Summits give aged North Korean spies hope of returning home

23/5/2018 19:32

        He's spent nearly six decades trapped on enemy soil, surviving 29 years in a prison where he was tortured by South Korean guards before being released to a life of poverty and police surveillance. Now, 89 years old and bedridden with illness, former North Korean spy Seo Ok-yeol just wants to go home.
        
        "People have a need to die in a place where they are respected," Seo said, though he worries it could be too late to finally be reunited with the wife and children he left behind.
        
        Seo is among 19 Cold War-era North Korean spies and guerrillas who have served their time in South Korean prisons and are pushing to return to the North. Though they are officially free now, Seoul has refused to let them return as it seeks commitments from Pyongyang for the return of hundreds of South Koreans thought held there.