The Invitation-Only Zone: The True Story of North Korea's Abduction Project

by Robert S. Boynton

Overview

A bizarre, little-known tale about the most secretive culture on earth

For decades, North Korea denied any part in the disappearance of dozens of Japanese citizens from Japan’s coastal towns and cities in the late 1970s. But in 2002, with his country on the brink of collapse, Kim Jong-il admitted to the kidnapping of thirteen people and returned five of them in hopes of receiving Japanese aid. As part of a global espionage project, the regime had attempted to reeducate these abductees and make them spy on its behalf. When the scheme faltered, the captives were forced to teach Japanese to North Korean spies and make lives for themselves, marrying, having children, and posing as North Korean civilians in guarded communities known as “Invitation-Only Zones”—the fiction being that they were exclusive enclaves, not prisons.

From the moment Robert S. Boynton saw a photograph of these men and women, he became obsessed with their story. Torn from their homes as young adults, living for a quarter century in a strange and hostile country, they were returned with little more than an apology from the secretive regime.

In The Invitation-Only Zone, Boynton untangles the bizarre logic behind the abductions. Drawing on extensive interviews with the abductees, Boynton reconstructs the story of their lives inside North Korea and ponders the existential toll the episode has had on them, and on Japan itself. He speaks with nationalists, spies, defectors, diplomats, abductees, and even crab fishermen, exploring the cultural and racial tensions between Korea and Japan that have festered for more than a century.

A deeply reported, thoroughly researched book, The Invitation-Only Zone is a riveting story of East Asian politics and of the tragic human consequences of North Korea’s zealous attempt to remain relevant in the modern world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780374536725
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	01/17/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Robert S. Boynton’s journalism has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, and other publications. He is the author of The New New Journalism and directs the Literary Reportage program at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University.

Table of Contents

Map of Japan and North Korea ix

Key People xi

Prologue 3

1 Welcome to the Invitation-Only Zone 5

2 The Meiji Moment: Japan Becomes Modern 11

3 Reunited in North Korea 29

4 Japan and Korea's "Common Origins" 39

5 Adapting to North Korea 49

6 Abduction as Statecraft 60

7 From Emperor Hirohito to Kim Il-sung 73

8 Developing a Cover Story 82

9 The Repatriation Project: From Japan to North Korea 88

10 Neighbors in the Invitation-Only Zone 104

11 Stolen Childhoods: Megumi and Takeshi 113

12 An American in Pyongyang 127

13 Terror in the Air 136

14 Kim's Golden Eggs 141

15 A Story Too Strange to Believe 158

16 The Great Leader Dies, a Nation Starves 170

17 Negotiating with Mr. X 180

18 Kim and Koizumi in Pyongyang 189

19 Returning Home: From North Korea to Japan 197

20 An Extended Visit 203

21 Abduction, Inc. 214

22 Kaoru Hasuike at Home 224

Epilogue 231

Time Line 239

Notes 241

Selected Bibliography 251

Acknowledgments 257

Index 261

Editorial Reviews

Boynton . . . gives us a riveting portrait of these bizarre kidnappings . . . His musings about Japan’s reaction to the abductions, ‘Japan’s 9/11,’ and the sudden realization ‘that the world was more dangerous than it had thought’ are cogent. His study of the ordeal that the abductees went through is moving.” —Sheila Miyoshi Jager, The New York Times Book Review

"Boynton has done his homework well, converting the suffering inflicted on a few dozen individuals into an eye-opening and surprisingly moving narrative.” —Publishers Weekly

“A thorough investigative report into the systematic abduction of Japanese citizens by the North Korean intelligence network over many decades. . . . More than anecdotal stories, [Boynton's] work zeroes in on the deeply uneasy makeup of the Korean-Japanese relationship. Engaging reading, surreal in some of the Orwellian detail.” —Kirkus Reviews

"An excellent work that is an optimal choice for both North Korea and Japan watchers." —Joshua Wallace, Library Journals Review (starred review)

From the Publisher

…a riveting portrait of these bizarre kidnappings…[Boynton's] study of the ordeal that the abductees went through is moving.

