Shady Dealings at Morning Light
Eric Ellis, Macau
July 14, 1994
THE diplomatic world throws up few quirkier oddities than the Zokwang Import and Export Company in Macau's Avenida de Sidonia Pais.
On the 5th floor of the sleepy apartment yesterday opposite Macau's police headquarters, men and women in black were quietly welcoming mourners to sign a book of condolences marking the death of North Korea's Great Leader Kim Il-sung.
Zokwang - "morning light" in Korean - is one of the Hermit Kingdom's few openings to the outside world and one of its chief sources of hard currency. Zokwang is thought to have been the nerve centre for the terrorist atrocities bearing the signature of Pyongyang's new strongman, Kim Jong-il.
The South Korean Government has pinpointed Zokwang and its affiliates as the planning base for a number of covert strikes against Seoul, in particular the 1983 Rangoon bombing that wiped out four cabinet ministers, and the 1987 bombing of a Korean Airlines jet that killed 115 people.
The Wall Street Journal reported in 1987 that North Korean "agents" in Macau were involved in a 1982 plot to assassinate the then South Korean President while he was playing golf in Manila.
As the AFR looked over the premises yesterday, Zokwang didn't look like a hornet's nest of international espionage.
Visitors enter the Chun Siu Building, stepping over the sleeping concierge, to a rickety lift that coughs and splutters its way to the fifth floor.
There beneath equal-sized portraits of the Great and Dear Leaders, and sunny aspects of "Beautiful Pyongyang", one is met by Zokwang's "manager", Mr Lee Jong Chol, who has been in Macau for two years.
A fluent English-speaker - there are eight languages represented at Zokwang- the smiling, black-armbanded Mr Lee denies the group has anything to do with terrorism.
"These are lies put around by South Korea and you Western journalists," he said. "We are a private business, nothing to do with the Government. We have no diplomatic status."
There are estimated to be about 100 North Koreans operating in Macau, the Portuguese colony which reverts to the rule of Pyongyang's best friend, China, in 1999.
Zokwang has been in Macau since 1974, the year Portugal threw off the right-wing Salazar and opened diplomatic relations with both North and South Korea.
Mr Lee said the firm traded "anything" from North Korea to East Asia and beyond, and had "good connections" in Hon Kong. He said he was keen to rustle up some business in Australia. "You want to buy some ginseng?" he asked.
By 3pm, the condolences book for Kim had about five entries, all from mainland-related operations in Macau such as the Xinhua Newsagency and the Bank of China.
"Great Leader Kim Il-Sung was very much respected in Macau," Mr Lee said.
Zokwang staff have been in trouble recently over attempts to launder dubious United States currency in Macau. Several of their number have appeared in court and have charges pending.
The company is one of several North Korean firms, as well as a restaurant, that have traded quietly in Macau over the years.
One of the companies even had a connection with Burwill, the Hong Kong group, formerly associated with the late iron magnate Lang Hancock and his efforts to barter goods behind the old Iron Curtain.