Through the issue of technology leakage to North Korea, the security vulnerabilities of Kakyō and university research institutions, and the protest campaigns that led to the closure of Shincho 45, this essay examines the structure of pressure that dominates postwar Japan’s space of public discourse.
It explores why a monthly magazine that had published such truths was driven out of existence, and sharply criticizes the essential nature of the actions of the Asahi Shimbun, opposition forces, and so-called civic groups.

2019-06-16
Was not the truth of the matter that what was driven into closure by the torrential-rain-like protest campaign of the Asahi Shimbun and opposition political operatives in sympathy with it was in fact a monthly magazine that had been publishing truths such as these?

The following is a continuation of the previous chapter.
For the North as well, his research is something they would desperately want.
According to Assistant Professor Tetsuo Sawada of Tokyo Institute of Technology, who appeared earlier, “Professor Byun is also conducting ADS experiments using extremely high-energy 14 MeV neutrons.
ADS is an abbreviation for ‘Accelerator Driven System,’ a device for efficiently causing the transmutation and elimination of ‘nuclear waste.’
Fourteen MeV neutrons are fusion neutrons, and Professor Byun is researching how these behave.
By using them, it is possible to achieve a criticality level of 3 to 5, resulting in a compact and highly advanced explosion.
This technology can also be applied to the miniaturization of nuclear weapons.”
According to a government-related source, Associate Professor Byun entered North Korea many times.
Specifically, he is said to have visited North Korea a total of seven times, in August 1992, July 1996, March 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and further in mid-October 2008.
The writer very much wanted to confront him personally about the truth of this, but even when emails were sent there was no reply, and even when a call was placed to his mobile phone, the line was cut the very moment the writer said, “Is this Professor Byun?”
So, as written at the beginning, the writer visited the staff housing of the Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute where Associate Professor Byun usually lived and asked his wife questions.
But she answered nothing, and Associate Professor Byun also did not appear.
Professor Tsutomu Nishioka laments, regarding the re-entry ban measures imposed on these five scientists, “It was something that could only have been done under the Abe administration, but a great deal of technology has already leaked out, and I must say it is too late.”
It would not be an exaggeration to say that in today’s Japan the only genuine scholar is Tsutomu Nishioka.
It would also not be an exaggeration to say that all the rest are nothing more than the Hotsumi Ozakis now existing there.
Article 25, Paragraph 1 of the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act states, in outline, that when one seeks to provide a foreign country with specific technology that could be diverted to the development of weapons of mass destruction, permission from the Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry is required regardless of that person’s nationality.
If technology is provided without obtaining that permission, it constitutes a violation of the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act.
It is a clear crime.
However, to begin with, it is extremely difficult to crack down on the outflow of such information overseas.
Ken Kato, representative of the Asia Investigation Organization, explained this to me.
“For example, even if someone were to hand over a USB memory stick at the very moment of passing a North Korean embassy official in the restroom of a park overseas, it would be virtually impossible for the Japanese government to prove that its contents were specific technology related to weapons of mass destruction.
What is therefore necessary is screening at the time of hiring, sorting and aptitude testing, so that members of organizations such as Kakyō are not allowed access to sensitive technologies from the standpoint of national security.
Those who swear loyalty to countries that threaten our nation with nuclear weapons, or who have joined related organizations, must be kept away from certain facilities.
This has absolutely nothing to do with ethnic discrimination.”
The Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute, when accepting foreign students and others, refuses students from specific countries such as North Korea, Iran, and China, and it is said that when hiring, it conducts background investigations on those of Korean nationality.
However, it seems that there is absolutely no checking at all for those of South Korean nationality.
Universities are places of free and vigorous inquiry where scholars gather without distinction of race, ethnicity, or nationality.
But among them there may be some who abuse such a tolerant atmosphere.
Please recall the slogan of Kakyō.
They say, “Science has no borders.
But scientists have a motherland.”
Research funds for national universities are all paid for by the taxes of the people.
If our taxes are being used, of all things, to develop weapons of mass destruction for a dictatorship that threatens our very survival, then it is nothing short of a nightmare.
“Because there was a slight accent in his speech characteristic of Koreans, I simply assumed, ‘Perhaps he is a Korean who came to Japan not long ago.’
There was a bit of rumor that he had been subjected to re-entry ban measures, and we had said, ‘I wonder what happened.’
But he is serious and humble, and his attitude toward research is pure through and through.
He truly has a wonderful character.
I find it very hard to believe he has ties to the North.”
A certain researcher who knew Mr. Byun through the Atomic Energy Society of Japan, to which he belongs, told me this with a clouded expression.
Associate Professor Byun surely has a duty to speak the truth in response to such voices of concern for him.
Published in Shincho 45, March 2017 issue.

*Was not the truth of the matter that Shincho 45…was driven into closure by the torrential-rain-like protest campaign of those who call themselves civic groups, together with the Asahi Shimbun and opposition political operatives who sympathized with them, over the paper by Mr. Eitaro Ogawa and Ms. Mio Sugita, precisely because it was a monthly magazine that had published truths such as these?

I am convinced that the facts made clear by the laborious work posted on the internet by a TBS employee concerning the reality of TBS, and the protest campaign against Shincho 45, are of the same root…that this was a favorite method of Chongryon.*