Re:ENGLISH LANGUAGE SOURCES ON 5.18 300~347

[80518]

Document 300

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
June 7, 1988, Tuesday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 1, Column 2; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1357 words
HEADLINE: In South Korea, Anger at U.S. Spreads
BYLINE: By SUSAN CHIRA, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, June 6
BODY:

Ever since American troops died defending this nation in the Korean War, Americans have basked in the gratitude of the Korean people. But now the image of a benevolent America is being called into question as a new wave of anti-Americanism moves off campus and into the mainstream.

Students have long denounced the United States as a repressive force in Korean politics, accusing Washington of pressing a Cold War ideology that divided Korea into two nations and supporting Korean dictators. But even for the majority of Koreans who reject such virulent anti-Americanism, the new openness of political debate is prompting a more detached, more critical view of the United States.

Increasing anger about United States pressures on South Korea to open its markets and pay for more its defense is dovetailing with a growing national pride. As South Korea emerges as an economic power and looks toward the Olympic Games here, a new self-confidence feeds an old xenophobia nursed over centuries of foreign interference.

New Freedom of Expression‎

‘‘Questions about the role of America have been in Korean minds for a long time, but they haven’t been discussed openly,’’ said Lee Chul, an opposition politician. ‘‘Americans say they are losing economic power, but we see they are rich, much richer than us. American pressure makes Korean farmers and workers mad. American realpolitik has led it to deal with immoral and illegitimate regimes.’’

Students, who have long called for the withdrawal of American troops as a prelude to reunifying the two Koreas, are freer to express these ideas more openly in the new political climate.

While few Koreans support the students’ call for troop withdrawal, President Roh Tae Woo has said he wants South Korea’s defenses to be self-sufficient by the 1990’s. And many Koreans are starting to chafe at the pervasive American cultural and political influence here.

Signs of this new attitude abound. Revisionist historical theories that blame the United States for dividing Korea are openly discussed in universities. A Korean businessman who numbers American diplomats among his friends rails against American immorality for pushing American cigarettes on the Korean people. The opposition leader, Kim Dae Jung, though critical of student violence - like a recent attack on the United States Embassy - has said that he can understand student anger and has called on the United States to prove its commitment to democracy by supporting changes here and distancing itself from the Government.

To some Koreans, the protector is becoming a bully that compromised its political ideals by supporting the authoritarian rule of former Presidents Syngman Rhee, Park Chung Hee, and Chun Doo Hwan.

A Visible U.S. Presence

‘‘In the past, I vaguely thought of America with good will, but not any more,’’ said Y. N. Chung, a 32-year-old carpenter. ‘‘It doesn’t mean I don’t like America. Now I can see what is good and what is bad.’’

Even as Seoul prepares to host the Olympics, a showcase for nationalism, Koreans encounter constant reminders of American influence. Of all the foreign embassies, only that of the United States flies its flag on Seoul’s main boulevard next door to Korean Government ministries and near the statue of Admiral Yi, the hero who saved Korea from Japanese invasion in the 1500’s.

A major American military base, Yongsan, occupies prime real estate in the heart of Seoul, its rolling green lawns and split-level homes a miniature of suburban America. American television beams into Korean homes through the broadcasts of the Armed Forces Korea Network.

Some Koreans resent what they see as American cultural arrogance. ‘‘Americans probably see Korea as inferior, and it hurts our pride,’’ said C. H. Kim, a 27-year-old army captain. ‘‘All the shops in the area around the bases use English. Why do they have to use English and not Korean?’’

‘Simple Resentments’

Choi Chang Yoon, a senior ruling party lawmaker and former high-ranking Government official, traces two strains of anti-American sentiment here. One, he said, is the product of ‘‘simple resentments’’ of American influence and trade pressures and a corresponding surge of Korean nationalism.

‘‘That kind of anti-American sentiment is possible in any bilateral relationship between a superpower and a country under its influence,’’ he said. ‘‘We don’t worry so much about that category, because it’s natural, as anti-Americanism is in Canada or Germany.’’

But he is more concerned about the students’ ideological anti-Americanism, which he said was influenced by North Korean propaganda, and how it may be influencing the public.

‘‘Nowadays, anti-Americanism as an ideology is beginning to spread to people who have simple resentments,’’ Mr. Choi said. ‘‘It’s becoming very complicated.’’

The student protests are highly visible, and they have become increasingly violent in the past few weeks. Today, a student who set himself on fire Saturday to protest the American and Government roles in the Kwangju killings died. It was the third student political suicide in a month. In the Kwangju incident, in May 1980, Government troops crushed an uprising in the southwestern city, killing hundreds.

It is impossible to estimate what percentage of South Koreans hold anti-American views, although it is clear that people who criticize the United States range from the average man in the street to some powerful opposition politicians. While Government policy remains resolutely pro-American, South Korea’s new commitment to democracy means officials must heed popular sentiment - and opposition politicians, who now hold a majority in the legislature, are taking a harder line.

Contempt and Dependence

Part of the problem, Americans here say, is that Koreans still seek to rally American support for their causes while trying to push Americans away.

While Korean students denounced American intervention, they asked the United States for support when they took to the streets last June and forced the Government to adopt democratic changes. While Kim Dae Jung criticized the United States for being too close to Mr. Chun, he was willing to accept American intervention when Mr. Chun’s Government condemned him to death for sedition.

