SEOUL — A court in South Korea ruled on Thursday that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un must pay a total of 105 million won ($70,474) in damages to five former Korean War prisoners, the third such ruling against Pyongyang.
The Seoul Central District Court told Agence France-Presse (AFP) it had ordered Kim to pay 21 million won to each of the five plaintiffs, all former South Korean soldiers who were captured during the 1950–53 Korean War and forcibly held in the North for decades.
The plaintiffs are Koh Kwang-myun and four other survivors, among only six former South Korean prisoners of war (POWs) still alive and residing in South Korea.
The men, all now in their 90s, were captured by Chinese communist forces during a reconnaissance mission and taken to what is now North Korea.
They were not repatriated despite the armistice agreement in July 1953.
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Koh endured forced labor for years at a POW camp and later at a coal mine in North Hamgyong province before escaping in November 2001, the court said.
Another plaintiff, Choi Ki-ho, was also forced to work in coal mines in North Hamgyong for more than five decades.
Lee Sun-woo lost three fingers while being captured during the war.
It remained unclear whether the men would ever receive compensation from Pyongyang.
The two Koreas remain technically at war because the 1950–53 conflict ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty.
Thursday’s ruling was the third time former South Korean POWs have won damages against Kim and North Korea, according to local reports, although none has yet succeeded in collecting compensation.
Some plaintiffs have moved to seize North Korean assets under Seoul’s control — such as copyright fees for Pyongyang’s state television broadcasts — but the legal process remains ongoing.
Former POW Han Jae-bok and two others won a landmark ruling in 2020 ordering the North to pay a total of 42 million won in damages, the first ruling of its kind in South Korea, the South’s Yonhap News Agency said.
Yonhap said the court proceeded with Thursday’s case through “public notification” after determining there was no practical way to notify the North or Kim about the lawsuit.
Public notification is a legal process in South Korea in which a court posts notice of legal documents in an official gazette when they cannot be delivered directly.