Old photo of Moon Jae-in manipulated to show him 'embracing North Korean leader's sister'

A doctored image of former South Korean president Moon Jae-in embracing Kim Yo Jong, the younger sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, has been shared in multiple social media posts that claimed it showed Moon had "sold out" his country. In reality, Kim Yo Jong's head was added to a Reuters news agency photo of Moon consoling the daughter of a 1980 democracy uprising victim.

"Did you enjoy embracing such a young woman?" read the Korean-language post shared here on May 15 on Naver Band, a South Korean forum.

"[Moon] sold out the country for an embrace," it continued.

During his five-year term from 2017-2022, the dovish Moon held three summits with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a policy of engagement that critics said had seen Seoul make too many concessions to its wayward neighbour.

He also had the chance to meet Kim Yo Jong during those summits, as well as earlier during the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, when she led a North Korean delegation to the South. There have been no official reports that Moon embraced Kim Yo Jong at these events.

Kim Yo Jong's existence was barely known to the wider world until her father Kim Jong Il's funeral in 2011 when she was seen on state television standing right behind Kim Jong Un, looking tearful and ashen-faced. 

The same doctored image was shared alongside a similar false claim here on Naver Band; and here and here on Facebook.

Uprising victim

A keyword search on Google found the image corresponds to a photo of Moon embracing Kim So-hyung, a woman whose father was killed in a 1980 crackdown on a democracy uprising in South Korea's Gwangju. 

The pair attended a ceremony to mark the event's 37th anniversary on May 18, 2017. 

Moon's presidential office included the photo as its entry for May in an official calendar for 2018, as seen in this post from its official account on social media platform X (archived link).

Below is a screenshot comparison between the doctored image (left) and the original calendar photo of Moon embracing a woman (right):

Moon embraced the woman after listening to her teary speech remembering her father, who was among the approximately 200 people killed during the uprising, according to official figures. 

The event -- including Moon's embrace -- was widely publicised at the time, as it was the former president's first major public event since he entered office on May 10, 2017 (archived links here and here).

Footage of the ceremony captured by broadcaster SBS can be seen here, showing Moon embracing the woman at the video's one-minute, 30-second mark (archived link).

Kim Yo Jong photo

A separate reverse image search on Google using a close-up crop of Kim Yo Jong’s face in the doctored image found it corresponds to part of a Reuters news agency photo taken during the first inter-Korean summit in 2018 (archived link).

The original photo shows Kim accompanying her brother and North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un at a meeting with Moon at the truce village of Panmunjom inside the demilitarised zone separating the two Koreas on April 27, 2018, according to the caption.

In the original photo, she wore a grey blazer, not a black one as seen in the false posts. 

Below is a screenshot comparison between the doctored image (left) and the original Reuters news agency photo of Kim Yo Jong with her brother (right): 

The same photo was published in multiple reports about the summit and Kim, including by The Guardian and the Korea Times (archived links here and here).