Koreans display a similar ambivalence about their own history, looking back with anger - and a touch of shame - at a series of foreign invasions over many centuries by Mongols, Chinese and Japanese, among others. Some Americans argue that Koreans tend to overemphasize their own helplessness in the face of foreign power and underplay their share of responsibility for the tragedies of the past.

‘‘Yes, anti-Americanism is spreading, because its fits the psychological flow of the period, which is resentment over the junior status of the Republic of Korea in the relationship with America,’’ said a Westerner who has long studied Korean politics and who has lived in this country for almost 30 years.

‘‘One of their problems,’’ he said, ‘‘is the agony of being under the influence of a strong outside power to which officials have kowtowed to one degree or another. The other aspect is a generation who don’t know the Korean War and embrace whatever is useful in sustaining the damage to their ego as they look at their history. There is a temptation to see foreigners as being responsible. That way, they don’t perceive their own folk as being all that bad.’’

American officials are bracing for more criticism as the legislature prepares to investigate the Kwangju incident. The crushing of the protests helped consolidate former President Chun Doo Hwan’s grip on power, but many Koreans, citing the close American relationship to the Korean military, blame the United States for either masterminding the harsh military response or acquiescing to it.

‘‘We are going to come in for a beating in the short term,’’ said an American diplomat. ‘‘In the long term it will come out O.K., and I hope we’ll be viewed in a more objective light. There is total agreement in our Government that for a really healthy relationship, there’s got to be more equilibrium.’’

GRAPHIC: photo of Korean farmers protesting at U.S. Embassy in Seoul (AP)

Document 301

Copyright 1988 The Christian Science Publishing Society The Christian Science Monitor
June 3, 1988, Friday

SECTION: Editorial; Pg. 15
LENGTH: 526 words
HEADLINE: Protests and progress in Korea
BODY:

IN the past few months, South Koreans have taken brave strides toward democracy, popularly electing a president and breaking a one-party hold on their National Assembly. But that has not stopped the country’s student activists from taking to the streets, burning American flags, and throwing homemade bombs at the United States Embassy.

Why the continued protests?

The reasons are rooted in the country’s recent past, a past that will have to be faced and purged if South Korea is to continue its journey toward more open government.

To begin with, student radicals view President Roh Tae Woo, a former general and partner in a 1980 coup, as another in a two-decade-long string of military rulers including Park Chung Hee and Chun Doo Hwan. Mr. Roh, however, has done a lot to expunge that image. He helped to begin direct presidential elections - a move impelled by widespread street protests last summer. As candidate for the dominant Democratic Justice Party, he ran on a platform of increased democracy and squeezed into office with a 36 percent plurality last December.

Roh now faces a task difficult for any elected leader - governing in partnership with a legislature dominated by the opposition. It’s an exercise in compromise which he says he welcomes.

The radicals, however, want more than words. Recent protests were in large part commemorative of a violent incident in May of 1980, when Chun Doo Hwan used troops to put down mass demonstrations in the city of Kwangju. About 200 people were killed. The students and opposition leaders want a full investigation of that incident. So far, the Roh government has only ventured to acknowledge that regrettable mistakes were made in Kwangju.

Similarly, the administration has released some of the country’s hundreds of political prisoners; the opposition wants them all released.

The anti-American tone of the protests springs from the depths of recent Korean history. Radicals charge the US with shoring up past oppressive regimes. To some Koreans, the continued presence of 40,000 US soldiers on their soil smacks of colonialism, as does formal control of many of South Korea’s own forces by American commanders. That arrangement, dating back to the UN Command in the Korean war, gave rise to allegations of US implication in the Kwangju incident.

None of these complaints should pose a roadblock to the country’s move toward democracy. Protests will probably continue, but it should be remembered that militants represent only a tiny fraction of South Korea’s 1.3 million university students. In the past, their protests have built toward society-shaking change only when other Koreans - more-moderate students and members of the country’s growing middle class - joined in.

For now, most Koreans sense a gradual, but real change in their country’s political workings. And they expect to see a recognition of national maturity likely to come with a well-run Olympics this summer. It appears that Roh - a man well positioned to pursue political change while holding an ever-watchful military in check - still has some room to steer the country along its new, and hopeful, road.

Document 302

Copyright 1988 The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London)
June 2, 1988, Thursday

SECTION: SECTION I; Overseas News; Pg. 6
LENGTH: 785 words
HEADLINE: US In South Korea, Defender Of The Faith Or Divider Of A Nation
BYLINE: Maggie Ford, Seoul

HIGHLIGHT: Maggie Ford in Seoul reports on growing resentment of the pervasive presence of the US military
BODY:

In the centre of Seoul, a crowded city of 10 m people with a shortage of parks and a growing traffic problem, it is possible nevertheless for a select few people to play golf.

Almost all of these privileged players are American, for the course is part of a large US military base.

The base has occupied its prime riverside site since the end of the Second World War.

Next to the headquarters of the South Korean military, the US base is a highly visible symbol of a style of relationship between the two countries which some South Koreans feel is quickly becoming out of date.

Others, especially students, take a more radical view, believing that the relationship is a deterrent both to the longed-for reunification of the peninsula and to the speedy introduction of democracy in the South.

The latter group stepped up its attacks on the US presence last month on the anniversary of the 1980 killings in Kwangju, a provincial city where at least 200 died when the military put down protests at the regime of ex-President Chun Doo Hwan.

Students have marched on two cultural centres and the US embassy in Seoul with home made fire bombs, shouting “Yankee, go home.”

If the 43,000 troops were to leave, the US Defence Department would lose far more than Yongsan base.

