A 13-year-old US boy is on a quixotic mission to North Korea, bearing a letter to the communist nation’s leader urging the planting of a peace forest on the tense Korean border.
Jonathan Lee, whose ethnic-Korean family lives in Mississippi, left Beijing on Thursday with his parents for a week-long trip to Pyongyang, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said.
“I’m slightly nervous because this is my first trip to North Korea. However, I have high expectations,” the boy was quoted as saying by Yonhap.
The trip comes amid high cross-border tensions, which grew after South Korea and the United States accused the North in May of torpedoing one of Seoul’s warships with the loss of 46 lives.
Jonathan said on his website that he was going to Pyongyang to propose the creation of a “children’s peace forest” in which fruit and chestnut trees would be planted and where children could play.
He said his plan to plant the forest in the demilitarised zone, a buffer dividing the peninsula, would give “hope to people and children around the world”.
He expressed hope of delivering his letter in person to North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il.
Jonathan’s father, Kyoung Lee, told Yonhap that he was not sure whether his family would be allowed to meet the leader but hoped the letter could be delivered to him through North Korean officials.
“You may be wondering why a 13-year-old boy wants to go into North Korea, especially right now when there are a lot of problems,” Jonathan wrote in the letter addressed to Kim Jong-Il, which was reproduced on his website.
“Now is the right time because many wish for peace on the Korean peninsula,” he wrote.
“Many people may say that there’s no hope and there’s too much conflict for this to happen. But, I see hope on the Korean peninsula,” he wrote, calling for Kim Jong-Il’s help.
He has also sent similar letters to South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak, US President Barack Obama and China’s President Hu Jintao.
If his wish to plant a forest within the world’s last Cold War frontier is achieved, it would be a stark contrast to the surrounding area, which is heavily fortified with concrete, barbed wire, landmines and soldiers.
Jonathan, who founded a group called the International Cooperation of Environmental Youth – Helping Our Polluted Earth, said his idea was inspired by former South Korean leader Kim Dae-Jung, who died in August last year.
As President from 1998-2003, Kim Dae-Jung held a landmark summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il in 2000 that paved the way for inter-Korean reconciliation and earned him a Nobel peace prize.
Jonathan said in his letter that Kim Dae-Jung had promised to visit North Korea together with him when he met the former South Korean President in Seoul three years ago.
“But sadly he passed away last year. I’d like to carry on his dream,” he said.
North Korea, which has no diplomatic relations with the US, has approved Jonathan’s trip despite a tense stand-off between the countries over the detention of four American citizens for illegal entry.
Three have been released but Aijalon Gomes, a 30-year-old former English teacher in Seoul, is still being held in prison.
Mr Gomes was arrested in January and sentenced to eight years’ hard labour for an illegal border crossing. The North said in July that Mr Gomes had tried to commit suicide and was being treated in hospital.
Aaron Tarver, a spokesman for the US Embassy in Seoul, said he did not have any information about any “private US citizen” travelling to North Korea.
“There is no requirement that a US citizen needs to get prior approval from the US government to travel to North Korea,” he said.