SEOUL, Feb. 22 (UPI) -- A North Korea defector, now living in the south, has created a musical about a concentration camp that puts his former country in a negative light.
Jung Sung San fled in 1994, escaping the prison he was sentenced to when caught listening to South Korean radio, the Los Angeles Times reports.
A student of film, he turned more political with his art when he found out his father was killed in 2002, presumably as punishment for Jung's escape.
The musical, Yoduk Story, is about life in a North Korean concentration camp that brings thoughts to Koreans as Auschwitz does for Jews.
Jung said two theaters wouldn't allow it on their stages, and hate calls on the phone mixed with complaints from South Korea's government that the musical could harm reconciliation plans with the north.
But the musical, he said, is true life.
He interviewed dozens of former prisoners at the Yoduk camp, although the main character, a popular actress accused of being a traitor and sent to the prison who eventually kills herself, is made up.
The U.S. Committee on Human Rights said the camp housed unknown numbers of prisoners, at least 40,000 at any time.
Jung said the musical is part grieving process for his father.
