TIMECODE

DIALOGUE

10:00:03

GFX:

101 EAST

10:00:16

STEVE CHAO:   For the first time in decades there’s a palpable fear of nuclear war in Asia.  With North Korean missiles landing close to Japan’s shores relations between the two countries are colder than ever.  And Japan’s Korean community is feeling the chill more than most.

10:00:37

STEVE CHAO:   I’m Steve Chao.  In this edition of 101 East we explore life in Japan under North Korea’s nuclear shadow.

10:00:47

GFX:

JAPAN:  IN THE MISSILE’S SHADOW

A FILM BY DREW AMBROSE & SARAH YEO

10:00:51

[SIREN AND RADIO BROADCAST IN JAPANESE]

10:01:01

DREW AMBROSE:   When this siren blares across Japan people have just ten minutes to seek cover from a missile attack.  Katsuyoshi Horiguchi has planned for this.

10:01:24

DREW AMBROSE:   He designed and built a nuclear bunker behind his daughter’s apartment.

10:01:32

DREW AMBROSE:   Horiguchi-san.  Hai hai desu.  Very fast, about three minutes.

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:   Oh!

DREW AMBROSE:   . . . I-i-is that kind of how long it takes to get down here into the bunker?

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:    Yes.  Generally it takes three minutes to get here. That’s good.

DREW AMBROSE:   Yes sugoi.

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Six minutes is the limit.  So three is okay.

10:01:55

DREW AMBROSE:   The retired grandfather believes seven people could survive in this bunker.  It’s equipped with air purifiers, supplies, and a computer for contacting the outside world. 

10:02:07

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  As long as the air purifier works we can live here in the bunker for one week.  There’s a lot of food and water under the bed.  For the toilet, we put a plastic bag in the bucket.

10:02:26

DREW AMBROSE:   Horiguchi says his bunker is needed now more than ever.  In 2017 North Korea tested twenty-three rockets, including two long range missiles that landed in Pacific Ocean waters near Japan.

10:02:40

DREW AMBROSE:   What has happened recently that drove you to start building a bunker?

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  When Donald Trump was elected American President I started to worry that North Korea and the USA would start fighting and go to war.  I started researching, found parts from Switzerland, and started building in January 2017.

10:03:16

DREW AMBROSE:   An avid outdoorsman, he fears a missile strike could contaminate and destroy the environment he loves.  Horiguchi worries his Government is blindly following America’s aggressive approach to North Korea.

10:03:33

KATSUYOSHI HORIGUCHI:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Well, more than half of Japanese people agree with America attacking North Korea.  I think this is very dangerous.  Abe is going to exploit that and purchase missiles for the military.  I think we are facing a very dangerous situation.

10:03:59

DREW AMBROSE:   Being tough on North Korea helped Shinzo Abe win his fourth term as Prime Minister.  He claims it poses the biggest threat to Japan since World War 2.  The pacifist nation is investing in missile defence systems, increasing sanctions, and pushing a tough diplomatic line against the regime.

10:04:22

PROFESSOR TOMOHIKO TANIGUCHI:  Shinzo Abe sees clearly that now is the time for us to show a consolidated front against North Korea.  If there is any small spot for misunderstanding, misinterpretation, that’s going to be ah tantamount for you to showing weakness, and weakness invites ah provocation.

10:04:49

DREW AMBROSE:   Professor Tomohiko Taniguchi is the Prime Minister’s Foreign Affairs Advisor.

10:04:54

PROFESSOR TOMOHIKO TANIGUCHI:   And the sheer tempo and pace with which North Korea has ah come very much ah a long way to build its nuclear arsenal and missile technology have been a surprise for every one of us, including the Japanese, Chinese, and the Americans.  Ah unlike other nuclear powers they say that that they are willing to use the weapon and ah I think that shocked a lot of people.

10:05:28

[SIREN]

GFX;

Please move this way for evacuation.

Please move calmly.

Please follow the instructions of the metro staff.

10:05:38

DREW AMBROSE:   It’s also put the country on high alert.  Since last year authorities have been staging evacuation drills to prepare citizens for a potential attack.

10:05:49

GFX:

Please don’t push push.  Move slowly please.

10:05:52

DREW AMBROSE:   In the past these evacuation drills have been held in rural prefectures in places like schools and public buildings.  This is the first time such an event has happened in the capital Tokyo.

10:06:03

[ANNOUNCEMENT IN SUBWAY – JAPANESE]

GFX:

Drill. . . Drill.

This is a drill announcement.

Missiles may have been launched.

