- Laura Bicker
- BBC Seoul correspondent
Kim Kuk-song (transliteration) has not lost the old habit of keeping secrets.
After several weeks of discussions, we got the opportunity to interview him, but he still worried about who would listen. He is wearing sunglasses in front of the camera, and only two of our team know his real name.
It took 30 years for Mr. Kim to rise to the top of North Korea’s powerful spy agency. He said that this intelligence agency is “the eyes, ears and brain of the supreme leader.”
He claimed to keep secrets, sent assassins to kill their critics, and even set up an illegal drug laboratory to help raise funds for the “revolution.”
Now, the former colonel decided to tell his story to the BBC. This is the first time a senior North Korean military officer has been interviewed by a major broadcasting company.
He stated in an exclusive interview that he is “the reddest among the reds.” A loyal servant of communism.
But military rank and loyalty do not guarantee your safety in North Korea.
In 2014, he had to flee, and has been living in Seoul ever since, working for the South Korean intelligence service.
He described the North Korean leadership desperately to make money by any means possible, from drug dealing to arms sales in the Middle East and Africa. He told us about the strategy behind Pyongyang’s decision, the North Korean regime’s attack on South Korea, and he also claimed that the spies and networks of this mysterious country can cover all parts of the world.
The BBC was unable to independently verify his claims, but we managed to verify his identity and, if possible, found evidence to confirm his claims.
We contacted the North Korean Embassy in the UK and the Mission in New York, hoping to get a statement, but so far we have not received any response.
“Terrorist Operations Task Force”
From the last few years of Kim Guosong in North Korea’s top intelligence agency, we can learn about the early experiences of the current leader Kim Jong Un. He portrayed a young man eager to prove that he is a “warrior.”
In 2009, North Korea established a new spy agency called the Reconnaissance General Bureau. Kim Jong-un was being trained to replace his father, who had had a stroke. The director is Kim Yong-chol (Kim Yong-chol), who remains one of the most trusted assistants of the North Korean leader.
The colonel said that in May 2009, the command system issued an order to form a “terrorist task force” to kill a former North Korean official who defected to South Korea.
“For Kim Jong Un, this is to satisfy the supreme leader (his father),” Mr. Kim said.
“In order to secretly assassinate Hwang Jang-yop (the former Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea who defected to South Korea), a’terrorist task force’ was established. I personally guided and performed this work.”
Huang Changye was once one of the most powerful officials in North Korea. He is an important creator of North Korea policy. He defected to South Korea in 1997 and has not been forgiven. While in Seoul, he condemned the North Korean regime, and the Kim family wanted revenge.
But the assassination failed. Two North Korean army majors were sentenced to 10 years in prison for this, and they are still serving their sentences in Seoul. North Korea has always denied any involvement in the incident and claimed that the incident was planned by South Korea.
The testimony of Jin Guosong shows that this is not the case.
He said: “In North Korea, terrorism is a political tool to protect Kim Jong Il and Kim Jong Un’s honor.” “This is a gift to show the successor’s loyalty to his great leader.”
There are more events. A year later, in 2010, the South Korean navy ship Cheonan sank after being hit by a torpedo. 46 people were killed. North Korea has always denied any involvement in this matter.
In November of the same year, dozens of North Korean shells hit South Korea’s Yeongpyeong Island (Yeongpyeong). Two soldiers and two civilians were killed.
There has been a lot of debate about who ordered the attack. Jin Guosong stated that he “didn’t directly participate in the operations of the Cheonan ship or Yanping Island”, but these actions “are not a secret to the officers of the General Investigation Bureau. They are proud and worthy of boasting.”
He said that these actions would not be carried out without high-level orders.
“In North Korea, without the direct approval of the top leader, even road construction would be impossible. The sinking of the Cheonan ship and the shelling of Yanping Island are not things that subordinates can accomplish.”
