Will North Korea compensate Japanese citizens lured into ‘paradise on Earth’?

Just days after a court in Tokyo ordered the North Korean government to compensate Japanese citizens who it had lured with the promise of “paradise on Earth”, the victorious plaintiffs are drawing up a strategy to force Pyongyang to pay up.The Tokyo-district-court" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="20675" data-entity-type="organization">Tokyo District Court ruled on Monday that three plaintiffs and the family of another claimant who died before the case was concluded should each receive 22 million yen (US$144,000) in compensation for the suffering they endured before escaping from the North and returning to Japan.Representatives of North Korea did not attend any of the hearings or submit written arguments in defence of the state.The lawyer who led the case said he expected Pyongyang to ignore the judgement, but that preparations were already under way to enforce it under Japanese civil law.“We have got the judgement we wanted and, under Japanese civil enforcement procedures, it is now the responsibility of the plaintiffs’ creditors to identify assets that can be seized,” Kenji Fukuda told This Week in Asia.One of the plaintiffs, Eiko Kawasaki (centre), and lead lawyer Kenji Fukuda (left) speak at a press conference in Tokyo on Monday after a court ordered the North Korean government to pay compensation to former residents who moved to the North under a state-backed repatriation programme. Photo: AFP“We are planning to draw up an inventory of the North Korean government’s assets here in Japan and we intend to move forward and start procedures to seize those assets,” he said.