Abductee: Choi Si-cheol
Recorded Date: May 24th, 2005


Profile of Abductee

Name: Choi Si-cheol (male)
Date of Birth: June 9, 1923 (lunar calendar)
Place of Birth: Bagwol-ri, Seongdeok-myeon, Gangneung-gun, Gangwon-do, South Korea
Last Address: 199 Bagwol-ri, Seongdeok-myeon, Gangneung-gun, Gangwon-do, South Korea
Date of Abduction: August 15, 1950 (age 27)
Place of Abduction: Home
Occupation: Farmer
Dependents: Wife, 2 Sons
Appearance/Personality: Short/ Bright Personality


Profile of Testifier

Name: Choi Sang-dong (born in 1944)
Relation: Son
Type of Witness: Direct witness


Summary of the Abduction

- In order not to be taken by local leftists, the abductee had been hiding in a loft in his house and avoided several visits and search of the leftists. But finally he was exposed and arrested by them.
- The abductee was put into the North Korean army to supplement the so-called “voluntary soldiers”.
- He was enforcedly abducted to be the North Korean “voluntary soldiers”, but people around him treated his family unfairly as if he voluntarily converted to Communism.
- Even after decades of the abduction, the guilt-by-association system blocked the abductee’s sons to work abroad and enter civil service in the government.


Detail of the Abduction

Q. How was the atmosphere around the town at that time?

We were not wealthy. My mother was too busy making ends meet for a family of ten. She had no idea what was going on out there. When people from the Internal Affairs Agency came to arrest father, she didn't even know who they were. My father hid under a pile of carpets in the shed. Soon after, on July 1st, he was caught. The People's Council of the town demanded my father to turn himself in and, when he rejected the request, they marched into our house. Men with red armbands came to my house and shouted out loud to make my father come out. When my grandmother and mother told them that he was not at home anymore, they started to threaten us, saying that they would take me and my brother instead. At that time, everyone in the town was afraid of the officers of Internal Affairs Agency. They carried a meter-long bamboo spear, with which they slaughtered a calf. They threatened people that those against them would face the same consequences. Under the rule of the Communists, we were people without a country, and there was no one who could protect us.

Q. How was the situation when your father was abducted?

Hearing their shout of threats, my father came out of the shed. He yelled at the people arresting him, "Why should I go with you when my children, my parents, and my brothers and sisters are here?" One of the officers answered back, "No family can come before a country." My father promised us that he would come back home in a week. However, that was the last time I saw my father. According to a townsman who was also drafted with him but managed to escape later, they were sent to a nearby school and were assigned to troops in a couple of days. It is assumed that he was taken to war fronts as human shields. Dying as a soldier, fighting for his own country, is sad but honorable. On the contrary, being forcibly captured and becoming a soldier of his enemy is only a grievous injustice.

Reason behind the Abduction

Q. Why do you think he was abducted?

My father was a farmer and my family was not wealthy in the first place. Since his absence, we had to go through even more difficult times financially. Air raids got more and more severe, and we had no option but to leave the town. I remember leaving the town on a snowy day. We wanted all family members to go together, but my grandfather’s sister-in-law, who lived with us and who had difficulties moving around, insisted that she would stay even if it would cost her life. So my grandfather, my mother, my brother and I started a journey to flee from attacks. I sat on grandfather's baggage and my mother carried my brother. We walked and walked. We could not bring enough clothes, blankets or even spoons. My grandfather had to wear still-wet clothes that my mother washed for him because we did not have any spare clothes.


News after the Abduction

Q. Were there any news about him after the abduction?

When we returned home later, all empty houses in town were burnt down and there were dead bodies scattered across the street. Burnt corpses were too horrible to look at. Many North Korean soldiers were lying dead, with guns still in their hands. My grandfather burst into tears, assuming that my oldest grandmother, his sister-in-law, would have died just like them. It was the first time I had seen him crying. He flipped every burnt corpse to find her body. I was seven years old then, and helped him finding the body. However, she was nowhere to be found. The soil was frozen hard, so we could not make graves for them. Instead, the bodies were buried under a pile of rocks. Looking at those piled rocks, I thought to myself, "Maybe, my father was

In school, other children started to pick on me. They would say "My father is a ROK Army, but your father is a North Korean Army. So you are our enemy." I saw with my own eyes how my father was hauled away against his own will. The words of bullies were too cruel for a child of my age. My mother suffered even bigger pain, as her three brothers were also forcefully taken as soldiers of the North Korean Army.

Later, hoping to find any signs of my father, I wrote letters to all the heads of small towns, police offices and police departments in Gang-neung. I only received letters of condolences and he was nowhere to be found. My heart broke down, thinking that no one was seriously concerned about the Abductees’ issues. Scar in my heart was not healed soon. I could not get engaged because there was a system called "Guilt-by-Association" that misbranded me as pro-North.