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For decades, North Korea’s communist regime sent agents abroad to abduct defectors, whose fate for abandoning the insular kingdom was imprisonment without trial, beatings, torture and death.

The abductions occurred mostly in South Korea and China but a man who admits to having taken part in the program was recently caught in Canada, prompting the government to seek his deportation.

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tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or 'Beaten, tortured or even killed': Agent who abducted North Korean defectors ordered deported from Canada in secretive hearing Back to video

Ottawa’s successful effort to obtain a deportation order against the state-sponsored abductor was described in an Immigration and Refugee Board decision released to the National Post on Wednesday.

But the case is being treated with such secrecy that much of the ruling was deleted by officials, apparently including the man’s name, age, nationality, when and how he came to Canada and what he was doing here.

All that is certain is that at a hearing in Vancouver in June, a lawyer representing the Minister of Public Safety argued the man was inadmissible to Canada for crimes against humanity. He had admitted his role in the abductions to a Canada Border Services Agency officer in January.