Megumi Yokota died of drug overdose in N Korea: S Korean paper

So let me get this straight, North Korea kidnapped a 13 year old girl, plied her with so many drugs that it killed her, then tossed her body in a pit.

It really is enough to make you rage.

If it's true you can't blame her for going mental. Imagine waking up one day in that place.

This is further proof that the North Korean regime is as barbarous as the Nazis; maybe worse

I feel so badly for the Yokotas. They have been clinging to the hope that Megumi was still alive. But to bring final closure, they need to find her remains and verify that they are hers.

Amazing how this news is from a South Korean newspaper and not from the North Korean government.

Jay Wilson: "This is further proof that the North Korean regime is as barbarous as the Nazis; maybe worse"

Where on earth do you get 'worse than the Nazis', just out of curiosity. A horrible and brutal regime, most definitely, though.

Well, I hope this gives them some sort of closure, as horrible as it is to hear about how their daughter died, and worse yet that she was given such an ignoble burial. So sad. And of course there will always be good reason for taking the word of North Koreans with a grain of salt, particularly on this issue. But if we start getting denials and statements of how it can't possibly be true (with no proof to the contrary), I think it's just going to cause a lot more suffering than the Yokotas and others are already going through. NK needs to be held accountable for this in some way, but first they need to focus on finding out more.

Even if true it's hard to believe.

....North Korea. The land where opiates and barbiturates are easily plentiful for the masses at every street corner and corner drug store? Somehow, me thinks not.

"died from an overdose of medication"

" died of an overdose of sedatives and sleeping pills in a psychiatric ward"

"the staff of the hospital gave testimony that Yokota was given sedatives and sleeping pills that exceeded safe doses."

so she was put down, her body dumped into a pit with seversl other corpses kindof confirms this. Very inhumane and disrespectful not even giving her a proper burial.

For NK, sounds horrible enough to be true. But sorry to say the real truth of what happened to her will never be known.

Imagine that. A savage country doing a savage thing. Who'd have thunk. Kind of a shame that 'civilized' nations continue to give North Korea money.

How does a country like North Korea still be so backwards when it is surrounded by countries at the top of world technology?

I hate North Korea.

They have no valuable resources to take over so no world power really cares about them, but I hate North Korea. For the horrific kidnappings/abductions, selling their people as slave labor to Qatar, for crimes against humanity that they do to their own people everyday.

Get rid of the Kim family.

This is the problem with the abductees issue and with making concessions to North Korea for re-opening these cases. There is no proof at all of what happened to Megumi Yokota. We're full circle again already, with no new information worth its salt, but Japan has made concessions to North Korea in exchange for these half-cocked stories. The story of Megumi Yokota was "confirmed" by "staff", but these "staff" would likely be shot or dragged off to a concentration camp with their children and grand-children if they denied the latest official version. The mental issues and the pit with no coffin seem designed to make the story semi-believable, but there is no proof, and therefore no closure for the Yokota family. No one would accept this story as true without proper evidence to back it up, although the inhumane treatment is typical of this rogue state.

People should understand that there are two North Koreas, and most people do get this. Pyongyang is different from the rest of the country and does have medical centres with drugs for those deemed worthy. The Kims have never suffered from a shortage of food by the looks of things, and Kim Jong Il was well known for his love of caviar and cognac. The elite have anything they want within reason while the poor outside of Pyongyang starve. This makes it possible that Megumi Yokota was treated (if you can call it that) in a Pyongyang clinic with access to medicines and sedatives.

All Japan has really done by re-opening this issue is give a bunch of concessions to a violent, crazy regime that has improved the lot of the ruling elite though. You will never get the truth out of North Korea about the abductees. My feeling is that North Korea should not be engaged at all unless they want to sit down and find ways of working with the rest of the world. NK uses the abductions issue to get concessions from other countries and perhaps we should not make any further concessions to this regime.

Americanhonor: "so she was put down, her body dumped into a pit with seversl other corpses kindof confirms this. Very inhumane and disrespectful not even giving her a proper burial."

It's disrespectful to do that to anyone, and she is certainly no exception. You need to think about the other bodies tossed into the mass grave like that as well, not just about Yokota.

hampton: "All Japan has really done by re-opening this issue is give a bunch of concessions to a violent, crazy regime that has improved the lot of the ruling elite though."

Well, that, yes, but also it is a way for Japanese politicians to take the focus off current scandals and troubles, usually involving the economy, and when their approval rating is plummeting. Now people read this and unite in anger against North Korea, and Abe and others can capitalize on the sentiment in order to gain back some of said approval. The last time we heard about NK was just after Obuchi and Miyashima quit. Now we hear about it again today as Abe is in a terrible pickle over the state of the economy and probable consumption tax hike. So, he vows again to 'resolve the issue' and get a little support where it's needed. So it's not entirely selfless or about solving the issue.

@Weasel

Let's see....North Korea. The land where opiates and barbiturates are easily plentiful for the masses at every street corner and corner drug store? Somehow, me thinks not.

