the pong su pongs

The North Korean heroin smuggling ship, the Pong Su is in the news again this week with the acquittal of its captain and three crew members after a seven-month trial.

It is in the news again today because both Federal Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, and Australian Federal Police Chief, Mick Keelty, have bought in to the argument that the North Korean Government has allegedly been heavily involved in heroin smuggling.

There is certainly something about the Pong Su that pongs.

The drug boat’s captain Man Sun Song was acquitted and so were three crew members. But those acquittals raise more question than they answered.

The jury wasn’t told that the captain had a direct line to North Korean officials. The jury wasn’t told that four other men off the Pong Su  had pleaded guilty to heroin smuggling charges.

The jury was not told about North Korea’s reputation for allegedly making millions of dollars through heroin smuggling operations on ships like the Pong Su – which was owned by the Government and supposedly leased to a Malaysian company.

The ship had a member of the Communist Party on board. And the crew were all North Koreans. According to the captain he came here to pick up a shipment of cars. A shipment that he later claimed was cancelled.

The Pong Su came here empty. Well, almost empty. On his regular tours of his ship Captain Man Sun Song obviously didn’t see the inflatable dinghy in the hold that the smugglers used to take the drugs ashore in heavy seas. Through carelessness by the two-man crew the dinghy motor sized. It capsized. One of the men drowned and a packet of 25 kilograms of heroin was lost.

If the captain was “I know nothing” innocent what was his ship doing, moored in the blackened, turbulent waters – dangerously close to the rocky shore – near Lorne? Why did he stay there so long?  His lame excuse was that they were doing engine maintenance. What was he doing there in the first place? Why did he then take off without several members of his crew?  His claim was that “they must have got off”. And if he was innocent and had nothing to hide why did he try to outrun – first the AFP – and then the Australian Navy warship, HMAS Stuart on a dash up the East Coast?

And why was he told by his masters that, after two days of flight, he and the crew  should stop and “fight to the death”? Doesn’t sound like a run-of-the mill voyage to pick up cars to me.

Tuesday, March 7, 2006

©Copyright Derryn Hinch 2006