KOFU, Japan: It has been more than 30 years since the identical twin sister of Japanese teacher Misa Morimoto vanished, believed to have been abducted by North Korea.
Hopes for her return have often surged and ebbed since, tracing the ups and downs of ties between Tokyo and Pyongyang.
Now, Morimoto, 54, is cautiously optimistic that a planned summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore on June 12 could bring news of the sister who resembled her so much that few could tell them apart.
In 2002, North Korea admitted it had kidnapped 13 Japanese in the 1970s and 1980s to train them as spies. Five returned to Japan, though Tokyo suspects hundreds more may have been taken.
In 2014, Pyongyang promised new information about the Japanese it had kidnapped, but never made good on the pledge, shattering many relatives’ hopes.
“Four years ago, we all expected everybody would soon come home, and we ended up despairing,” Morimoto told Reuters at the home where she grew up with her sister Miho in the central Japanese city of Kofu.
“So this time, rather than hoping a lot, we’ll just watch to see what happens.”
Miho, who had ambitions of going to university, disappeared on June 4, 1984 after setting out for a library. Her motorbike was found at a nearby train station the next day and her handbag discovered on an isolated beach, 360 km (220 miles) away, near where two abductees were seized.
Morimoto has met other families who believed their loved ones might be in North Korea. She has been struck by the similar aspects of their accounts, such as the remote beach, and silent telephone calls to family homes cut off shortly after being answered. On some, Miho’s family had heard muffled sobs.
The agenda for the Trump-Kim summit is not known, although the US president has said he hopes to start negotiating an end to North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.
But Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has urged Trump to keep the abductee issue, a key plank of the premier’s political program, central to the talks. Trump has met the families of abductees several times and brought up the issue in speeches.
US pressure could make a difference, Morimoto said, citing three US citizens held in North Korea who were freed in May.
“To be honest, when Trump became president, I was worried what might happen. But he is a very clear, straightforward person, so his message is probably very easy for North Korea to understand.”
For years, Morimoto has awaited word of her sister. A special education teacher with three grown children, she has just became a grandmother.
“The stress can be very bad,” she said. “But if I give up, if I lose hope, everything will be over. I have to hold on to hope no matter what happens.”
Japanese woman hopes Trump-Kim summit will bring news of missing twin
Japanese woman hopes Trump-Kim summit will bring news of missing twin
- In 2014, Pyongyang promised new information about the Japanese it had kidnapped, but never made good on the pledge
- US pressure could make a difference, Morimoto said, citing three US citizens held in North Korea who were freed in May
Agonizing wait as Switzerland works to identify New Year’s fire victims
- Authorities begin moving bodies from burned-out bar in luxury ski resor Crans-Montana
- At least 40 people were killed in one of Switzerland's worst tragedies
CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland: Families endured an agonizing wait for news of their loved ones Friday as Swiss investigators rushed to identify victims of a ski resort fire at a New Year’s celebration that killed at least 40 people.
Authorities began moving bodies from the burned-out bar in the luxury ski resort town Crans-Montana late Friday morning, with the first silver-colored hearse rolling into the funeral center in nearby Sion shortly after 11:00 am (1000 GMT), AFP journalists saw.
Around 115 people were also injured in the fire, many of them critical condition.
As the scope of the tragedy — one of Switzerland’s worst — began to sink in, Crans-Montana appeared enveloped in a stunned silence.
“The atmosphere is heavy,” Dejan Bajic, a 56-year-old tourist from Geneva who has been coming to the resort since 1974, told AFP.
“It’s like a small village; everyone knows someone who knows someone who’s been affected,” he said.
It is not yet clear what set off the blaze at Le Constellation, a bar popular with young tourists, at around 1:30 am (0030 GMT) Thursday.
Bystanders described scenes of panic and chaos as people tried to break the windows to escape and others, covered in burns, poured into the street.
‘Screaming in pain’
Edmond Cocquyt, a Belgian tourist, told AFP he had seen “bodies lying here, ... covered with a white sheet,” and “young people, totally burned, who were still alive... Screaming in pain.”
The exact death toll was still being established.
And it could rise, with canton president Mathias Reynard telling the regional newspaper Wallizer Bote that at least 80 of the 115 injured were in critical condition.
Swiss authorities warned it could take days to identify everyone who perished, an agonizing wait for family and friends.
Condolences poured in from around the world, including from Pope Leo XIV, who offered “compassion and solidarity” to victims’ families.
Online, desperate appeals abound to find the missing.
“We’ve tried to reach our friends. We took loads of photos and posted them on Instagram, Facebook, all possible social networks to try to find them,” said Eleonore, 17. “But there’s nothing. No response.”
‘The apocalypse’
The exact number of people who were at the bar when it went up in flames remains unclear.
Le Constellation had a capacity of 300 people, plus another 40 people on its terrace, according to the Crans-Montana website.
Swiss President Guy Parmelin, who took office on Thursday, called the fire “a calamity of unprecedented, terrifying proportions” and announced that flags would be flown at half-mast for five days.
“We thought it was just a small fire — but when we got there, it was war,” Mathys, from the neighboring village of Chermignon-d’en-Bas, told AFP. “That’s the only word I can use to describe it: the apocalypse.”
Authorities have declined to speculate on what caused the tragedy, saying only that it was not an attack.
Several witness accounts, broadcast by various media, pointed to sparklers mounted on champagne bottles and held aloft by restaurant staff as part of a regular “show” for patrons.
‘Dramatic’
Pictures and videos shared on social media also showed sparklers on champagne bottles held into the air, as an orange glow began spreading across the ceiling.
One video showed the flames advancing quickly as revellers initially continued to dance.
One young man playfully attempted to extinguish the flames with a large white cloth, but the scene became panic-stricken as people scrambled and screamed in the dark against a backdrop of smoke and flames.
The canton’s chief prosecutor, Beatrice Pilloud, said investigators would examine whether the bar met safety standards.
Red and white caution tape, flowers and candles adorned the street outside, while police shielded the site with white screens.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who said 13 Italians had been injured in the fire, and six remained missing, was among those to lay flowers at the site.
The French foreign ministry said nine French citizens figured among the injured, and eight others remained unaccounted for.
After emergency units at local hospitals filled, many of the injured were transported across Switzerland and beyond.
Patients are being treated in Italy, France and Germany, and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said his country was ready to provide “specialized medical care to 14 injured.”
Multiple sources told AFP the bar owners were French nationals: a couple originally from Corsica who, according to a relative, are safe, but have been unreachable since the tragedy.