I've never been there myself, but NK's main export (unofficially, of course) is hard drugzs. What they do is, they make strategic drops in the ocean and the buyers make the pickup. They also deal in weapons.

smithinjapan, you're singing to the choir about the domestic reasons for Abe and the government to be flogging this dead horse abductions issue. I couldn't agree more that this is a popular distraction for Abe, and not much else.

Farmboy, what fruit? The only fruit has gone to North Korea in the form of concessions from Japan against the advice and wishes of the US government and the rest of the free world. Abe has achieved nothing at all other than the latest cock and bull story from the nutty regime in Pyongyang. I don't see why Abe deserves any credit at all for following a policy that has made Lil Kim even stronger.

Farmboy: "He has been pursuing a resolution to this problem for many, many years, from the time he was a chief Cabinet secretary under Koizumi, and I think his efforts have borne fruit."

I don't think his efforts have borne any fruit whatsoever -- he's just the most recent PM to hope the inevitable NK collapse comes on his watch. Given how he's angered them with his comments on islands and visit to Yasukuni (or donations), I can't see why they would be 'warmer' with Abe than others for any reason except that they have no choice in order to get concessions. Now, Koizumi is an example of someone who's efforts bore fruit -- then the wingers, like Abe, got their say on reneging of promises and poof relations fall to worse than before.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/11/07/national/politics-diplomacy/japan-denies-report-that-abductee-yokota-died-in-1994/

The central government on Friday denied a report out of South Korea claiming that Megumi Yokota, who was abducted by North Korea at the age of 13 and remains a symbol of the four-decade campaign to recover kidnapping victims, died in 1994 of an overdose. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said there was “absolutely no credibility” to a report in the Dong-A Ilbo newspaper about Megumi Yokota’s death at a North Korean psychiatric hospital 20 years ago. The paper cited a report by South Korean activist Choi Sung-yong and Japanese investigators.

When you follow the Yokota story for all these years you become part of their family and in doing so, none of us will ever have closure but at the same time we all feel some hope.

http://english.donga.com/srv/service.php3?biid=2014110798568

The Dong-A Ilbo exclusively obtained on Thursday a joint investigation report issued by the Japanese government’s abduction issue team and Choi Seong-yong, representative of South Korean abductee families. The report contains an interview with North Korean hospital staff who witnessed death of Megumi. In this report submitted to the Abe administration, the both Japanese and South Korean parties met with the two former hospital staff who worked at Pyongyang Hospital No. 49, a psychiatric hospital where Megumi died, in a third nation on Sept. 11. This fact would provoke a nation-wide controversy since the Abe administration has concealed the Megumi issue for two months, which has drawn great attention from the Japanese public.

Most likely died of lead poisoning (shot) Scumbags, High time they were dealt with.So what, they have a very large army, but will they fight? End the suffering of millions of N.Koreans. I find it strange how there is a lot of Sabre rattling by America towards Russia and the Ukraine and China and the disputed Islands. Why doesn't somebody put that little Gimp out of our misery once and for all.

Smithinjapan: I got the phrase "worse than the nazis" because this is just one example of the sheer and utter barbarity of North Korea

My question is this when Japan first question the where about of Megumi why did they lie and say she had died or did they lie when they sent back ashes of some one else? No that this report has came out and if it is true the ashes they sent could have very well been those of some one else bury alone in the same grave and backwards thinking NK just thought any ashes would be ok to send being that they were probably not that sophisticated in DNA technology as Japan. Anyways this is just more confusion and more pain for the Yokotas. I wonder if they will ever find or believe the real truth.

RIP Megumi Yokota san

Never believe in anything published by the Cho-Joong-Dong; the big three right-wing newspapers who dominate the market in South Korea.

"Get rid of the Kim family."

How? Hey, let's ask the Chinese to overthrow them. They are, in fact, responsible for North Korea still existing today.

Dong-a Ilbo said the finding was included in a report by Japanese officials who had interviewed North Korean witnesses who were on the staff of the hospital where Yokota died, and Abe’s administration had been briefed about the fresh details.'

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Sounds this newspaper got info from Japanese officials.

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Kim does not have family. He already fed his uncle to hungry dogs in a cage.

China already deserted N Kprea. It is now best friend of S. Korea.

It makes one wonder as to just how many countries do this in the world yet are not in the news for doing it.

Sad, if true. "dumped in a pit to be buried without a coffin..." That sounds about par for NK...

Looks like time of Kim dectatorship will be over. It just rreleased remaining two American prisoners. Hope N Korea will comply with Japanese demand of this case and victims can come back to Japan with their family if they were married.

This is further proof that the North Korean regime is as barbarous as the Nazis; maybe worse

Time to dial-back the hyperbole, son. As bad as the N.K. regime is, they haven't yet tried to systematically exterminate an entire ethnic group. Until they do, there's no way they can be "as barbarous as the Nazis; maybe worse."