The Geneva Trap

Chapter 47

Park Woo-jin looked relaxed when Liz and the Special Branch officer came back into the room. Without looking at him, Liz said, ‘Park Woo-jin, you admitted to Mr Fielding in our earlier session that you had made an unauthorised intrusion into a secret programme and stolen some of the contents. You said that you were motivated purely by intellectual curiosity. So perhaps you would tell me, who is Mr Dong?’ As she spoke the name she looked at him and noticed his expression change. There was a brief silence, then he said, ‘I don’t know a Mr Dong. Are you sure you have the right name?’

Not at all sure, thought Liz to herself, but without replying she took out of an envelope a surveillance photograph of the unknown man walking by himself in St James’s Park and pushed it across the table. ‘Who is this?’

‘I don’t know him,’ replied Park Woo-jin after studying the picture for a moment.

‘Think again,’ said Liz, and produced a photograph of Park Woo-jin and the same man sitting together on the bench on Acton Green.

There was an even longer pause. Then Park Woo-jin said, ‘Oh, yes. I was confused for a moment. That is a cousin of my mother’s. He came to visit me.’

‘Where does he live?’

A longer pause. Then: ‘In Seoul. He was on business in Europe and he came to visit me.’

‘I assume from what you say that he is South Korean?’ A nod. ‘When did you last see him before that visit?’

‘Several years ago.’

‘Park Woo-jin, none of this is true, as you know. This man comes regularly into this country and I don’t think he comes from Seoul. What was it that you left in the waste bin in St James’s Park a week or so ago, for him to collect?’

On the table in front of him, Park Woo-jin’s hands had clenched. Liz pushed a series of photographs across. They showed him walking towards the bin and dropping in the newspaper, the approach of Mr Dong, Mr Dong putting his hand in the bin and then withdrawing it clutching the newspaper. The pictures had time-codes on them from which it was clear that the actions were in sequence. ‘Well?’ said Liz.

Park Woo-jin said nothing. ‘I should tell you,’ she continued, ‘that since you were picked up this morning, I have been in touch with your Embassy and have shown them these pictures. They do not know who Mr Dong is either and they very much doubt that he is one of their citizens. It is certain that he does not use a South Korean passport when he comes into this country. Having seen these photographs your Embassy people agree with me that you have some serious explaining to do.’

There was a silence. After a moment Liz resumed, ‘The penalties in this country for espionage are serious and I have no doubt that in your own country they are just as serious – possibly more so. And then there is the United States to consider,’ she added. ‘They have a close interest in your activities, given your previous employment at Langley.’

Park Woo-jin was no longer replying. All the self-assurance he had shown when he was talking to Charlie Fielding had disappeared. His hands on the table in front of him were constantly moving, clutching at each other. But frightened though he undoubtedly was, he still showed no sign of caving in.

Liz had not finished. ‘I don’t know which judicial system would be the least unpleasant,’ she mused. ‘In this country we no longer hang or shoot spies but we do give long prison sentences for espionage. Our prisons are probably more humane than some of those in the United States,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘where I believe they do have the death penalty for spies. But I don’t know how they are treated in your country. Perhaps you could tell me.’

She leaned forward, both hands on the table, and looked straight into his eyes. ‘Five years in prison here or in the USA or even in Korea might be bearable; ten years just about. But we’re talking about twenty minimum, and more likely close to thirty. Tell me, Mr Park, have you ever thought about what you’ll look like in the year 2040? You’ll emerge from prison, if you emerge at all, without parents, without a wife, and without children. And without a country happy to take you. Whoever you are working for has abandoned you, and now you haven’t a friend in the world. Unless… you tell me the truth, all the truth, right now.’

She looked at her watch to show that she had other things to do, and that if he didn’t make his move soon, she’d be on her way to do them.

Park Woo-jin still said nothing. He was obviously considering his options. Liz didn’t know if he’d get even six months with the evidence she had, much less thirty years, but she could see she’d scared him, and so she left the next move to him.

She could hear Park’s breathing as they sat in silence; he was inhaling deeply, as if trying to suck an answer out of the dead air of the underground room. When she looked at him she found his eyes staring at her questioningly, all certainty gone.

‘What would happen if we had an honest conversation?’ he asked. She was taken by surprise. What was he up to? He suddenly looked and sounded like a frightened student rather than a trained spy.

She said cautiously, ‘I would of course share whatever information you gave me with our colleagues in the United States and in your Embassy. Then it would be checked. If it were truly honest, and we will know if it is not, it would certainly be taken into account when we were considering what to do with you.’

‘How do I know that’s true?’

‘You don’t. But you’ve been in England for a while now. You know what kind of people we are, and how we work. That should help you make your mind up.’ She couldn’t think of any other reason why he should trust her.

But Park nodded. ‘One thing,’ he said. ‘You must promise that no harm will come to my parents.’

‘Your parents?’ Liz was amazed. He was sounding more and more like a frightened child. ‘I assume the Korean authorities will want to talk to them, particularly if you don’t tell me the truth. But if I think you’re being honest with me, I’ll ask them to leave your parents alone. I can’t promise anything, though.’

He nodded. ‘I understand. You will, too, when I tell you everything.’

He talked very softly and slowly, as if subdued by his own story. He said that his parents were simple but intelligent people – his father was a clerk in Seoul, and his mother taught in a primary school. But for all their relatively humble status, they had lived with a secret for many years. For they were North Koreans, who had been infiltrated into the South, via China, in the 1970s, shortly after they were married, with false identities as South Koreans. Their spy masters did not plan for them to relay secrets from their work; they had none. The plan was much more long-term. The real point of their infiltration was so that they would bear children who could be educated and encouraged to attain important positions in South Korean society. It was the children who would be the spies. The parents had to ensure that when the children were old enough to understand, they would reject the propaganda they would be fed officially about the North. The fact that Park was an only child had increased the pressure on his parents – and on Park himself. He smiled a sad smile, and in that sadness lay his acknowledgement that he had never had a choice.

