North Korea Sanctions Enforcement Act of 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I thank Senator Gardner and Chairman Corker for their leadership and tireless efforts within the Foreign Relations Committee in dealing with the national security challenges posed by North Korea.

As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I periodically receive intelligence briefings on North Korea's military capacity and the political will of North Korea's leaders to threaten the United States and our interests abroad. Based on these briefings and the extensive intelligence in forming them, I believe we need to embrace an ``all of the above'' approach to confront North Korea's continued development of ballistic missile, nuclear, and cyber technologies. These threats have become too serious to ignore and far too complex to confront with anything short of a coordinated strategy that is prepared to employ the full force of the United States Government, including all of our diplomatic, intelligence, economic, and military resources.

As Americans, it can be easy for us to forget just how lucky we are to live in a free and open society. Most of us, myself included, simply have no idea of what it is like to live under a totalitarian regime like the one that has kept North Koreans in a state of impoverished servitude, cut off from the rest of the world for generations. But every so often the mask slips, and there is an event that gives the world a clue about what can happen when a nation-state operates and thrives behind a veil of mystery and secrecy. For me, and many of my fellow Utahans, one of these clues came nearly 12 years ago when a young man from Utah suddenly went missing in southern China.

In August 2004, David Louis Sneddon disappeared while hiking in the Yunnan Province of China. He was 24 years old at the time and a student at Brigham Young University in Provo, UT. Having spent his summer studying Mandarin in Beijing, David wrote to his family about his plans to hike the scenic Tiger Leaping Gorge along the Jinsha River in southern China. That was the last time David's family would ever hear from him. His passport and credit cards were never used again; they were never seen again. David Sneddon was never seen again.

What happened to David Sneddon? To my knowledge he is the first American since the 1970s to go missing in China without an explanation. What happened to him? How can a young man, who is skilled in a country's language and knowledgeable of their culture, simply vanish without a trace?

These questions have answers. For more than a decade, David's family members, friends, and loved ones, as well as regional experts, reporters, and embassy personnel have searched for those answers in vain. For their part, local authorities point to the Jinsha River for answers. They contend that the lack of physical evidence surrounding David's disappearance could indicate that he fell and was swept away by the river, despite the fact that his body was never found. Well, it is certainly possible for that to happen to an unsuspecting tourist hiking on unfamiliar terrain, but David was not a novice outdoorsman by any stretch of the word. He was an Eagle Scout and an avid hiker who had years of experience trekking over rugged landscapes across the American West.

In recent years investigational reporters and regional experts have suggested an alternative explanation of David's disappearance. For instance, on April 25, 2013, Melanie Kirkpatrick, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and a well-regarded expert on North Korea, wrote an excellent article in the Wall Street Journal.

The United Nations Human Rights Council last month established an international commission of inquiry into what it describes as North Korea's ``systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights.'' The commission's mandate includes examining North Korea's abductions of foreigners and the likelihood that some victims are imprisoned in the North. Pyongyang is believed to have kidnapped nationals of at least 12 countries.

One such victim may be an American citizen. David Sneddon disappeared in China in August 2004, when he was a 24-year- old student at Brigham Young University. He was vacationing in Yunnan Province after completing several months of study at Beijing International University and before returning to the U.S. for his senior year. Speaking in Tokyo last month about Mr. Sneddon's disappearance, Keiji Furuya, Japanese minister of state for the abduction issue, told me: ``It is most probable that a U.S. national has been abducted to North Korea.''

The charge that an American citizen was likely kidnapped by North Korea is noteworthy in and of itself. It is even more so coming from a cabinet-rank member of the Japanese government about a citizen of another country. The minister added: ``I would not like to speak further about it because it would be an intervention in the domestic affairs of the United States.''

Japan is in a unique position to evaluate North Korea's kidnapping operation, having investigated it for more than 30 years. North Korean agents infiltrated Japan in the 1970s and 1980s, snatched Japanese citizens and took them back to North Korea. Japanese traveling in Europe were also kidnapped. North Korea forced the abductees to teach Japanese language and customs at its spy schools so that its agents could travel the world posing as Japanese nationals.

