Abductee sticks to N Korean line

Mr Kim was speaking publicly about his experiences for the first time

A South Korean man believed to have been kidnapped by the North in 1978 has denied he was abducted.

Kim Young-nam also said his former wife Megumi Yokota, a Japanese woman the North admitted to kidnapping, was dead.

Pyongyang has long insisted that she committed suicide, but her parents have refused to believe it. The case has soured Japan-North Korea relations.

Mr Kim was speaking shortly after being allowed to meet his southern relatives for the first time in 28 years.

It is the first time Mr Kim has been given a chance to speak publicly about what happened to him.

But before the press conference, many analysts said they were sceptical he would reveal the truth about his kidnapping or about his former wife, for fear of the North Korean authorities.

The South Koreans have long believed that Mr Kim was abducted by the North, and a former North Korean agent, Kim Gwang Hyon, has admitted to playing a part in the kidnapping.

Suicide claim

Kim Young-nam vanished from a beach at the age of 16 in 1978.

He is one of nearly 500 South Koreans who are believed to have been taken by the North, many of them used to train North Korean spies.

Mr Kim's case has been followed especially closely because, while in the North, he married and fathered a daughter with Megumi Yokota, a Japanese who was kidnapped at the age of 13 from the coast near her home in Japan.

Megumi Yokota's parents believe she is still alive

Her parents have do not believe North Korea's claims that she is dead, and have been desperate for any information from Mr Kim.

But, as expected, in Thursday's press conference, Mr Kim stuck to Pyongyang's version of events.

"For the first three years I was married to Megumi, we had a daughter and led a happy life," he was quoted as saying by South Korea's Yonhap news agency.

"But then I started seeing signs of disorder from Megumi... unfortunately she never recovered and committed suicide in a hospital on 13 April 1994," Mr Kim said.

Explaining his own presence in North Korea, Mr Kim denied he was abducted and instead claimed that he was rescued by a North Korean boat when a raft he was on drifted out to sea.

North Korea has not acknowledged the kidnapping of any South Koreans, saying that they were willing defectors.

But the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, did admit and apologise for the abduction of 13 Japanese citizens.

Five have since been released. Most were used to teach Japanese language and customs to North Korean spies.