“This kind of military work was designed and implemented according to special orders of Kim Jong Un. This is an achievement.”
“Blue House Spy”
Jin Guosong said that one of his responsibilities in North Korea is to formulate strategies to deal with South Korea. Its purpose is to establish a “political subordination” relationship.
This includes having eyes and ears at the scene.
“I have instructed spies to go to South Korea many times and perform missions through them. There are many cases,” he said.
He did not elaborate, but he gave us an interesting example.
“In one case, a North Korean agent returned to North Korea safely after being sent to work at the Blue House. That was in the early 1990s. He returned home safely after working at the Blue House for five or six years and worked at the 314 Liaison Office of the Workers’ Party. .”
“I can tell you that North Korean agents play an active role in various civil society organizations and important institutions in South Korea.”
The BBC could not confirm this claim.
I have seen several sentenced North Korean spies in South Korea. As the founder of the news website NK News, Chad O’Carroll pointed out in a recent article, dozens of them have been held in Korean prisons. North Korean spies, who have been arrested for engaging in various espionage activities for decades.
A few incidents continue to occur, and at least one of them involves spies sent directly from North Korea. However, NK News data shows that since 2017, South Korea has been arrested for espionage-related crimes, because North Korea has switched to using new technology instead of traditional spies to gather intelligence.
North Korea may be one of the poorest and most isolated countries in the world, but the widely watched defectors warned that Pyongyang has formed an army of 6,000 experienced hackers.
According to Kim Guosong, the former leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Il, ordered the training of new personnel in the 1980s to “prepare for cyber warfare.”
He said: “Moranbong University selects the brightest students from all over the country and puts them in special education for six years.”
British security officials believe that a North Korean organization called the Lazarus Group launched a cyber attack in 2017, which paralyzed parts of the British National Medical Service System and other organizations around the world. It is believed that the organization carried out a high-profile hacking attack on Sony Pictures in 2014.
Jin Guosong said that this office is called the 414 Liaison Office.
Internally, we call it “Kim Jong Il’s Intelligence Center”.
He claimed that the company had direct dial telephones with North Korean leaders.
“People say that these agents are in China, Russia and Southeast Asian countries, but they are also operating in North Korea. The office also protects communications between North Korean spies.”
Drugs for U.S. Dollars
Kim Jong Un recently announced that North Korea is facing a “crisis” again, and in April called on the people to prepare for another “hard march”-a term used to describe the catastrophic famine that occurred under the leadership of Kim Jong Il in the 1990s.
At that time, Jin Guosong was in the war department and was ordered to raise “revolutionary funds” for the supreme leader. He said that this meant illegal drug dealing.
“In North Korea under the leadership of Kim Jong Il, drug production reached its peak during the’hard and long march’,” he said. “At that time, the Revolutionary Fund provided by the Ministry of War for the Supreme Leader had already been used up.”
“After receiving the assignment, I brought three foreigners to North Korea, established a production base in the training center of the 715 Liaison Office of the Labor Party, and produced drugs.”
“That’s methamphetamine. Then we can change it into U.S. dollars and give it to Kim Jong Il.”
His description of the drug trade is credible. North Korea has a long history of drug production, mainly heroin and opium. Thae Yong-ho (transliteration), a former North Korean diplomat in the United Kingdom who defected, said at the Oslo Freedom Forum in 2019 that North Korea has carried out state-supported drug trafficking and is trying to solve the widespread domestic drug abuse problem.
I asked Mr. King where the drug money went. Has it been exchanged for cash to the people?
“Help you understand that all North Korea’s money belongs to the North Korean leader,” he said. “With this money, he can build a villa, buy a car, buy food, buy clothes, and enjoy luxury goods.”
It is estimated that the number of deaths caused by chronic food shortages in North Korea in the 1990s ranged from hundreds of thousands to 1 million.
According to Jin Guosong, another source of income is illegal arms sales to Iran, which is managed by the Department of Operations.