In 2002, the late dictator Kim Jong II admitted to the visiting Japanese prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, that North Korea had kidnapped 13 Japanese citizens. Kim did so in the expectation that his confession would pave the way for the normalization of relations with Japan. The move could have had the salutary effect for North Korea of attracting Japanese investment and reducing North Korea's economic dependence on China. Instead, Kim's confession inflamed Japanese public opinion and made normalization impossible.

North Korea allowed five of the abductees to go home. It said the other eight victims had died, but the death certificates supplied by Pyongyang were found to be fake. Japan believes those eight victims--as well as others whom Kim Jong II did not acknowledge--are alive in North Korea.

In recent years, Pyongyang's kidnappers have turned their attention to China, where they have abducted South Korean humanitarian workers. The South Koreans were targeted because of their work helping North Koreans escape on an underground railroad across China to eventual sanctuary in Seoul.

This brings us back to David Sneddon. In addition to speaking Chinese, Mr. Sneddon is fluent in Korean, having spent two years in South Korea as a Mormon missionary. This unusual linguistic ability may have thrown suspicion on him. The Sneddon family believes that David was kidnapped by North Korean agents who mistakenly thought he was helping North Korean defectors. Yunnan Province, which borders Laos, Burma and Vietnam, is along the underground railroad's usual route out of China. North Korean security agents are known to operate there, apparently with Beijing's permission.

At the time of David's disappearance in August 2004, China told the Sneddon family that its investigation had concluded that the young man likely had a fatal mishap while hiking through Tiger Leap Gorge. That theory was disproved by facts uncovered by David's father and two of his brothers three weeks after he went missing. The three Sneddons retraced the young man's steps in Yunnan and found witnesses who reported seeing him during and after his hike through the gorge.

The Sneddons have had their share of frustrations in dealing with the U.S. State Department. A senior diplomat wrote the family last year that ``Under the Privacy Act, we are not permitted to release any information about David's case unless we have his written consent to do so.'' The diplomat noted a health-or-safety exception but only if the family ``has convincing information as to where the U.S. citizen is located or what his/her condition may be.''

``We're living a Catch-22,'' says David's brother, Michael Sneddon. ``If our family had `convincing information' as to David's whereabouts, David would no longer be missing. It's absurd.'' The Washington-based Committee for Human Rights in North Korea plans to file a Freedom of Information Act request for information on actions the State Department has taken on the Sneddon case, says executive director Greg Scarlatoiu.

The Sneddons refute speculation that David may have disappeared voluntarily. He had purchased a plane ticket home, put a down payment on his student housing for the fall semester, and made arrangements to take the LSAT exam for entry to law school. His Beijing roommate, who traveled with him until a few days before his disappearance, says David was planning to go home.

Last year, a Tokyo-based research organization published a report citing new evidence that North Korea kidnapped Mr. Sneddon. A source in China told the National Association for the Rescue of Japanese Abducted by North Korea that in August 2004--the date of his disappearance--Yunnan provincial police arrested an American university student who was helping North Korean refugees. A second Chinese source told the Japanese researchers that the Yunnan police handed over the American to North Korean security agents. In both cases, personal details about the unnamed student correspond with facts known about David Sneddon. Seven Japanese parliamentarians traveled to Washington last May to present this evidence to the State Department and Congress.

For one former Japanese intelligence official, the Sneddon disappearance is a case of deja vu. The official, who asked not to be identified by name, compares it to the abduction cases he tracked in the 1970s and 1980s. ``The evidence is always fragmented and isolated,'' he says. Until Kim Jong II confessed to kidnapping 13 Japanese citizens, he notes, some in the Japanese government refused to acknowledge the abductions for fear of alienating Pyongyang. The former intelligence official has looked at the Sneddon evidence and believes there is a strong possibility that North Korea kidnapped the American.

The U.N. commission of inquiry will spend one year gathering and evaluating information on North Korea's abductions. Let's hope it discovers what happened to all those who disappeared--including the American David Sneddon.

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Mr. LEE. Mr. President, Kirkpatrick's research shows that David's disappearance in China fits the pattern of foreign national kidnappings by North Korea in East Asia since the 1970s. While this might sound strange to Americans--because it is indeed strange to us as Americans-- it is an issue with which the people of Japan and South Korea are tragically all too familiar.