The New York Times Book Review - Sheila Miyoshi Jager

11/23/2015
The wackiness of North Korea’s government is a staple of TV comedy, but the reality is more grim, as journalist Boynton (The New New Journalism) relays in this disturbing account of the current regime’s kidnappings. In 1977, North Korean agents began abducting young Japanese citizens for reasons that remain unclear; they probably hoped to convert the victims to loyal Communist subjects who would return to Japan as spies. By the early 1980s, the project fizzled out, but the abductees remained in North Korea. In 2002, after years of protest, North Korean officials admitted that a few Japanese were in their country against their will. They returned five abductees. Observers, Boynton included, agree that many remain. In his narrative, Boynton alternates among heartrending stories of the abductees, a history of Japan that emphasizes its disgraceful treatment of Korea, and records of the Japanese government’s incompetence in handling the issue once it became known. In light of the bizarre and tragic nature of North Korea’s Juche system (its state ideology), this particular series of events may seem inconsequential, but Boynton has done his homework well, converting the suffering inflicted on a few dozen individuals into an eye-opening and surprisingly moving narrative. Maps & illus. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

★ 11/01/2015
In the 1970s and 1980s, the North Korean government kidnapped people from Japan, South Korea, and elsewhere. Boynton (journalism, New York Univ.; The New New Journalism) investigates this phenomenon by examining the stories of Japanese abductees. When the first people went missing, mainstream Japanese society had difficulty believing that North Korea was behind it. In 2002, Kim Jong-Il admitted that 13 people had been kidnapped, and that eight of them were dead, revelations that outraged the Japanese public. It's widely believed that many more were taken. The book's narrative switches back and forth between the life stories of individual abductees and the history of Japanese-Korean relations since the 19th century, helping to place the abductions in a larger context. Boynton explores various theories about the reason for these kidnappings: to teach foreign languages to North Korean agents, to raise a generation of spies from their offspring, etc. Ultimately, no clear motive is understood, and many questions are left unanswered. VERDICT An excellent work that is an optimal choice for both North Korea and Japan watchers. For another story regarding North Korea's history of kidnapping, see Paul Fischer's A Kim Jong-Il Production.—Joshua Wallace, Ranger Coll., TX

Library Journal

2015-09-03
A thorough investigative report into the systematic abduction of Japanese citizens by the North Korean intelligence network over many decades. Journalist Boynton (Director, Literary Reportage Program/New York Univ.; The New New Journalism: Conversations with America's Best Nonfiction Writers on Their Craft, 2005) continually circles back to the essential question regarding these absurd scenarios of abduction from the streets and coasts of Japan since the mid-1970s: what was the point of kidnapping the Japanese and bringing them back to North Korea for brainwashing? The author explores the racial aspect: was the program an attempt by Kim Jong-Il's authoritarian regime to instigate a "long-term breeding program" through abducted Japanese couples to introduce a mixed race that might serve as perfect spies? Or was the purpose to steal identities with which to create fake passports? Or possibly to get back at Japan for its long history of imperial ravaging? Boynton takes a few of these sagas of abduction and brings them vividly to life—e.g., the fairly typical story of Kaoru Hasuike and his girlfriend, Yukiko Okudo, who were young students in 1978 when they were abducted from a Japanese beach and transported to North Korea. Separated for "re-education" for two years and then reunited and married, the couple was moved through so-called heavily guarded "invitation-only zones" in Pyongyang, a kind of "gilded cage" for exceptional cases. For the couple, it was a way to keep them isolated and away from prying eyes. Thanks to a wrenching act of diplomacy between the two countries in 2002, Kim Jong-Il publicly apologized for the abductions, and an "extended visit" was arranged for a handful of surviving abductees (their children back in North Korea served as "de facto hostages") to return to Japan, including the Hasuikes. The author seems as mesmerized by all this strangeness as readers will be. More than anecdotal stories, his work zeroes in on the deeply uneasy makeup of the Korean-Japanese relationship. Engaging reading, surreal in some of the Orwellian detail.

Kirkus Reviews