

Clearly, he was not doing well.

From 1974,

the South Korean government decided to stop his activities.

He was not authorized to make films.

He was an outcast in Korea.

He had to try to find work somewhere else.

Rissient: The suspicion was that he was dead.

The suspicion that he could have been killed by the Korean CIA.

(boat engine whirs)

(tape recorder clicks)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

♪ (singing Korean opera) ♪

♪ (opera continues) ♪

(applause)

(tape recorder clicks)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(hammering)

(whistle blows)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(inaudible)

(sighs)

♪ (film soundtrack plays) ♪

(chuckles)

(Indistinct chatter)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(inaudible)

David Straub: Kim Jong-il had a most bizarre childhood.

He was clearly an awful leader and an awful person,

as an adult.

But one has to feel a little sympathy for this boy,

unable to live anything like a normal childhood.

Apparently, the decision was made

that Kim Jong-il couldn't play with other children.

So he had only a tiny number of playmates.

He was put in an enormous house to live,

given a huge room stuffed with toys.

(applause)

Undoubtedly, being raised that way must have contributed

to the very odd personality that Kim Jong-il developed.

As early as the early seventies,

Kim Il-sung was having his son, Kim Jong-il, groomed

to succeed him.

(muffled applause)

And yet, the people's respect for Kim Jong-il

was much less than it was for his father, Kim Il-sung.

Kim Jong-il was not the founder, he was the son.

He inherited his position.

He was much shorter than his father.

(inaudible)

And his father was quite outgoing.

He looked like a politician.

He laughed, he slapped people on the shoulder.

And Kim Jong-il was clearly, in ways, self-aware

and knew that he was not charismatic.

He was introverted, shy.

He never really spoke publically to his people.

Kim Jong-il thought of himself as an artiste.

(inaudible)

But in the late 1970s,

Kim Jong-il was actually running the country, for the most part.

Kim Il-sung probably had the last word,

but he was very much, in many respects,

the retired grandfather,

and I don't think he was watching very closely

what Kim Jong-il was doing.

♪ (big band music plays) ♪

(inaudible)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(canon fire)

- (shouting) - (explosions)

(roars)

(explosion)

(explosion)

♪ (film soundtrack plays) ♪

♪ (sings in Korean) ♪

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(laughing)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(laughing)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(Kim Jong-il laughs)

Narrator: Korea, a land of morning calm.

Jong-il peak soars high in Mount Paektu.

The dear leader, comrade Kim Jong-il, was born

In this historic house in the secret camp, below the peak.

The mountain is a mysterious one,

where wonders are made.

(birds singing)

(muffled cheering)

(inaudible)

(chuckles)

(cheering and applause)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(laughing)

(Kim Jong-il laughs)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(muffled cheering)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(speaking Korean)

(speaking Korean)

Choi:

(Choi chuckles)

(chuckles)

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

Rissient: He was shooting a picture in Prague.

It was a kind of sensation.

Shin Sang-ok had surfaced in Prague,

shooting a film for North Korea.

He was full of ambition...

speaking of the studio which he was building,

bringing new equipment with him, to make films,

and producing films.

And I guess he was close to...

the man he was in the sixties, when he was so successful.

He was certainly very happy.

I suppose you're from Korea, aren't you?

I came here on some business.

Welcome.

(inaudible)

Derek Malcolm: They were accompanied by about

at least 20 heavies,

whom, I gathered, were...

I thought were North Korean security people.

They were definitely guarding these people.

All in the same suit. It was very strange.

They were all in exactly the same dark suit.

I don't know... They seemed sort of friendly.

It did seem as if there was something slightly odd going on.

Yi: They went to the Berlin International Film Festival.

And there, they met South Korean friends

attending this festival.

Shin and Choi showed very cold shoulder to them.

"Okay, we're doing very good in North Korea.

You cannot even imagine how much the party is supporting us.

We are freely making films as we want.

We are perfectly okay in North Korea.

There is no country in the world

better than North Korea to be in the film business."

North Korean watchdog security guards

reported to Kim Jong-il when they got back to Pyongyang.

"Oh, now, don't say anything.

Shin Sang-ok and Choi Eun-hee

are absolutely loyal to North Korea.

They are loyal to Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il."

And they started to obtain more confidence

from these two leaders.

And they gave them better treatment.

That was the beginning of Shin and Choi

starting to think about escaping from North Korea.

(chuckles)

Choi: (speaking Korean on tape)

(indistinct chatter)

(chanting)

Shin Sang-ok: (speaking Korean on tape)

(tape clicks)

Straub: Out of the blue,

I received a telephone call from a lady,

saying that she was associated

with Shin Sang-ok and Choi Eun-hee,

and she needed to talk to me.

Her father had met Shin Sang-ok when travelling in Europe.

She said that Shin had asked him

to pass a message to the US government,

that Shin was being held under duress,

that he not defected to North Korea,

that he wished to escape and come to the United States.

And we have a bag, full of rattling microcassette tapes

like we used to use in those days.

Well, at that point, I nearly jumped off my chair

and said, "Tapes? Of Shin talking with Kim Jong-il?"

Now, at that time,

no one had ever heard Kim Jong-il say anything.

We didn't know what his voice sounded like.

My wife is originally from Korea.

I thought it would be useful if she could help me

listen to a few of these tapes,

to see if they sounded authentic.

So, for some silly reason, we were sitting in bed,

and we actually covered our heads with the sheets

while we were listening covertly to these tapes.

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

(tires screech)

(tram bell rings)

On March 13th, Shin Sang-ok,

a former South Korean movie producer,

who has been working in North Korea,

and Choi Eun-hee,

approached the US government and sought assistance.

We have given them assistance,

but I can't give you anything further.

Dean S. Robinson: In Vienna, we would expect

that any defector that's going to walk in

is either an Eastern-bloc military person,

an Eastern-bloc intelligence officer or a diplomat.

Film people from North Korea...

that's interesting. That's...

That's not something you see very often on the radar.

That's not what you would expect.

They spent considerable time,

sitting down talking to the intelligence authorities

about every single aspect of that story.

This story could sound funny,

if we were the suspicious kind of people.

When I met Shin and Choi for the first time,

they were so uneasy. They were so ill at ease.

Some people said Choi was really kidnapped.

But Shin was not kidnapped, he walked into North Korea.

That was a widespread story.

Rissient: Everyone was convinced in South Korea

that he had gone willingly.

For whatever it means,

every single person at that time thought that.

(Kim Jong-il's indistinct voice on tape)

On the tape, Kim Jong-il confessed

that he had to kidnap Shin and Choi

to North Korea

to improve the North Korean film business.

Kim Jong-il: (speaking Korean on tape)

The truth about the kidnap, I think,

unless there really is a solid source in North Korea,

a trustable source...

I think we shall never know.

Anyway, they were brought to the United States.

The United States government accepted their asylum

in the United States.

(laughs and cries)

(chuckles)

(indistinct chatter)

(cries)

(sighs)

(indistinct chatter)

(crowd sobbing)

(explosion)