Foggy landscape

Jill Colgan:  Beyond these fog bound perimeters is Taejon Prison, two hundred kilometres south of the capital, Seoul.

01.00.00.00

Its walls have hidden from view men who have not seen the outside world since the late 50s and early 60s. Many years ago they were soldiers for North Korea and they paid for their patriotism with half their lives.

00.17

Man in crowd talking to media pack

Man:  Why are you blocking the road? We always use this road.

00.37

Reporter:  If they all stand here it'll be chaos when they come out.

Woman in crowd:  We're the relatives and friends - don't stick us in with that lot.

00.49

Jill Colgan:  Forgotten for so long, the inmates about to walk from Taejon Prison are momentarily being thrown into the international spotlight.

00.59

Inmates walk through prison gates

Eight long term political prisoners walk through the gates. Simultaneously another nine are being freed at prisons elsewhere in the country. All have served at least thirty years in gaol.

Woo Yong-Gak being greeted by relatives

Jill Colgan:  All eyes are on 71 year old, Woo Yong-Gak believed to be the world's longest serving political prisoner -- he has spent the last 41 years behind bars.

01.30

Woo talking to media

Woo:  We will never forget the people inside and outside Korea  who fought to secure our release.  We will forever keep them in our hearts.

01.44

Photographer

Jill Colgan:  After 41 years spent mostly in isolation, the spectacle before Woo is overwhelming.

01.57

Man:  Give him some room. Come on, let him have some room.

02.04

Woo:  It's the first time for me to meet the people who actually helped us.  I recognise them here.  Yet I envy so much their freedom. I was gaoled while I was still young - the same age as many of the people here. If I hadn't been gaoled I too could have had a full life and participated in social movements.

02.10

View from bus of traffic/Woo in bus

Jill Colgan:  Until today, Prisoner No. 3514 has spent each day in a cold tiny cell on his own with nothing but a blanket. For most of their years in gaol all men were allowed just half an hour outside the cell to exercise, alone.

02.46

Woo in bus

Woo:  We were never treated as though we had any human rights - right up until the late eighties.  We were so oppressed.

03.08

Meal being served

Jill Colgan:  Two hundred supporters have gathered for a celebration meal at a nearby restaurant.

03.32

Here everything fascinates the men: the sight of children, the novelty of a shared meal. In gaol, every meal of every day of each year was eaten in isolation in their cell. But then, for the last thirty and forty years these men have been seen as dangerous enemies of the state. Former spies and soldiers who refused to renounce Communism.

03.39

Woo:  Even when our lives were threatened - when they tried to push us unconverted prisoners to change our ideology... even then we didn't hate the people who did this to us.

04.11

Seoul street at night

Jill Colgan:  Pursued by international and domestic media for two days since his release, Woo Yong-Gak has refused all requests for a personal interview about his experiences. All except for this one given to Foreign Correspondent.

04.29

Woo and others

Woo:  At this very moment everything is so new.  I now have to learn how to live again from comrades who have been released before me.

04.44

Jill Colgan:  Woo says he and the others were tortured and beaten in gaol.

05.14

Woo:  There is a deep dark isolation for so-called communists and political prisoners in a special zone in which any conservation is forbidden between prisoners. We couldn't even touch each other - it was complete isolation and loneliness.  It was so stupid.

05.18

Probably I should be so happy at my release but in my heart the feeling is so heavy because I've left so many friends and long-serving comrades behind in prison.

Jill Colgan:  In 1958 Woo was a young North Korean military officer sent to lead a

06.01

Archival footage

reconnaissance party over the border into the South. He was caught and imprisoned for espionage.

Woo:  In maximum security even murderers who behave themselves are able to earn points and have their sentences reduced.

Woo

Even though we political prisoners might have been in gaol for thirty or forty years and worked hard there would never be any reprieve.

Man entering room with tray of food

Jill Colgan:  Woo says he bears no ill will towards his former gaolers but there's one thing he won't do, report to police as is required by the country's National Security Law, the law that kept them all imprisoned.

06.54

Meat cooking

Woo:   We won't report to police even if they arrest again -it doesn't matter. Everyone agrees, no-one will report.  The National Security Law and the compulsory statements should both be abolished.

07.14

Jill Colgan:  Even saying this publicly could land them back in gaol.

07.31

Kwon Nak Ki with guests

Jill Colgan:  Their host at this meal, Kwon Nak Ki says it will be extremely difficult for these men to start their lives over again.

Kwon: Already they're old - so financially and physically it will be difficult for them to manage by themselves.

07.46

Even though they've been released spiritually they are not really free because the National Security Law means they have to be monitored all the time.  So even on the outside they're controlled by this law - just like in gaol.

