N. Korean Trade Official Defects

This guy no doubt can tell us where a few bodies are buried (not literally, one hopes):

A North Korean employee of a state-run company defected to the South with three family members recently, sources in the Foreign Ministry confirmed yesterday, correcting some media reports that the man was a diplomat. He worked at a trading company run by the government, the ministry sources said. They gave few other details of the matter, citing its sensitivity.

Unfortunately, it’s almost a sure bet the South Koreans will try to keep the Americans from debriefing him and getting anything embarassing on North Korea.  The story of what happened to defector Bok Ku Lee, also from a state trading company, is instructive:

Upon my arrival, I was debriefed by South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, and occasionally put in the hands of unsophisticated American questioners in Seoul. Remarkably, the South Korean officials made it clear to me that I would be in danger if I were to speak out about the WMD programs I had worked on or the atrocities I had witnessed. It soon became obvious that they feared my testimony because it might jeopardize South Korea’s “sunshine policy,” which seeks to keep the North’s repressive regime in power in order to avoid the economic consequences to the South were it to collapse.

Lee later evaded South Korean intelligence, made his way to the U.S. Senate, and told his story.  The South Koreans responded by harassing Mr. Lee’s wife, causing  Lee to seek help from Senator Richard Lugar, who asked the South Koreans to kindly lay off.  After that, the story made its way to the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page.