US troops, aircraft and weaponary, both conventional and nuclear, have a dual role: to help defned the country from the Communist North and, perhaps more importnantly, to play their part in Pacific defence against the Soviet presence in Moscow’s own far eastern territories a few thousand miles north of the peninsula.

With the US bases in the Philippines attracting strong criticism, Pentagon officials are expected to resist strongly any efforts to reduce their role in South Korea.

However, the growing anti-Americanism could spur a change in the operational control of the forces, not least because it is arguably in Washington’s best interests to do so.

Anti-US sentiment has grown fairly recently in South Korea as the younger generation has focused attention less on the Korean war in the 1950s and more on the period following liberation from the Japanese colonisers in 1945.

Young South Koreans blame both the Soviet Union and the US for the division of the nation and are suspicious of the motives and activities of the US occupation forces which have controlled South Korea until 1948.

Little objective analysis of the period is available to students who have mainly been exposed to ideological propagnada which they increasingly refuse to believe.

Unlike the older generation they are also less likely to accept the Government’s view about activities and motives in North Korea.

Allied to the belief that the US bears blame for the division is the feeling that Washington has supported dictatorial leaders - particularly the widely disliked former President Chun - against the public wish to introduce democracy.

Many students believe that the US military knew about and acquiesced in General Chun’s 1979 military coup and his later decision to send troops to Kwangju.

The South Korean Government is expected shortly to come under strong pressure to reveal the facts about the Kwangju incident at the new National Assembly where the Opposition has a majority.

US officials say that they have no control over certain individual South Korean army units under the combined forces agreement and could not have prevented either the coup or the Kwangju killings.

Mr William Gleysteen, the US ambassador to Seoul in 1980 said last year that the US had agreed that a division of troops should be sent to Kwangju after 10 days in order to end the matter.

These troops were responsible for a relatively small number of deaths.

Anti-American attitudes have also been stirred recently in the wider community by heavy-handed US tactics in trade negotiations.

South Korean producers are outraged that US cigarettes are to be sold cheaply in Asia at the same time as US tobacco farmers find the home market shrinking due to health concerns.

Indebted livestock farmers have demonstrated against imports of US beef.

Observers believe that the US decision to pursue beef imports when the matter is highly sensitive and the small Dollars 20 m market was formerly supplied by Australia reflects a failure in Washington to work out detailed policy in the best interests of the US. Both the US and South Korean Governments are now soft pedalling trade issues in the hope that public anger will die down.

But until Seoul accedes to demands for more democratisation, preferably allied to progress in dialogue with Pyongyang, Washington is still likely to receive at least part of the blame for student dissatisfaction.

GRAPHIC: Picture A US serviceman controlling Korean civilians at the “Peace Bridge” on the Imjin river ceasefire line between North and South Korea. The Peace Bridge leads to the heavily fortified demilitarised zone (DMZ) and the trip is popular among South Korean tourists.; Map, no caption

Document 303

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 27, 1988, Friday, FINAL EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A17
LENGTH: 507 words
HEADLINE: South Korea cracks down after 10 days of protests
BYLINE: (Reuter-AP)
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

SEOUL (Reuter-AP) - A huge force of riot police put down attempts by South Korean youths to stage rallies in the capital today after President Roh Tae Woo ordered steps against violence in the run-up to the Olympics.

His order came during a meeting of top law-enforcement officials, the first he has called on national security since taking office in February.

“It is imperative that all possible measures be taken to forestall acts of violence by domestic radical groups to guarantee the safety of the Olympics and their successful staging,” Roh said. The Games open in
September.

Riot police fired volleys of tear gas and a special martial arts unit charged the students today in the harshest response to a demonstration in 10 days of of anti-government protests.

The police squads moved in quickly when radical students and dissidents attempted to march on the city hall. Police dispersed the protesters with tear gas and chased them through the streets.

Radical students hurled a few firebombs and rocks at police but most ran when police charged.

Punched, kicked

Police seized and dragged away dozens of protesters. Some of the protesters were repeatedly punched and kicked.

“Avenge the Kwangju massacre!” and “Down with the military dictatorship!” students screamed. They also shouted, “Drive out the Yankees!”

The march was the latest to mark the anniversary of the 1980 civil uprising in Kwangju, during which about 200 people were killed. Students accuse Roh of complicity in the government’s suppression of the 1980 protest.

About 7,000 riot police with shields, truncheons and tear gas rifles were deployed in the centre of Seoul. Squads of riot police stood guard on street corners as columns of police swept through the street.

The demonstrations also have been anti-American, with protesters charging that the United States supports military rule in South Korea and that it forces the partition of the Korean peninsula.

Meanwhile, a radical student who set himself on fire on the May 18 Kwangju massacre anniversary has died from severe burns, a student committee announced today.

Burial Monday

Choi Duk Soo, 20, will be be buried Monday in a “Democratic People’s Funeral” at a still undetermined site.

Classmates said Choi died Thursday at a Seoul hospital and that the body was being kept in a student council building on the main Dankook campus in Seoul.

On May 15, another student stabbed himself and leaped from a building in a ritual suicide demanding the release of political prisoners and reunification of the Korean peninsula.

The death triggered a series of violent anti-government demonstrations.

Describing the coming months as “the most dangerous” since the Korean War in the early 1950s, Roh warned today that terrorist groups may stage attacks well before the Games open Sept. 17.

The president expressed concern that North Korea would try to sabotage the Olympics, but said attention should also be paid to “left-leaning domestic radicals” bent on violence.

