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Memoirs suggest kidnapped women are in North Korea

The memoirs of a US army deserter have added weight to the theory that three young women who went missing 27 years ago in Macau were spirited away to North Korea, a news report said yesterday.

The trio -- Thai masseuse Anocha Panjoy and jewellery shop assistants Hong Leng-ieng and So Mio-chun -- have not been seen since the evening of July 2, 1978, after they accepted a dinner invitation from a wealthy Japanese man who called himself Mr Fukoda.

At the time it was thought the women could have been abducted and forced into prostitution or murdered on the high seas after being enticed on board ships.

However, in his recently published memoirs, the American Charles Jenkins, who spent more than 39 years in North Korea after deserting his unit in 1965, claimed to have met Thai national Anocha Panjoy during his time there.

Jenkins says he knew her well because she was married to fellow deserter Larry Abshier who died of a heart attack in 1983. He also produced a photograph of a beach scene with a woman in the background he claimed was Anocha.

In his book Kokuhaku (To Tell the Truth) he says he believed there were abductees from all over the world in North Korea.

According to a report in Hong Kong's Sunday Morning Post, the claim has aroused new interest in a case that had been largely forgotten since 1988 when a similar claim was made by South Korean actress Choe Eunhee.

Choe was kidnapped and taken to North Korea in 1978 but escaped in 1986. She later described a meeting with a woman from Macau who matched the description of Hong in North Korea.

In 2002, the North Korean government acknowledged kidnapping at least one dozen Japanese citizens to help train its spies.

However, it has denied abducting Anocha and says that she is not in the country.

Thai authorities are pressing for further clarification on the issue.
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