ICC Note: Pastor Lim Hyeon-Soo, a Canadian-Korean who was previously held in a North Korean prison for the past 2.5 years, was released late last week and has arrived at his home in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. Today, he met his one year old granddaughter who he met for the very first time, and shared his amazing testimony.
08/13/2017 Canada (Reuters) –A 62-year-old Canadian pastor held in a North Korean prison for more than 2 1/2 years said he suspected his life sentence was commuted last week to help reduce pressure on Pyongyang.
“I believe (North Korean leader) Kim Jung Un let me go as a gesture of goodwill in the face of so much rhetoric,” Hyeon Soo Lim told a packed worship hall in a Toronto suburb on Sunday.
That was his first public appearance since his release on Wednesday, during a week when Washington and Pyongyang were exchanging escalating threats of violence amid their long-running dispute over North Korea’s nuclear program. Canadian authorities have declined to discuss the negotiations that led to Lim’s release.
Wearing a baggy charcoal-gray suit and speaking in his native tongue of Korean, Lim described a harsh life of labor in solitary confinement, where he was forced to dig holes in frozen ground for two winters.
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