Kwon Nak Ki in medicine shop

Colgan:  A former prisoner himself, Kwon Nak Ki was released ten years' ago. Working from this small oriental medicine shop, he has since campaigned for the release of all political prisoners, and the abolition of the draconian National Security Law, a law long criticised by international human rights groups.

08.08

Kwon preparing medicine

Kwon:  In the past, a lot of people have died or been tortured or gaoled under the National Security Law.  It's still being used to suppress people who are concerned about reunification.

08.31

Kwon interview

It's being used against trade union activists and students - and anyone who has fought for democracy. Although they've released seventeen prisoners including Woo Young-Gak, it's not enough. They have to repeal the law.

Kim Dae Jung enters room

Colgan:  South Korean President, Kim Dae Jung knows the law must change. Himself a former political prisoner on death row, President Kim used this his first anniversary in office to free Woo and the other prisoners.

09.13

But he's been unable to push Korea's deeply conservative law makers to change the security law. Nor is he able to send the prisoners home in

09.29

Colgan at press conference

this chilly Cold War climate.

Kim

Kim:  The North and South are both in the same predicament. We cannot have a one-way exchange - if one side hands over prisoners and the other doesn't, it will be unjust and South Koreans will not accept this.

09.43

North Korean army marching

Jill Colgan:  North Korean refuses to hand back its South Korean prisoners, condemning its own patriots to continue their lives apart from their families, and perhaps to die in exile.

10.07

Ahn  at Airport

There are just a lucky for whom the story differs. Seventy one year old Ahn Young Ki is among those just released and after 38 years in prison, Ahn is going home.

10.29

As a teenager in South Korea, he heard the stories about a free education for all and a better life under Communism. When it came time to choose sides, Ahn ran away to the North. Today, in his first real suit, he's going back to see family he left behind in South Korea 49 years ago.

11.01

Ahn in plane

The last time he was in an aircraft it was an emergency airlift, the day he was shot and captured in 1962 while trying to sneak back across the border to see his family.

11.29

Ahn:  When I heard about the amnesty I was overjoyed at being able to walk out of the prison gates alive.  Even though I suffered so much, at least I didn't die.

11.47

Jill Colgan:  He's now going to the small southern island of Koje, a fishing and farming community where his brother and sister live.

11.56

Ahn in taxi, greets relatives

Jill Colgan:  Today after so many years on his own, he becomes the head of his family.

12.40

Ahn:  I haven't sat with my family since 1950 - this is the first time.  I'm deeply affected by it and can't decide how much I feel. Until yesterday, my body was bound in chains,  but now I am set free. It's like a dream.

12.47

Ahn drinking tea/with policeman

Colgan:  Ahn didn't get to see his parents or six brothers and sisters again before they died.  They've chosen a nearby restaurant for a quiet celebration but we'd barely sat down when the police arrived to inform Ahn he is still a security risk.

13.14

Ahn:  It's unfair to have to report - so I won't do it, on purpose.  And I cannot promise I won't do anything that will breach the National Security Law. I was in prison for thirty-eight years and I'm not sure whether I'll be arrested or not.  I can't imagine what it would be like to be arrested again - but the security monitoring law is that worst law of all - so I'm going to break away from it.

Farm

Music

Colgan:  For now, Ahn will work on the farm with his brother and sister. Some day though he hopes to see the North again and discover what happened to the young family he left behind.

14.23

Ahn:  I want to go back home.

14.38

Ahn/Brother

I cannot leave here for good because I would miss my siblings too much.  Yet I miss my two daughters as well. When I saw them last they were aged 1 and 3.  When the time is right, I want to go back - I don't want to live without seeing them again. At this time I know the North and South Korean governments are discussing our case.  I hope there's a good outcome.  As soon as possible I'd like to see my two daughters and my lovely wife who must have been so deeply lonely without me all this time.  I want to take care of them.

Ahn and brother walk

Colgan:  Now inseparable, these two brothers fought on opposite sides of the Korean War. (15.40) Neither ever thought it would take 50 years before they'd finally be reunited.

15.27

Ahn:  Through my life I want to tell the Korean story - how much tragedy we have suffered through the separation. I want to describe, through me, how much we have missed each other.  I also want to write the story of how much people have suffered in prison - yet refused to give up the desire to stay alive.

15.48

Woo picking up child

Music

Colgan:  Like Ahn, Woo Yong-Gak is hopeful one day finding his family alive in the North, yet he is wary of even saying he wants to go back, because of the suspicions it will arouse.

16.19

16.44

Woo:  I don't really want to say right now whether I want to go back or not.

16.58

Woo

Anyone who has been separated from their wife and family - who misses and loves them - would feel the same way as me. But I reject any proposal with conditions.

17.03

Ends 17.28