10:06:20

DREW AMBROSE:   In this subway station every second of this ten minute exercise is choreographed.

10:06:28

PROFESSOR TOMOHIKO TANIGUCHI:   Our enemy is the lack of knowledge.  You must be prepared, ah and you should control the ah people’s minds so that they would not panic, and that’s something that you must avoid at all cost.

10:06:50

DREW AMBROSE:   As tensions rise members of Japan’s ethnic Korean community are feeling the pressure.

10:06:56

[DOOR KNOCK]

SHIN GIL UNG:   Yeah.

10:06:58

DREW AMBROSE:  Shin Gil Ung is the Principal of a Tokyo High School aligned to the North Korean regime.  

10:07:04

SHIN GIL UNG:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  I always have this fear that our people’s freedom and movement will be restricted.

10:07:16

DREW AMBROSE:   Many of these school children are descendants of Koreans brought here as prisoners or slave labour during World War 2.  When Korea split in two many in Japan’s Korean community pledged allegiance to the North.  As a result their schools and businesses have always been viewed with suspicion.

10:07:38

SHIN GIL UNG:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Whenever there’s an excuse the Police use all sorts of nonsensical reasons to come and search our schools in raids.  If we go to war our community may face a severe crisis.

10:08:00

[TEACHER IN CLASSROOM]

10:08:05

DREW AMBROSE:   Under the watchful eyes of North Korea’s leaders students here learn in both Korean and Japanese.  Every year the regime gives two million dollars to a network of kindergartens, schools and universities across Japan.

10:08:23

SHIN GIL UNG:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  The most important thing we teach the students is that they can contribute to reunite Korea.  Here in our school our goal is not to teach communism.  Our goal is to teach the students how to live as Koreans within Japanese society.  Parents do not want a North Korean education for their children.  Their wish is for their children to speak the language and learn the culture and live as proud Korean people in Japan.  That’s why they send their children here.

10:09:06

[SINGING]

GFX:

[KOREAN/JAPANESE WRITING]

10:09:13

DREW AMBROSE:   But it’s North not South Korea they identify with.  In their senior year these school students go on a two week excursion to Pyongyang.  For most of them it’s the first and only time they’ll visit North Korea.

10:09:28

SHIN GIL UNG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Myself and other people here we own cars, we go for holidays.  It’s unrealistic for us who have these sorts of lifestyles to go back to North Korea.  The day we go back to the motherland will be when Korea is unified, prosperous, and free.

10:09:56

DREW AMBROSE:   Ryong Song;

RYONG SONG:  Hi.

DREW AMBROSE:   Konnichiwa.

10:09:55

DREW AMBROSE:   I’m meeting up with fifteen year old Ryong Song to hear what the students think.  It’s lunchtime and the canteen is a hive of activity.  Feeling like the new kid at school I try to get to know Ryong Song.

10:10:17

GFX:

It’s tasty.

10:10:24

DREW AMBROSE:   I was expecting the school to be very strict, very regimented.  I’m surprised at how casual things go on here.

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Yes.  There are many strict rules.  But among my friends we chat, we discuss, and we’re having a great time.

10:10:46

DREW AMBROSE:   Ryong Song’s grandparents migrated here during the Korean War.  His parents are divorced and he lives with his mother and brother.

10:10:53

DREW AMBROSE:   When you grow up what do you want to be?

RYONG SONG:  I want to a carpenter.

DREW AMBROSE:   Carpenter?

RYONG SONG:  Yeah.

10:11:08

DREW AMBROSE:   History is one of his favourite subjects.  So I ask him how his understanding of the past shapes his views.

10:11:15

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  The Korean Peninsula used to be one country.  It was divided into two countries.  But we still think about it the same way, that we’re all Koreans.  That’s what we’re learning at school.  And I think it is very important to keep this feeling, that we are one. The teachers educate us about history, and the current problems.  And the teachers ask us to keep watching what’s happening, because it is our motherland.  Now there’s a lot of talk about missile issues.  But for myself, I really want them to solve the situation.  I’m hoping that Japan and Korea will have a good relationship in future.

DREW AMBROSE:   But do you learn the American. . .

10:12:12

DREW AMBROSE VOICEOVER: I ask him what he knows about American’s criticism of the regime..

10:12:18

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Well, we haven’t covered these things in detail.  Not in detail.

10:12:30

DREW AMBROSE:   The Principal says the school teaches history from both the Japanese and North Korean perspective.

10:12:36

SHIN GIL UNG:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  When we teach North Korea’s political system, we explain Pyongyang’s point of view.  But for social studies we don’t teach Pyongyang’s point of view.  We reflect how Japanese school is teaching.  Otherwise our students won’t pass the college entrance exam.