GRAPHIC: Reuter photo South Korean riot police

Document 304

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 24, 1988, Tuesday, FINAL EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A17
LENGTH: 246 words
HEADLINE: Students bomb U.S. building in Korean riots
BYLINE: (AP)
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

SEOUL (AP) - South Korean students hurling firebombs and rocks attacked a U.S. diplomatic office yesterday as thousands of demonstrators battled riot police for a sixth consecutive day in Kwangju.

Groups of students also attacked four police stations in Kwangju, smashing windows and doors before being driven off. Clashes between police and about 1,000 protesters also broke out in downtown Kwangju after dark, the Korean news agency Yonhap said.

The attack on the U.S. Information Service did not damage the building, said police, who fired tear gas to thwart the raid.

At least four policemen were reported injured and two protesters were arrested.

The attack followed demonstrations at Kwangju’s Chonnam University, where police fired tear gas to stop about 3,000 students and dissidents trying to march off campus.

Demonstrators called for a full investigation into the South Korean army’s bloody suppression of a 1980 uprising in Kwangju in which at least 200 people were killed.

Thousands of demonstrators have clashed with police in Kwangju since rallies began Wednesday marking the eighth anniversary of the uprising.

Anti-U.S. sentiment has been running high in the recent wave of protests, with students demanding the removal of all U.S. influence.

The U.S. government has denied any involvement in the Kwangju incident, but dissidents contend the United States condoned the movement of South Korean soldiers to suppress the protests.

Document 305

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 23, 1988, Monday, HOME DELIVERY TWO

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A11
LENGTH: 325 words
HEADLINE: South Korea police clash with students
BYLINE: (REUTER)
DATELINE: KWANGJU, South Korea
BODY:

KWANGJU (Reuter) - South Korean riot police firing teargas clashed with thousands of youths in the southwestern city Korean city of Kwangju yesterday.

In rallies against the government and the United States, demonstrators chanted and hurled rocks and gasoline bombs.

They confronted police wearing gas masks and plastic helmets in the broad streets of the city, scene of a bloody civilian uprising eight years ago.

Scores of protesters were arrested but there were no immediate reports of injuries.

Halted traffic

The rallies were called to demand a full-scale inquiry into the army’s crushing of the 1980 revolt. Official figures say about 200 people were killed in the bloodshed, but dissidents claim the death toll was at least 1,000.

The clashes, which lasted about four hours yesterday, halted traffic in much of the city. Clouds of teargas hung over the city center and streets were littered with rocks, broken bottles and spent teargas canisters.

The youths yelled “Execute (President) Roh Tae Woo” and shouted slogans linking the United States with the crushing of the Kwangju uprising.

Earlier, many of the demonstrators were part of a 7,000-strong crowd of students who paid tribute at a cemetery where about 100 victims of the uprising are buried.

The 1980 rebellion was directed against martial law imposed by then-president Chun Doo Hwan, who had seized power through a military coup in 1979. Roh was an army leader when the rebellion was crushed.

Denies role

Radicals denounce Washington for backing a succession of military-backed South Korean governments and for what they say was U.S. involvement in the army’s crushing of the revolt. The United States, which has operational command over South Korean troops, has denied any role in the events.

Roh in April apologized for the suppression of the uprising, which he called part of democratization efforts by students and citizens of Kwangju.

Document 306

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
May 21, 1988, Saturday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 1; Page 3, Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 490 words
HEADLINE: Seoul Students Attack U.S. Embassy
BYLINE: AP
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, May 20
BODY:

Students scaled the walls of the United States Embassy and tossed homemade bombs at its buildings today in protests commemorating a demonstration eight years ago that was crushed by the military.

Witnesses said a policeman and a demonstrator were wounded in the attack today, which began shortly before noon. Seven attackers were arrested.

Embassy officials said that the bombs did not damage the buildings and that no Americans were hurt.

The demonstration, and others this week, recalled an anti-Government uprising in Kwangju on May 18, 1980, during which hundreds of protesters were killed by soldiers. Friday’s protests and others earlier this week were called to commemorate the bloodshed in that southern city. #2 People Are Wounded In the demonstrations this week, protesters have denounced the United States, saying it supports military dictatorship in South Korea.

Witnesses said that in the demonstration today, students, some of them armed with steel bars, hurled six homemade bombs at policemen and over the embassy walls.

Four of the devices, made from explosives packed in soft drink cans, exploded, sending about 100 people who had been waiting for visa applications running for cover, witnesses said.

A police officer was hospitalized with blast wounds on his neck and hands, they said. A student was wounded when a policeman hit him with an iron bar.

In Washington, the State Department spokesman, Charles E. Redman, said the attack on the embassy lasted about five minutes and that five policemen and one student were injured.

‘‘There is no excuse for this kind of behavior,’’ Mr. Redman said. ‘‘There is a political system now in Korea that provides for the expression‎ of political views and participation in the political process.’’

Five students climbed over the six-foot-high fence of the embassy compound and ran around the grounds for several minutes, scattering leaflets.

One student draped a South Korean flag over his shoulder while other students tried to destroy two American flags before being overpowered by the police, the witnesses said.

The students also tried to unfurl a placard that read, ‘‘Drive out America, culprit of the Kwangju massacre,’’ the witnesses said.
March Called for Today

Student groups called for another march in Seoul on Saturday to denounce the Government. Opposition church groups also called for peaceful protests.

In other parts of Seoul and two provincial cities, hundreds of students staged demonstrations to demand an end to the Government of President Roh Tae Woo and the withdrawal of 41,000 American troops stationed here.

Many Koreans consider the Roh Government a continuation of what they term the ‘‘military dictatorship’’ led by President Chun Doo Hwan.

Many of the protests were peaceful but some turned into battles with riot police, who retaliated with tear gas. In Kwangju, 400 students clashed with the police, hurling firebombs and rocks.

GRAPHIC: Photo of policemen, some in plain clothes, arresting a student outside United States Embassy in Seoul, South Korea (Reuters)

Document 307

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 21, 1988, Saturday, SATURDAY FIRST EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A3
LENGTH: 481 words
HEADLINE: Seoul students bomb U.S. embassy
BYLINE: (AP)
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

SEOUL (AP) - Radical students scaled the walls of the U.S. embassy, tossed homemade bombs at its buildings and shouted “Yankee go home!” yesterday in protests marking a bloody demonstration eight years ago.

Witnesses said two people were injured in the attack, which broke out shortly before noon. Seven attackers were arrested.

Embassy officials said the bombs didn’t damage the buildings and no Americans were hurt.

Witnesses said students, some of them armed with steel bars, hurled six homemade bombs at police and over the embassy walls.

Four of the devices, made from crude chemical explosives packed in soft drink cans, exploded with big bangs, sending about 100 people inside running for cover, witnesses said.

Scattered leaflets

A police officer was taken to hospital with blast wounds, they said. A student was also injured when he was hit by a policeman armed with an iron bar.

Five students climbed the 1.8-metre (6-foot) fence and ran around the embassy compound for several minutes, scattering leaflets.

They tried to destroy two U.S. flags before being overpowered by police, the witnesses said.

The students also tried to unfurl a placard that read, “Drive out America, culprit of the Kwangju massacre,” they said.

The placard referred to an anti-government uprising in Kwangju on May 18, 1980, during which hundreds were killed. Yesterday’s protests and others earlier this week were called to commemorate the bloodshed in that southern city.

Protesters have denounced the United States in demonstrations this week, charging that Washington supports military dictatorship in South Korea.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Charles Redman said the embassy incident lasted only about five minutes amd that five policemen and one student were injured.

“There’s no excuse for this kind of behavior,” he said. “There is a political system now in Korea that provides for the expression‎ of political views and participation in the political process.”

National police remained on full alert as militant groups called for another march in Seoul today to denounce the government. Opposition church groups also called for peaceful protests.

Tear gas

In other parts of Seoul and two provincial cities yesterday, hundreds of students staged demonstrations and marches, demanding the fall of the government of President Roh Tae Woo and the withdrawal of 41,000 U.S. troops stationed here under a mutual defence treaty.

Many of the protests were peaceful, but some turned into battles with riot police who retaliated with tear gas. In Kwangju, 400 students clashed with police, hurling firebombs and rocks.

Eight students were arrested in Suwon, 40 kilometres (25 miles) south of Seoul, when they stormed an office of the governing Democratic Justice Party with firebombs and sticks. Riot police overpowered the attackers.

Document 308

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 21, 1988, Saturday, SATURDAY SECOND EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A3
LENGTH: 428 words
HEADLINE: Seoul students bomb U.S. embassy
BYLINE: (AP)
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

SEOUL (AP) - Radical students scaled the walls of the U.S. embassy, tossed homemade bombs at its buildings and shouted “Yankee go home!” yesterday in protests marking a bloody demonstration eight years ago.

Witnesses said two people were injured in the attack, which broke out shortly before noon. Seven attackers were arrested.

Embassy officials said the bombs didn’t damage the buildings and no Americans were hurt.

Witnesses said students, some of them armed with steel bars, hurled six homemade bombs at police and over the embassy walls.

Four of the devices, made from crude chemical explosives packed in soft drink cans, exploded with big bangs, sending about 100 people inside running for cover, witnesses said.

Scattered leaflets

A police officer was taken to hospital with blast wounds, they said. A student was also injured when he was hit by a policeman armed with an iron bar.

Five students climbed the 1.8-metre (6-foot) fence and ran around the embassy compound for several minutes, scattering leaflets.

They tried to destroy two U.S. flags before being overpowered by police, the witnesses said.

The students also tried to unfurl a placard that read, “Drive out America, culprit of the Kwangju massacre,” they said.

The placard referred to an anti-government uprising in Kwangju on May 18, 1980, during which hundreds were killed. Yesterday’s protests and others earlier this week were called to commemorate the bloodshed in that southern city.

Protesters have denounced the United States in demonstrations this week, charging that Washington supports military dictatorship in South Korea.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Charles Redman said the embassy incident lasted only about five minutes amd that five policemen and one student were injured.

No excuse

“There’s no excuse for this kind of behavior,” he said. “There is a political system now in Korea that provides for the expression‎ of political views and participation in the political process.”

National police remained on full alert as militant groups called for another march in Seoul today to denounce the government. Opposition church groups also called for peaceful protests.

In other parts of Seoul and two provincial cities yesterday, hundreds of students staged demonstrations and marches, demanding the fall of the government of President Roh Tae Woo and the withdrawal of 41,000 U.S. troops stationed here under a mutual defence treaty.

Many of the protests were peaceful, but some turned into battles with riot police.

Document 309

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
May 20, 1988, Friday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 1; Column 4; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 661 words
HEADLINE: SEOUL STUDENTS RIOT, ATTACK U.S. EMBASSY, ANNEX
BYLINE: By KARL SCHOENBERGER, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

Thousands of student demonstrators clashed Thursday with riot policemen in central Seoul, hurling firebombs and rocks and attacking a U.S. Embassy annex in one of the most violent protests in South Korea in several months.

As the demonstrations continued today, radical students scaled the walls of the main U.S. Embassy compound to throw at least three small bombs. Police said the bombs exploded but did not cause any injuries or damage. Five students who climbed the wall were arrested, state radio said, and two others were arrested later when they rushed through the compound’s gates.

Thursday’s fighting broke out after the police allowed about 25,000 people to join a funeral procession for a Seoul National University student who committed suicide Sunday after shouting anti-U.S. slogans and calling for the release of all political prisoners.

The protest march took on a passionate anti-American tone after the demonstrators massed in the plaza in front of City Hall, burned an American flag and attempted to deface the building that houses the Cultural Center of the U.S. Information Agency.

U.S. Denounces Attack

In Washington, a U.S. official denounced the attack on the Cultural Center. State Department spokesman Charles Redman said: “We see no excuse for it. The violence which a small minority in Korea persists in using serves no positive purpose.”

Redman said the students should recognize that political reforms are being introduced in their country and that it is possible to peacefully seek change within the system.

Many of the students boarded buses in Seoul that were to take them, along with the body of Cho Sung Man, to the city of Kwangju, 170 miles south of Seoul, for burial in the cemetery where victims of the
May, 1980, Kwangju uprising are buried.

The Yonhap News Agency reported that about 40,000 people participated Thursday in rallies and demonstrations around the country to commemorate the Kwangju uprising.

In Seoul, thousands attempted to march in formation through Seoul’s shopping district. Police moved in with armored vehicles, firing volleys of tear gas and sending demonstrators and passers-by scrambling.

Police Positions Attacked

Roving bands of demonstrators attacked police positions with rocks and firebombs for several hours before order was restored. One firebomb set a garden at the Lotte Hotel on fire, but no major damage was reported during the engagement.

The student, Cho, 24, leaped from the top of a building in the Myongdong Catholic Cathedral compound Sunday after stabbing himself in the abdomen in a ritual suicide.

He denounced the United States, saying the presence of 43,000 U.S. troops in South Korea prevents the reunification of North and South Korea and props up the government of President Roh Tae Woo and, before him, that of the authoritarian Chun Doo Hwan.

Cho also demanded the immediate release of all prisoners of conscience. The opposition parties say there are about 1,000 of these, though the government counts only 342.

Hailed as a Martyr

Students hailed Cho as a “martyr for democracy and for national reunification” in Thursday’s “People’s Democratic Funeral.”

They called for Roh to step down and for an end to the “military dictatorship” with which he is closely associated as a former army general and Chun’s confidant, and for American troops to withdraw from the peninsula.

Violent demonstrations have disrupted downtown Seoul since Tuesday, when students began observing the eighth anniversary of the Kwangju incident, in which special forces brutally suppressed demonstrations in the southwestern provincial capital after Chun declared martial law and had dissident leader Kim Dae Jung arrested. The government says 193 protesters were killed in the fighting then, but according to local residents, the toll was more than 1,000.

Victims and their relatives are now demanding that Roh’s role in the Kwangju incident be investigated.

GRAPHIC: Photo, Student demonstrators flee a cloud of tear gas in Seoul. Reuters

Document 310

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 20, 1988, Friday, ME1

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A3
LENGTH: 510 words
HEADLINE: Angry Korean mobs mourn student
BYLINE: (Reuter-AP)
DATELINE: KWANGJU, South Korea
BODY:

KWNAGJU (Reuter-AP) - Tens of thousands of South Koreans took over the main square of Kwangju last night to mourn a student radical who killed himself Sunday in protest against the United States and Seoul government policies.

In Seoul earlier, rioters hurling rocks and firebombs fought police, attacked a U.S. cultural centre and burned an American flag in front of City Hall.

It was the third day of the worst street protests in South Korea since last summer, when demonstrations forced the government to agree to elections and democratic reforms.

A crowd of several thousand in the southwestern city of Kwangju, scene of a bloody civilian uprising eight years ago, chanted “Execute (President) Roh Tae Woo” and sang anti-American songs as Cho Song Man’s coffin was carried among them.

About 1,500 riot police had been drafted to patrol the demonstration but by nightfall about half had left and and no violent clashes were expected.

Thousands of mourners went to the “martyrs cemetery” on the outskirts of Kwangju for the burial of Cho, who stabbed himself in the stomach before leaping to his death from the roof of an annex to Seoul’s Roman Catholic cathedral.

Before he jumped, Cho, 24, scattered leaflets criticizing Washington for backing what he called Roh’s dictatorial government, and for sanctioning South Korean troops’ crushing of the uprising. Washington has always denied any role in the tragedy.

More than 100 people killed during the 1980 Kwangju uprising were buried at the cemetery. Official accounts put the death toll at about 200 but dissidents say it was about five times that number.

About 2,000 students, hurling stones and gasoline bombs, clashed with riot police at the city’s Chonnam University during anti-government protests marking the anniversary of the nine-day revolt which started
May 18, 1980.

More than 30,000 people jammed the main square for a rally calling for an inquiry into the army’s crushing of the revolt. It dispersed without incident.

Cho’s body arrived during the day from Seoul, where thousands of students and dissidents took part in a funeral march through city streets.

Among those taking part in the Seoul ceremonies were opposition leaders Kim Dae Kung and Kim Young Sam, who have called for a full probe into the Kwangju incident.

Protesters burned an American flag as speakers denounced the government following a march by about 25,000 people to City Hall. When the crowd did not disperse, police fired tear gas from armored vans and about 5,000 riot police attacked.

Skirmishes between police and protesters broke out around luxury hotels. Tourists looked on in astonishment or ran for cover.

Almost 3,000 mourners surged towards the U.S. Information Service building. Hundreds of riot police used teargas to scatter the protesters.

Students, chanting “drive out Americans hampering Korean reunification,” pulled down the nameplate and hurled gasoline bombs but the building suffered only slight damage. Police said about a dozen students were arrested.

GRAPHIC: 2 Reuter photos student demonstration; students fleeing tear gas

Document 311

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
May 19, 1988, Thursday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 14; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 803 words
HEADLINE: CROWD OF 50,000 IN KWANGJU ‘UNTHINKABLE’ IN PAST; S. KOREAN RALLY ILLUSTRATES NEW TOLERANCE OF DISSENT
BYLINE: By KARL SCHOENBERGER, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: KWANGJU, South Korea
BODY:

Eight years after citizens of this provincial capital took up arms against brutal repression by South Korean government troops, suffering hundreds or even thousands of casualties in the process, the name Kwangju has suddenly taken on new meaning.

A recent government policy of limited tolerance for dissent has changed public perception of this city in the southwestern Cholla region from a citadel of rebellion to an important center in South Korea’s quest for democracy.

The scene here Wednesday -- when about 50,000 people, including busloads of students from Seoul, marked the anniversary of the bloody “Kwangju incident” -- would have been unthinkable in previous years. People were given the right to assemble, and to peacefully express their anger.

“We didn’t have the courage, or the freedom, to do what we wanted to do last year,” said Choi Ok Ki, a 32-year-old businessman who watched a massive rally from a rooftop.

Police stayed out of sight as tens of thousands of people visited Mangwoldong Cemetery, where many victims of the 1980 fighting are buried. In previous years only several hundred people had been able to visit the graves, hiking over the hills because the roads were blocked. And they were always far outnumbered by riot police.

Authorities once forcibly removed relatives of the dead, loading them on buses and taking them out of the city, to dampen protests. But this year officials provided special bus service to the cemetery and put up signs showing the way.

Indeed, although mothers in traditional white mourning robes wailed over the graves of their sons, the cemetery took on a festive atmosphere as vendors sold soda and dried squid along the roadside.

Despite the unprecedented numbers of demonstrators, there was a conspicuous lack of violence.

In contrast, a student protest in downtown Seoul on Wednesday erupted into violence, with police shelling demonstrators with tear gas and demonstrators responding with firebombs and rocks.

The government says 193 citizens were killed in the nine days of disturbances here in 1980, which started when troops suppressed nonviolent demonstrations over the declaration of martial law by former President Chun Doo Hwan, who was then an army general, and the arrest of dissident leader Kim Dae Jung, whose political base is here. Demonstrators took up arms and drove the troops out of the city but were later crushed in an army tank assault.

Eyewitnesses say they saw the army carry away loads of bodies in trucks and helicopters, and estimates of the death toll go as high as 1,000 to 2,000. The scope of the carnage has never been substantiated, dissident leaders say, because relatives of the missing have been afraid of being persecuted for their association with the “rebels.”

“We urged people to report before, but because of the rigid social atmosphere and the military’s control of the government, no one was willing to come forward,” said Chun Ke Ryang, head of an association of bereaved families. “But the atmosphere has become much more relaxed.”

The change at Kwangju comes after widespread rioting in Seoul and other cities last June forced the government to pledge democratic reforms. An official panel reviewing the Kwangju incident tried to restore the city’s honor earlier this year by announcing that the demonstrators were not rebels, but rather patriots seeking democracy. President Roh Tae Woo issued an apology and called for the healing of old wounds, but the opposition dismissed the committee’s findings as a whitewash.

A thorough investigation into the 1980 events is the top issue before the new Assembly, which is expected to open before June.

Meanwhile, many activists here are demanding that discovery of the truth be followed by swift punishment for those responsible.

“I personally don’t seek revenge,” said Hong Nam Soon, 74, a Kwangju attorney who is seeking new trials for people convicted of crimes in connection with the incident. “I don’t believe the point of the investigation should be retaliation, but many people in Kwangju feel otherwise. Somehow, those responsible must be punished.”

Criticism of Roh, the former general who was elected president last December after being handpicked by Chun Doo Hwan as his successor, centers on the fact that he was commander of the garrison in Seoul. In that capacity he is suspected of supporting Chun’s coup and may have had some connection with troop movements during the Kwangju incident.

South Koreans are also demanding a probe into the role of the U.S. military amid widening anti-American sentiment. The American commander of allied forces in South Korea technically is in charge of South Korean troops, and critics speculate that he must have condoned and supported the suppression in Kwangju. The U.S. military denies this.

GRAPHIC: Map, SOUTH KOREA, / Los Angeles Times

Document 312

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
May 19, 1988, Thursday, Late Final Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 2; Column 6; Late Final Desk
LENGTH: 334 words
HEADLINE: SEOUL STUDENTS, POLICE CLASH AT FUNERAL MARCH
BYLINE: By UPI
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

Funeral observances for a dissident student turned violent today as thousands of students burned an American flag, threw gasoline bombs at a U.S. Embassy building and mounted hit-and-run firebomb assaults on riot police in downtown streets.

The domestic Yonhap News Agency, meanwhile, said about 40,000 people participated in rallies and demonstrations around the country to commemorate a bloody 1980 civil uprising in Kwangju, 170 miles south of Seoul.