“There are special small submarines, semi-submarines. North Korea is very good at making such cutting-edge equipment.” He said.
This may be a bit like North Korea’s propaganda, because the country’s submarines use very noisy diesel engines.
But Jin Guosong said that these transactions were so successful that the deputy director of North Korea in Iran would brag about calling Iranians to his swimming pool to do business.
Professor Andrei Lankov, a global authority on North Korea, said that since the 1980s, the arms trade between North Korea and Iran has been an open secret, including ballistic missiles.
Despite the severe sanctions imposed by the international community, North Korea continues to promote the development of weapons of mass destruction. In September this year, the country tested four new weapon systems, including a new long-range cruise missile, a ballistic missile vehicle launch system, a hypersonic missile and an air defense missile.
Technology is becoming more and more advanced.
According to Jin Guosong, Pyongyang also sells weapons and technology to countries that have been in a prolonged civil war. In recent years, the United Nations has accused North Korea of providing weapons to Syria, Myanmar, Libya and Sudan.
The United Nations warned that weapons developed in Pyongyang may eventually appear in many turbulent corners of the world.
“A faithful servant betrayed”
Jin Guosong leads a privileged life in North Korea. He claimed that Kim Jong-un’s aunt gave him a Mercedes-Benz and allowed him to go abroad freely to raise funds for the North Korean leader. He said that he raised millions of cash by selling rare metals and coal, and packed the cash back home in a suitcase.
In this poor country, millions of people are struggling with food shortages. This kind of life is hardly imaginable, let alone truly living such a life.
He said that he has a strong political relationship through marriage, allowing him to move between different intelligence agencies. But again, this relationship puts him and his family at risk.
Soon after Kim Jong-un took power in 2011, he decided to purge those whom he regarded as threats, including his uncle Jang Sung-taek. For a long time, as Kim Jong Il’s health gradually deteriorated, some people have always believed that Jang Sung Taek is the de facto leader of North Korea.
Jin Guosong said that Zhang Chengze’s name is more widely spread than Kim Jong-un’s name.
“At that time, I felt that Zhang Chengze would not hold on for too long, and I felt that he would be exiled to the country,” he said.
But then, North Korean official media announced in December 2013 that Zhang Chengze had been executed.
“I was very surprised, it was a fatal blow, and I was shocked,” Mr. Jin said. “I immediately felt life threatened. I knew I could no longer live in North Korea.”
He was abroad when Jin Guosong read about the execution in the newspaper. He decided to make a plan to escape to South Korea with his family.
“Leaving the country where my ancestral grave and family are located, and fleeing to South Korea is my saddest emotional decision. At that time, South Korea was still a strange land to me,” he said.
Even behind the sunglasses, I can see that the memory is very difficult for him.
In our many meetings, one question I have been asking is why he decided to speak up now.
“This is the only responsibility I can do,” he said. “From now on, I will be more active in liberating my northern compatriots from the dictatorship and let them enjoy true freedom.”
There are more than 30,000 defectors in South Korea, and only a few have decided to accept media interviews. The more high profile you are, the higher the risk to you and your family.
In South Korea, many people also doubt the North Korean defectors’ description of life. After all, how can they really confirm their story?
Jin Guosong’s life is extremely unusual. His statement should be regarded as part of the North Korean story, not all. But his story allows us to see a regime that few people can escape from, and tells us what it takes to survive this regime.
“North Korea’s political society, their judgment, their thinking process, they all follow the belief in absolute obedience to the supreme leader,” he said, “generation after generation, cultivate a’loyal heart’.”
The timing of this interview is also very interesting. Kim Jong-un hinted that if certain conditions are met, he may be willing to talk to South Korea in the near future.
But Jin Guosong also issued a warning.
“I have been here for many years, but North Korea has not changed at all,” he said.
“Our strategy is still continuing. What you need to know is that North Korea has not changed even 0.01%.”