10:13:01

DREW AMBROSE:   He admits that the North Korean heroes in their textbooks are seen as terrorists in Japan.  None more so than the two men that shaped North Korea.  But someone’s missing.

10:13:14

DREW AMBROSE:   Why is there no portrait of Kim Jong-Un the current leader up on the classroom walls?

SHIN GIL UNG:   [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Regarding Kim Jong-Un so far we don’t have any direct guidance or support from him.  So I don’t think about hanging up his picture.  Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-Il are the leaders who show us continuous support in our school’s seventy year history.  So we hang up their portraits to show our appreciation.

10:13:51

DREW AMBROSE:   This loyalty comes at a cost.  Japan’s Government recently slashed funding for any schools with ties to North Korea. 

10:14:01

PROFESSOR TOMOHIKO TANIGUCHI:   What ah makes it legitimate for taxpayers to spend their money on institutions that are constantly telling pupils that the Japanese are your enemy.  It, that’s, it just does not make sense.  The school that you talked about ah is legitimising everything that North Korea does.  Do you want to send your children to that school?  That’s the question that those parents must ask themselves very seriously.

10:14:39

DREW AMBROSE:   Ryong Song can’t understand the criticisms of his school.

10:14:44

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  We use the internet freely.  There are no restrictions.  This is not the time to think only about Korea.  We are taught we shouldn’t just criticise Japan.

10:15:03

DREW AMBROSE:   He certainly seems like any other fifteen year old schoolboy.  Cheeky and full of surprises.

10:15:13

RYONG SONG:  Ah, what do you like?

DREW AMBROSE:   What do I like?  Music, ongaku, ongaku, yeah.  What what about you what do you like?

RYONG SONG:  I like magic.

DREW AMBROSE:   Magic?

RYONG SONG:  Yes.

DREW AMBROSE:   Magic.  Can you can you show us a trick?

RYONG SONG:  Yeah.

DREW AMBROSE:   . . .  Do you have any?  Oh!  A coin trick.

RYONG SONG:  [performs coin trick]

DREW AMBROSE:   Woh!

GFX:

Mysterious!

10:15:44

DREW AMBROSE:   That’s not the only trick Ryong Song has up his sleeve.  This year he made it onto the school’s prestigious boxing team.  Today they’re training for an upcoming competition.

GFX:

Don’t hesitate to punch.

Right…that’s right.

10:16:05

DREW AMBROSE:   His father wanted him to play soccer, but Ryong Song’s passion is to be in the ring.

10:16:11

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  If I become professional I want to be a representative of my home country, Korea.

10:16:20

DREW AMBROSE:   That’s another thing his father may not want to hear.

10:16:25

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  When I go out to eat with my father, he hides that he is Korean.  I don’t like that because in my heart I always want to be Korean.  I always think about that.

10:16:44

DREW AMBROSE:   But he understands his father is just trying to protect him.

10:16:48

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  I remember when I was in kindergarten I say this is my name, and I’m Korean.  My friends say ah, mother and father told me that is the country where bad people live.  Since then I’ve realised that many people here think this way.

10:17:14

[LOUD SPEAKER FROM MOVING VAN]

GFX:

Get out of Japan!

You can’t even talk properly.

Dirty Korean people, get out of Japan!

10:17:24

DREW AMBROSE:   In this tense political climate a number of far right groups are stoking these divisions.

10:17:30

[LOUD SPEAKER FROM MOVING VAN]

GFX:

The dirty Korean people must return to their

northern territories immediately.

Get out of Japan…get out!

10:17:45

DREW AMBROSE:   We’re outside the South Korean Embassy where the authorities work hard to stop a number of trucks driven by far right protestors.

10:17:54

[LOUD SPEAKER FROM LARGE TRUCK]

GFX:

Deport them!

We come in peace.

If you let us talk, we will leave.

Get rid of these dirty people!

10:18:18

DREW AMBROSE:   Japan’s new hate speech laws ban such groups from demonstrating in public places.  So to get around the laws they use trucks to keep moving.

10:18:28

DREW AMBROSE:   It’s actually really hard to follow these trucks because the protestors stop for five minutes, spout some hate speech, and then just drive on.

10:18:40

DREW AMBROSE:   When they struggle to get closer to the Embassy their anger soon turns to us.

10:18:48

PROTESTOR:  [JAPANESE]

GFX:

Hey!

Your country can’t do whatever it wants!

Don’t underestimate Japan, idiots!

