‘Sending letter to NK violates security law’

The Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned a lower court’s ruling that acquitted a South Korean man of violating the National Security Law for sending a birthday greeting in 2007 to the then leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-il.

The man, surnamed Kim, sent the letter in January of that year using the email address of a North Korean spy. Kim, a former Marine, was working in a fisheries trading firm jointly set up by South and North Korea in Indonesia.

In the letter, Kim wished Kim Jong-il good health on the occasion of his upcoming birthday. He wrote, “I’m grateful for Kim’s excellent leadership. I’m ready to follow the Dear Leader until I die because he is a beacon for the Korean people.”

Kim provided his identity numbers and passwords for his email and the website of the Marine Corps veteran’s association and other military-related institutions to North Korean operatives.

Kim was indicted in August 2009 for violating the National Security Law, which bans South Koreans from praising, supporting or sympathizing with the communist North, defined as an “enemy state” under South Korean law.

A district court handed down a two-year suspended jail sentence, convicting him of assisting North Koreans to acquire information about South Korea and praising North Korea. An appeals court upheld the sentence, but cleared him of charges of praising the North, saying sending such a letter didn’t constitute a violation.

The Supreme Court, however, ruled Kim should be punished for his letter.

“In the letter, Kim expressed his support for the North Korean regime and pledged loyalty to its leader. Such an act threatens the country’s stability and endangers our liberal democracy,” the court said in a ruling.

The ruling came amid heated debates over national security issues ahead of the Dec. 19 presidential election.

The existence of the security law is controversial in South Korea because governments had previously misused the law to punish many anti-government activists. Some liberals have called on the government to scrap or revise the law, but conservatives say South Korea should keep the law to protect the country from the North. How to deal with the communist North is a major issue in the presidential election. <The Korea Times/Na Jeong-ju>