‘How old were you when you became aware of your parents’ position?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s hard to say. By the time they fully told me, I knew most of the truth. You see, in South Korea there is much more indoctrination than people in a place like Britain realise. Here all you’re ever told is how horrible North Korea is; the South is made out to be some sort of perfect society, though in some ways it is little more than an extension of America – there’s very little true Korean culture left; everything, from television to things you buy in shops, seems to come from Disney. But from day one a South Korean child is taught to worship the state, and to hate the North Koreans. With my family, there was always a different perspective – my parents didn’t want me to rebel, far from it, but they made it clear that what I was learning in school about North Korea was not the truth.’

‘Did they have contact with their North Korean controllers?’

‘They must have, but I was never aware of it. Except once, and that involved me. A man came to visit when I was ten years old; they said he was a distant cousin. We had supper together and then my parents left me alone with this man. He asked me lots of questions – about school, and what subjects I liked, and what sports I played. But he asked me another question that seemed odd at the time. If I had to choose to obey my government or my parents, which would I pick? Most South Korean children would have said their government – that’s what I mean about indoctrination. But I said my parents. He seemed very pleased by this.’

After that Park knew he had been selected to play a role, but he didn’t know what it was and his parents wouldn’t tell him. Like all parents, they wanted him to do well, and the first step was to succeed in school; but behind their aspirations for him lay an unspoken agenda, which he associated with the ‘cousin’ who had asked him all the questions.

Fortunately, Park Woo-jin was a clever child, already three years ahead of his classmates in mathematics by the age of twelve. He had taken to computers like a fish to water, and graduated from university with highest honours.

‘Did you know by then who your parents were working for?’

‘Yes, and I knew that the torch had been passed on to me. After all, there wasn’t much either of my parents could tell the North Koreans – it was made clear that this was to be my responsibility. The instruction came that I should try and find a post with the military.’

That proved easy enough – listening, Liz realised that the Korean military would have been delighted to have a programmer with this young man’s skills, especially as many of the gifted young computer experts were flocking overseas in droves to make their fortunes in America’s Silicon Valley.

Fearful he would do the same, and impressed by his talents and his diligence, the military had promoted Park Woo-jin rapidly, and he was cherry-picked after only five years’ experience for a plum secondment to the Pentagon. He had passed the positive vetting process without a hitch, and passed it again when the Americans had had him checked. The North Koreans had done well with the false documentation of his parents. He did not know who his parents really were or what had happened to the people whose identity they had adopted. But the process must have been watertight as he passed all vetting with no problems.

He’d enjoyed his stay at the Pentagon, especially since the North Koreans had asked nothing from him, perhaps deciding there was no point in risking his exposure when he was operating at only mid-level in the Defense Department But when the opportunity for a second secondment had come his way – to the UK’s Ministry of Defence – everything had changed. He’d been contacted and encouraged – no, told – to apply, and when he’d landed the post, had been given a controller who’d insisted on regular meetings. His contacts with North Korea’s Intelligence Service had been very limited until then – in Washington he’d met an Embassy employee on only two occasions – but once in London there had been drops of information and sometimes weekly meets.

‘With the man in the photographs?’

‘Yes.’

‘We know him as Dong Shin-soo. What’s his real name?’

‘I don’t know. I didn’t call him anything.’

‘Where is he based?’

‘I don’t know but I think it must be somewhere nearer than Pyongyang. In Europe maybe.’

‘How did he contact you?’

‘He sent an encoded email, with a time and place embedded. Sometimes I did not meet him. When I had information, I would pass it by a drop, as you photographed me doing it in St James’s Park.’

‘What did he want you to do?’

‘He wanted me to gain access to a project being run at a separate site.’

‘Did you know what the project was?’

‘No.’

‘Or where it was located?’

‘No. I only knew the prefix used as an identifier for its network. But access was forbidden, and for a while I thought it would be impossible to get in.’

‘But you managed.’

Park Woo-jin gave a wry smile, recognising that his success was what had landed him here. ‘I left what is known as a trailer. It lets all sorts of information flow through it, then when it sees what it wants, it grabs it. In this case the network identifier tipped it off.’

Liz imagined a fish waiting for food where the river narrows and the water funnels between two rocks. The fish was checking out the bits and bugs floating above its head until finally it saw the fly – Hugo Cowdray’s email – it had been watching for and rose to grab it.

‘Did you know what was in the code you managed to extract?’

‘No. It was heavily encrypted. It would take more than one person to break that kind of code. That’s not my speciality.’

‘But you gave the code to your controller here in St James’s Park?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what did he do with it?’

‘How should I know?’ Park Woo-jin protested, and Liz found his reaction too immediate to be contrived.

‘It must have been very valuable to have you take such a risk. For years you were operating under heavy cover – you said yourself you rarely met anyone from the North Korean Intelligence Service. Suddenly you’re meeting them frequently, and you’re given a critical task. Didn’t you wonder what it was all about?’

‘Of course I wondered. But I assumed it was a weapons system of some sort, and besides, there was no point in me poking my nose into things that didn’t concern me.’ He realised the absurdity of what he had just said, and smiled sadly. ‘I mean, it wasn’t worth the risk.’

Liz felt a pang of sympathy for this young man who, if he was telling the truth, had never had much of a chance. If he was telling the truth… To be sure of that, his story would have to be assiduously checked in three countries.

Just to satisfy herself, she asked out of the blue, ‘Have you ever been to Marseilles?’

He looked at her as if she were mad, and shook his head. She was sure that part of his story was true. Park Woo-jin was a pawn, not a king.