Witness from Hell

Oslo

It was not until 2010 that I met a North Korean. I met Kang Chol-hwan at the Oslo Freedom Forum. Kang is the famed defector who wrote a memoir called “The Aquariums of Pyongyang.” Shaking his hand, I had a strange feeling: I felt I was meeting someone from outer space. I had the feeling of meeting an emissary, an escapee, from the largest, most terrible prison imaginable.