WORLD : Seoul Pardons Woman Who Put Time Bomb on Jetliner in ’87

President Roh Tae Woo granted a special pardon today to a North Korean woman condemned to death for placing a time bomb on a Korean Air jetliner that disappeared over Southeast Asia late in 1987 with 115 people aboard.

Information Minister Choe Byung Yul said Kim Hyon Hui, 28, a former child actress who was a confessed agent for communist North Korea, will not be hanged despite a March 27 Supreme Court ruling upholding her death sentence.

Officials said she will soon be released on the ground that she was a pawn and a victim of the Communist regime.

Choe said that Kim, having committed a terrorist attack on a civil aircraft causing a heavy loss of lives, deserved harsh punishment but that the government decided to let her live as a witness to North Korean atrocities. The Justice Ministry recommended a presidential pardon for the woman on the ground that she confessed. Choe said Kim, through intensive brainwashing in a closed society, was reduced to a human tool for North Korean President Kim Il Sung and his son, Kim Jong Il, who ordered the bombing.