Exodus to North Korea Shadows from Japan's Cold War

Through travels that range from Geneva to Pyongyang, this remarkable book takes readers on an odyssey through one of the most extraordinary forgotten tragedies of the Cold War the return of over 90,000 people, most of them ethnic Koreans, from Japan to North Korea from 1959 onward. For most, their new home proved a place of poverty and hardship; for thousands, it was a place of persecution and death. In rediscovering their extraordinary personal stories, this book also casts new light on the politics of the Cold War, and on present-day tensions between North Korea and the rest of the world.

Tessa Morris-Suzuki is professor in the Division of Pacific and Asian History, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australia National University.