Letters For Loved Ones In The Koreas

Seated in his living room, Lee Sun-kyo was impassive as he opened a letter he had dreamed of receiving since he was separated from his father by war 50 years ago.

But he wept as he read his father's neat script on Friday.

"I would love to meet my grandchildren whose names I have never spoken out loud," wrote Lee's father, Ri Ui Pil of North Korea. Lee, a 54-year-old South Korean construction worker, has two children.

The letter was part of a reconciliation project on the divided peninsula that saw 300 South Koreans get letters from relatives in the North and an equal number of North Koreans receive letters from the South.

Lee broke into sobs twice as he read Ri's two-page letter, but he appeared perplexed by his father's constant praise for Kim Jong Il, North Korea's leader.

"I have been living without any worry since I put myself in the bosom of great leader Kim Jong Il," 82-year-old Ri wrote. "Who else in the world would so much care about his people?"

Still, the letter was a consolation for Lee, one of millions of Koreans on both sides of the demilitarized zone who were separated from their families during the 1950-53 Korean War. The letter exchange was the first postal delivery for ordinary citizens between the two Koreas since their peninsula was divided in 1945.

"I have no memory of my father but I feel that he wrote the letter with a warm heart," said Lee, gazing at an old black-and-white, framed photograph of his father on a wall of his home in Seoul.

"His handwriting is clear and solid, indicating that he is in good health," said Lee, who was only 4 years old when he and his mother were separated from Ri in Seoul at the start of the Korean War. At that time, Ri, an actor, was away from home on a performance tour.

Ri starts his letter with a short inquiry about Lee, who later telephoned his 77-year-old mother to tell her about its contents. Ri also said he remarried in the North, has another son and lives in a rural area after retiring from a long acting career.

The rest of the letter is filled with praise for Kim Jong Il, who last year responded to South Korean efforts to engage one of the most isolated regimes in the world after decades of enmity. The two sides are involved in a fitful process of political and other contacts.

At North Korea's insistence, letter recipients are not allowed to write back. Two or three photographs were allowed to be enclosed but there was no photo in the letter to Lee, which was delivered by a postman with a bouquet from the South Korean Red Cross.

Kim Jae-bok, 75, a retired South Korean businessman, on Thursday visited the Red Cross office in Seoul to pick up the letter from Kim Jae Yul, his 61-year-old brother in the North. The envelope contained two color photos.

"They look well-fed and well-dressed," Kim Jae-bok said.

But he too was startled by his brother's praise for Kim Jong Il and his late father and national founde, Kim Il Sung, which made up most of the letter.

"We were so close that I thought he must have had much to ask about me. But only one line. After so many years in the communist society, he has changed, so much changed," Kim Jae-bok said.