POLICE:  [JAPANESE]

GFX:

Please don’t be loud.

Who the hell are you?

Who are you?

Please, step back, step back.

10:19:07

DREW AMBROSE:   And right wing activists are taking things even further.  In late February Tokyo’s early morning quiet was shattered when two men were arrested for allegedly firing multiple gunshots at North Korea’s de facto Embassy.

10:19:27

DREW AMBROSE:   We meet with one of the prime movers behind these right wing groups. Hiroyuki Seto is the leader of a new political party called Japan First.  He supports Prime Minister Abe’s strong stance again North Korea.

10:19:44

HIROYUKI SETO:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  We should start war immediately.  That’s my view.  When war starts North Korea will be destroyed and disappear.  When there is no nation, the North Korean schools here will be shut down.

10:20:05

DREW AMBROSE:   Seto admits that he has organised a number of demonstrations against Koreans.  He defends these aggressive methods, saying many migrants are funnelling millions of dollars to the North Korean regime through their businesses.

10:20:19

HIROYUKI SETO:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Actually I think some of them who claim to be South Korean Nationals are actually close to North Korea.  There is a hidden ideology behind them.

10:20:37

DREW AMBROSE:   Now that he can no longer hold demonstrations Seto takes his right wing message online.

10:20:43

HIROYUKI SETO:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  My actions aren’t hate speech.  They are normal activities.  Hate speech law doesn’t restrict any of our activities.

10:20:55

DREW AMBROSE:   But when pressed Seto has had enough.

10:21:00

HIROYUKI SETO:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  There is no question about North Korea.  There are many questions about hate speech.  I don’t want to answer anymore.  I don’t have time.

DREW AMBROSE:   No no no.  Let let me just explain.

HIROYUKI SETO:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Those people who support hate speech laws are left wing.  The hate speech laws are made by those who are trying to supress our voice.  We fight against dangerous people.  We don’t fight with those who pose no threat to us.  Don’t worry about it.  Okay.  That’s it.

10:21:46

DREW AMBROSE:   Hate speech laws are a positive step for a country notoriously cold on immigration.

10:22:01

DREW AMBROSE:   Do do you feel the hate speech laws have to be stronger?

PROFESSOR TOMOHIKO TANIGUCHI:   Well in theory there is room for those laws to be strengthened.  But this challenge is going to be something that is not going away, we have to live with it.

10:22:21

DREW AMBROSE:   While others may target them, Koreans like Ryong Song are getting on with their lives.  Today his boxing team is competing against a prestigious Japanese High School.

10:22:34

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  There is so much equipment, and lots of pictures.  I feel this school must be very well established.  Right now I’m nervous, but even if your cameras weren’t here I would still try to give one hundred percent of my best.

10:22:58

DREW AMBROSE:   Ryong Song will be fighting a Japanese boy he’s met before at other events. 

10:23:03

DREW AMBROSE:   Do you think you have the the skills to beat him?

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  I’m not confident I’ll win.  But I’ll do my best.

10:23:14

DREW AMBROSE:   When the competition begins the Korean Team is on the back foot.

10:23:19

[BOXING COACH – JAPANESE]

GFX:

Reach further!

Correct your stance.

Use two and three punch combinations.

Alright! Let’s go!

10:23:38

DREW AMBROSE:   Soon it’s Ryong Song’s turn to contest three rounds.  He’s slow to start, and his opponent lands more punches.

10:23:49

[BOXING COACH - JAPANESE]

GFX:

Move, move, move!

You must go for it when you get a chance

or you will lose.

When you went down, down, down…

you should’ve hit him.

You should not show any fear.

Ok, let’s go.

10:24:14

DREW AMBROSE:   As the bout continues Ryong Song fights back, attacking in short bursts.  But it’s not enough.

10:24:27

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  I didn’t do well.  I was so nervous my feet couldn’t move, and I got punched by my opponent.  This is something I need to work on.

10:24:48

DREW AMBROSE:   When the contest ends there is no animosity.  The two teams start training together.

10:24:56

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  My philosophy is, in the ring it doesn’t matter who the opponent is.  Out of the ring I’m building friendship.

10:25:10

DREW AMBROSE:   For Ryong Song competing here is about more than chasing the glory of victory.

10:25:17

RYONG SONG:  [JAPANESE]

VOICEOVER TRANSLATION:  Through sport I like to tell them we are not bad people, we are not hostile, and everyone should get along.  I would like to erase the bad image of North Korea.  And if I win I can show everyone, that I did it as a Korean.  That’s how I feel.

10:25:56

GFX:

ALJAZEERA