북한에 납치됐던 일본여성 소가 히토미(45)의 남편으로 주한미군 탈영병 출신인 찰스 젠킨스(64)가 3일 주일미군기지에서 열린 군사재판에서 북한에서의 비참했던 생활상을 증언했다고 뉴욕타임스 인터넷판이 4일 보도했다.
신문은 군 법원이 "이미 북한에서 40년동안 감금생활을 했다"는 변호인단의 주장을 받아들여 젠킨스에게 예상보다 가벼운 금고 30일과 불명예 제대를 선고했다고 전했다.
미국 언론의 관심을 피하기 위해 미국 대선에 맞춰 일본 가나가와(神奈川)현 자마(座間)기지에서 열린 이날 재판에서 젠킨스와 그의 아내 소가 히토미는 감시인이 항상 따라붙었던 북한에서의 생활상을 소상히 진술했다.
소가는 1980년6월 자신의 감시인이 "젠킨스와 결혼하기로 정해졌다"며 그와 첫 만남을 주선했다고 말했다. 소가는 "우리는 점점 서로 사랑하게 돼 만난지 1개월도 안 돼 결혼하기로 했다"며 자신과 남편은 모두 북한을 싫어했다고 증언했다.
젠킨스는 하루에 10시간씩 김일성 저작집을 공부하고 암기하도록 강요당했다며 저작집의 내용은 '미친 사람의 관점에서 본 계급투쟁'이었다고 표현하면서 이런 표현은 북한에서는 사형감이라고 말했다. 그는 김일성이나 김정일을 한 번이라도 비판하면 가차없이 죽음을 당한다며 직접 땅을 파고 매장당하는 사람도 봤다고 전했다.
소가는 특히 북한의 생활수준이 19세기로 후퇴한 것과 같다고 묘사하기도 했다. 소가의 증언에 따르면 그들의 평양 집에는 난방시설이나 전기가 없어 겨울에는 있는 옷을 다 껴입고 잠을 자야만 했고 뜨거운 물로 목욕하는 것은 아주 드문 사치였다.
밤에는 촛불을 켜고 글을 읽다가 초가 다 타면 남은 촛농을 모아 새 초를 만들었으며 배급제도가 붕괴돼 집 뜰에서 채소를 재배하고 닭을 길렀지만 허기진 채 잠드는 경우가 많았다. 또 안내인 없이는 집을 나설 수 없었고, 집은 철조망으로 둘러싸여 있었다.
젠킨스는 책을 구할 수 없어 지니고 있던 금지된 역사소설 '쇼군' 한 권을 20번도 넘게 읽었지만 나중에는 북한의 단일 채널 라디오를 다룰 수 있게 돼 몰래 BBC나 미국의 소리 방송을 들었다고 말했다. 그는 반미감정이 극심한 북한에서 하루는 병원으로 끌려가 간호병들이 팔을 결박하고 마취도 없이 '미군'이라는 문신이 새겨져 있던 자신의 피부를 벗겨냈던 경험을 진술하기도 했다.
젠킨스는 증언을 마치면서 군 동료들과 미국민, 가족에 사죄한다고 밝혔다. 노스캐롤라이나에 사는 젠킨스의 누이 팻 해럴은 NYT와 전화통화에서 91세 된 노모에게 이 소식을 전하겠다며 "40년이나 걸렸지만 그와 연락이 닿을 것이라는 희망을 버린 적이 없다"고 말했다.
아래는 뉴욕타임즈 인터넷 판 보도기사 전문이다. (konas)
G.I. Deserter Tells of Cold, Hungry Times in North Korea
By JAMES BROOKE
Published: November 4, 2004
AMP ZAMA, Japan, Nov. 3 - Charles Robert Jenkins, the Army sergeant who left his soldiers and walked into North Korea in 1965 to avoid combat duty in Vietnam, received a light sentence Wednesday after pleading guilty in a court-martial here to desertion and aiding the enemy.
After hearing bleak testimony about his harsh life in North Korea, an Army judge seemed to accept a defense lawyer's argument that Sergeant Jenkins, 64, had "already suffered 40 years of confinement." The judge, Col. Denise Vowell, then demoted him to private, stripped him of four decades of back pay and benefits, and gave him a dishonorable discharge and a 30-day jail sentence.
The prosecutor, Capt. Seth Cohen, had called for a tougher sentence, evoking, in a veiled way, the need for military discipline while American soldiers are fighting in Iraq. Referring to noncommissioned officers like Sergeant Jenkins, he said, "We can't have soldiers going into the field fearing that their N.C.O.'s will abandon them, especially given the state of the world today."
But the trial and sentencing seemed to reflect American political needs to mollify Japanese public opinion, which has been moved by the drama of the American defector from North Carolina and his Japanese wife, Hitomi Soga Jenkins, whom he met in North Korea a few years after North Korean agents had kidnapped her from a Japanese island in 1978.
Apparently to minimize American media attention, the one-day military trial took place as votes were being counted in the American presidential election.
Massaging Japanese public opinion is important to Washington, which wants to move the Army's First Corps from the state of Washington to this base, already the headquarters of the United States Army in Japan. By receiving a 30-day sentence, Private Jenkins is now detained in Japan, avoids return to the United States for incarceration, and can receive weekly visits from his Japanese wife and their two North Korean-born daughters.
To further soften Japanese opinion, military officers gave a slide show of the detention facility, which is on a United States Navy installation at Yokosuka. Drawing oohs and aahs from Japanese reporters, the slides showed rows of exercise bicycles, a living room-style visitation room, and close-ups of the food, including a large photo of a slice of pumpkin pie with whipped cream on top.
"It's not Club Med, but it is not hard labor either," said Capt. King H. Dietriech, commander of the Navy facility. He also stressed that "there will be no special treatment for Private Jenkins."
For the American, one more month of controls should not be a big strain.
Mrs. Jenkins was returned to Japan in 2002 along with four other Japanese who had been abducted. Japanese diplomats arranged with North Korea for Sergeant Jenkins and their two daughters to leave for reunification with Mrs. Jenkins this past July, and the United States Army began court-martial proceedings against him in September.
In rare testimony on Wednesday about life in North Korea, Sergeant Jenkins and his wife said their lives had been controlled by omnipresent "political supervisors."
Mrs. Jenkins said her supervisor prepared her for her first meeting with Sergeant Jenkins in June 1980 by suggesting that "I was to marry" him.
"Little by little, we started to love each other," Mrs. Jenkins said, noting that they decided to get married barely one month after meeting. "My husband did not like North Korea, nor did I."
One day, when Sergeant Jenkins was a bachelor, living with three other defectors, he took advantage of the rare absence of their political supervisor to search their house. In the attic, he recalled, they found tape recorders. In each room, they found a microphone.
The Americans, he said, were forced for 10 hours a day to study and memorize the writings of North Korea's founder, Kim Il Sung, writings that he called "class struggle from the perspective of a crazy man."
