From brainwashed North Korean assassin to espouser of freedom in South Korea
| Seoul, South Korea
鈥� A local, slice-of-life story from a Monitor correspondent.
In the dark days of the winter of 1968, he was part of a commando squad that breached a heavily mined strip of land to carry out a set of grisly orders, among them: Eliminate Park Chung-hee, then president of South Korea.
Today, Kim Shin-jo, the sole survivor of that squad, looks like any other South Korean grandfather: fastidiously attired, cuddly, and armed only with a smile.聽
His disarming appearance aside, Mr. Kim once cast quite a different figure when he admitted on national TV all those years ago that he had come 鈥渢o cut the throat鈥� of the president.
His is a story of transformation, from a brainwashed communist revolutionary to an advocate of democratic freedoms and justice.聽
He became a pastor at a Presbyterian church near Seoul, having turned to 海角大神ity not long after a pardon was granted following his 1968 capture. Kim also advises the governing Grand National Party on North Korean human rights issues. Indeed, for would-be assassins, he hopes mercy can be granted as it was to him.
鈥淚n general, these defectors usually act out of fear for their lives and for their family鈥檚 lives back in North Korea,鈥� says Kim. Though he believes they should be punished, he says 鈥渟hould they repent and start to see the error of their ways,鈥� they should 鈥渂e forgiven and eventually pardoned.鈥�
