KCNA Commentary Slams Politically-motivated Plot against Chongryon

Pyongyang, November 12 (KCNA) -- Shortly ago the Japanese reactionaries hatched another hideous politically-motivated plot against the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan (Chongryon).
    Kyoto District Court held a trial of an official of Chongryon and the president of the Korean Goods Sales Company, who had been detained on charges of "violation of the law on foreign exchange", demanding prison terms for them.
    The trial was, in a word, the fabrication made on the basis of unreasonable and absurd assertions for a sinister purpose of doing harm to Chongryon.
    The Japanese reactionaries groundlessly claimed that the Tongbang Company illegally imported Songi mushroom to Japan from north Korea and a Chongyon official and the president of Korean Goods Sales Company might be involved in the case.
    The "accused" Chongryon official is the second son of the chairman of Chongryon and once he worked at the Korean Goods Sales Company. It was the major political reason why the Japanese reactionaries showed so keen interest in the case.
    It was their ulterior motive to fabricate the shocking case in which "a family of Chongryon official is involved" and kick off a horrible campaign against Chongryon in the Japanese society.
    The trial proved nonsensical without any clear evidence as it was hastily staged to serve a conspiratorial purpose.
    The Japanese prosecution authorities at the trial made desperate efforts to force the "accused" to admit "charges" by absurd speculations and far-fetched assertions. They just insisted that the Chongryon official and the president of the company might have known about the import of mushroom as the business which imported Songi mushroom and the Korean Goods Sales Company had indirect contact and, in the final analysis, this was "sequential conspiracy."
    Does Japan styling itself a "law-governed state" not know a trial cannot be held in the absence of clear facts and evidence?
    They went ahead with this trial in disregard of the common sense of law as they have long pursued an ambition to destroy Chongryon.
    What is ridiculous is that the prosecution authorities demanded light penalties for those of the body directly related to the mushroom import but heavier penalties for the Chongryon official and the company president with whom they said had indirect contact.
    All the facts reveal the hypocrisy and conspiratorial nature of the case.
    It is the sinister intention of the Japanese reactionaries to invent a pretext for kicking up a wholesale repressive campaign against Chongryon by implicating it in the case.
    Chongryon means the DPRK and their anti-Chongryon moves are nothing but a blatant challenge to it.
    It is by no means an accidental coincidence that the Japanese reactionaries cooked up the case at a time when they are openly calling for reinvasion of the Korean Peninsula.
    They may behave so if they seek to derail the process for normalizing the DPRK-Japan relations in a moment through their persistent confrontation with it.
    They would be well advised to behave themselves. They should stop at once all sorts of burlesques to justify their indiscriminate suppression of Chongryon and moves for invading the DPRK. -0-