Kwon Pyong escaped China on a jet-ski last summer. He strapped five fuel barrels to his craft, and brought five water bottles and five sandwiches for the dash across the sea.
The dissident’s lone regret after his 320-kilometre escape across the Yellow Sea was not taking night vision goggles.
Court documents from his criminal case in South Korea, past interviews with his friends and family and a statement from the Incheon Coast Guard last year corroborated many of the details in his account.On a Yamaha WaveRunner purchased with the equivalent of$37,500 in cash, withdrawn from several banks to avoid tipping off the police, Kwon set off on the morning of August 16 from the foggy coast of the Shandong Peninsula.
He did not see any boats or ships on guard, he said, even as he entered a heavily militarised area that the navy monitors for activity, including defectors from North Korea. He studied aerospace engineering at the university for a few years and returned in 2012 to China, where he ran an online clothing brand and traded cryptocurrencies. He continued travelling widely, touring Lebanon and Syria as an aspiring photojournalist, he said.
He left behind his e-commerce and crypto operations, as well as his friends, family members and a girlfriend. While living in his parents’ house in Ansan, south of Seoul, Kwon went to the gym, read books about crypto trading and volunteered at an English language school for adults. He said he also befriended a group of Nigerian refugees by joining their soccer club.
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