The circumstances of David's disappearance add a level of credibility to this theory. For instance, the area where David was traveling is a well-known thoroughfare on an underground railroad for North Korean dissidents trying to escape to Southeast Asia. As a result, this area is monitored and patrolled by North Korean Government agents who were involved in the capture of a high-level North Korean defector and his family in the area only months before August 2004.

David was fluent in Korean, thanks to having spent 2 years serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in South Korea. He matched the profile of activists in this area who were thought to be assisting North Korean escapees.

In a coincidental twist of fate, David disappeared only a month after Charles Robert Jenkins, an Army deserter, was released by the North Korean Government after having spent nearly 40 years imprisoned in the totalitarian state, forced to teach English to North Korean intelligence agents. An American who spoke fluent Korean would be an attractive replacement for Charles Jenkins.

Three weeks after his disappearance, David's father and two of his four brothers traveled to China and retraced David's planned steps through the Tiger Leaping Gorge. The results of their factfinding mission, including their conversations with local residents, businesses, tour guides, and travelers have been shared with the State Department and detailed in an excellent piece by Chris Vogel published in Outside Magazine in 2014.

One of the most compelling pieces of evidence discovered by David's father and brothers is that several people, including a trail guide who had been hiking the Tiger Leaping Gorge around the time of his disappearance, remember interacting with a young man fitting David Sneddon's description. David's family also met with the owner of a small Korean restaurant in the city of Shangri-La, a bustling tourist outpost with a convenient access to the Tiger Leaping Gorge. When she saw a photograph of David, the young restaurant owner lit up. She immediately remembered David, and for good reason. Not only did David stand out because of his fluency in Korean, but he reportedly visited the restaurant on three separate occasions over the course of 2 days while he was in that city.

Indeed, according to the Outside Magazine article, the last time anyone saw David, which was on August 14, 2004, he was reportedly leaving a Korean restaurant. At first glance, this may seem like a minor detail, but seen in the right light, it is, in fact, an ominous clue.

According to many regional experts, there is a historical pattern of North Korean agents using Korean-run restaurants in China, Japan, and elsewhere to prey on their targets for kidnapping and abduction. Despite these reports, there have been no further or more fruitful leads regarding David's whereabouts. People move away or change their stories. Embassy and State Department staff move to different assignments, and the trail grows cold.

For nearly 12 years, along with his family, we have been looking for David. There are many people who deserve credit for the contributions they made to this effort. In particular, I wish to thank Ambassador Robert King, the special envoy for North Korean human rights issues and a longtime personal friend of mine, as well as his office, for the attention they have given to David's case and the good-faith efforts they have made over the years to try to find answers. I commend Ambassador King for his work on this complex, sensitive, and very important issue.

There is still work yet to be done. An upstanding American citizen is still missing, and an aggrieved family--indeed, an entire community-- continues to wait and pray for a resolution, which is what brings us here today.

The first and most important responsibility of the United States Government is to ensure the safety and freedom of the American people at home and abroad. When American citizens travel overseas, the State Department plays a critical role in fulfilling this core constitutional duty.

The amendment I am filing today--which I plan to submit as a stand- alone resolution with Senators Hatch, Fischer, and Sasse--gives the sense of the Senate that the State Department, in conjunction with the intelligence community, should continue to fulfill that obligation to David Sneddon and his family. A companion bill will be introduced in the House of Representatives by my friend Congressman Chris Stewart and the rest of the Utah delegation.

The State Department's responsibilities in this matter include investigating all plausible explanations behind David's disappearance and leaving no stone unturned in trying to return one of our brothers to his family.

At the time of his disappearance, David had his whole life ahead of him. In fact, he was already planning for it. Before setting out to hike the Tiger Leaping Gorge on that fateful day in August of 2004, David had signed up to take the law school admissions test--the first step toward applying to law school, he had arranged business meetings back home in Utah to get an early start on pursuing his dreams of entrepreneurship, and, eager to get back to BYU's beautiful campus, he had already paid for his student housing for the upcoming fall semester, but he never had the chance to do any of those things, and the Sneddon family deserves to know why.

The greatest threat to totalitarian regimes in any part of the world is the truth; that the world may learn of the horrors they perpetrate every day against their own people and that their people may learn that there is a world full of freedom and opportunity beyond the ironclad borders of their enslaved homeland.

It is in pursuit of the truth--about David Sneddon's whereabouts-- that I file this amendment today.

Thank you, Mr. President.

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