TOKYO — Japan asked the United States on Thursday to pardon the American husband of one of the five Japanese abducted by North Korea in 1978 and currently visiting Japan, so the couple can possibly make a permanent move to Japan, Japanese government officials said.
In a meeting at the Japanese prime minister's office, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe asked Richard Christianson, deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, that the U.S. refrain from court-martialing 62-year-old Charles Robert Jenkins, who deserted from the military in 1965.
Christianson told Abe that he will convey the request to Washington, the officials said.
Jenkins, who was stationed on the demilitarized zone separating North and South Korea at the time of his desertion, went to North Korea and 15 years later married Hitomi Soga, a Japanese woman who was abducted to the North in 1978.
In a meeting at the Japanese prime minister's office, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe asked Richard Christianson, deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, that the U.S. refrain from court-martialing 62-year-old Charles Robert Jenkins, who deserted from the military in 1965.
Christianson told Abe that he will convey the request to Washington, the officials said.
Jenkins, who was stationed on the demilitarized zone separating North and South Korea at the time of his desertion, went to North Korea and 15 years later married Hitomi Soga, a Japanese woman who was abducted to the North in 1978.