In Seoul, police said at least 22 protesters were detained for questioning during today’s demonstration.

The students, mourning the suicide of a 25-year-old university student, chanted “down with the dictatorship” and “oust the Americans” in a march through the capital that had a strong anti-U.S. tone. Several Westerners were jostled by the students.

About 8,000 students burned an American flag and attempted to deface the outside of an American Embassy annex housing the U.S. Information Service before police moved in with three mobile tear-gas launching vehicles.

‘Democratic Funeral’

The “People’s Democratic Funeral” was held for Cho Sung Man, a Seoul National University student who hurled himself from the top of a Catholic church building in Seoul last Sunday after calling for the release of all political prisoners.

The procession began in a downtown park early today and was to proceed through the city to Seoul National University and on to the city of Kwangju, 170 miles south of Seoul, where his body was to be buried next to the victims of a 1980 anti-government revolt.

In Kwangju, about 2,000 students at Chonnam University held a rally today to demand a new investigation into the 1980 revolt. They clashed with police when they tried to march to another rally sponsored by dissidents to commemorate the Kwangju incident, witnesses said.

Police fired tear gas to disperse crowds gathered near Kwangju’s main central square, but witnesses said despite that, more than 5,000 people participated in the rally.

GRAPHIC: Photo, South Korean youth hurls firebomb at riot police in Kwangju today during protest arising from suicide of dissident student and demanding new look into bloody 1980 uprising in city. Associated Press

Document 313

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
May 17, 1988, Tuesday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 9; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 506 words
HEADLINE: S. KOREA STUDENT’S SUICIDE CALLED RESULT OF POLICE MISTREATMENT
BYLINE: By KARL SCHOENBERGER, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

A university student jumped to his death from a hospital window after claiming that he had been committed as a mental patient because of his political activities, an opposition party said Monday.

The Party for Peace and Democracy disclosed the incident, which occured Friday, as student demonstrations erupted over another suicide by a student who leaped from a rooftop Sunday after demanding the release of all political prisoners.

The suicides occurred only days before opposition forces are to mark the anniversary of the May, 1980, Kwangju incident, in which government troops killed at least 193 protesters. The suicides could put new fire into anti-government demonstrations, which lately have lacked the focus and rage of the widespread protests that forced democratic reforms last year.

Political Science Major

Officials at St. Mary’s Hospital in the Kangnam section of Seoul confirmed Monday night that Koh Jung Hee, a 27-year-old political science major at Yonsei University, jumped to his death Friday from the window of his ninth-floor room. They refused to discuss the incident in detail.

Officials of the Party for Peace and Democracy said the police committed Koh in February, against his will, after arresting him and diagnosing him as mentally ill. Koh had written foreign embassies and made phone calls to the presidential palace protesting fraud in the December presidential election, the party said.

Koh was a volunteer in the presidential campaign of Kim Dae Jung, the Party for Peace and Democracy’s candidate, who came in third behind President Roh Tae Woo and another opposition candidate.

Three days before his death, Koh reportedly told his mother and sister that he would commit suicide unless he were released. The family is now calling for an investigation, the party said.

Meanwhile, students skirmished with police at two Seoul campuses Monday, and opposition parties renewed their call for the release of political prisoners in response to the suicide Sunday of Cho Sung Man, a 25-year-old chemistry student at Seoul National University.

Cho stabbed himself in the abdomen and leaped from the roof of a four-story building in the Myongdong Cathedral compound in central Seoul. According to fellow protesters, he shouted “Immediately release all prisoners of conscience!” before jumping and left behind a suicide note demanding that North Korea be co-host for the Olympic Games in September.

In the past, some South Korean dissidents have resorted to suicide in the hope of shaming the government into action, and there were indications that Cho’s death might have an effect on the Roh administration.

Yoon Giel Joon, chairman of the ruling Democratic Justice Party, reportedly urged the government to grant the opposition demands.

Human rights advocates estimate that 300 to 400 prisoners of conscience remain behind bars, even after an amnesty in February. The government has said the number is much smaller and that only those convicted of serious crimes are still in prison.

Document 314

Copyright 1988 The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London)
May 13, 1988, Friday

SECTION: SECTION I; European News; Pg. 3
LENGTH: 270 words
HEADLINE: Kim Young Sam In Political Comeback
BYLINE: Maggie Ford, Seoul
BODY:

Mr Kim Young Sam was yesterday re-elected president of South Korea’s opposition Reunification Democratic Party three months after he stepped down in response to pressure for an opposition merger.

Mr Kim’s RDP became the second largest opposition party in the National Assembly election last month in which the ruling party lost its majority. He was eclipsed for first place by Mr Kim Dae Jung’s Party for Peace and Democracy.

Mr Kim said that he planned to pursue reform through the assembly, where new powers will allow the investigation of controversial matters. Mr Kim Dae Jung said yesterday that he planned to try to form a committee to look into the Kwangju incident when the assembly opens.

At least 200 people were killed in a rebellion in provincial Kwangju in May 1980. Mr Kim said that three main issues needed to be investigated - the motives of the military in the incident and its cause, the identity of the officers who ordered the killing and the role of the US, which was technically in control of South Korean army units at the time.

The issue is perhaps the most sensitive one confronting President Roh Tae Woo, whose predecessor ex-President Chun Doo Hwan, took power in a military coup with his help six months before the rebellion.

Meanwhile, hints are emerging that the Government is considering releasing more of the hundreds of political prisoners still detained, after criticism last week from Cardinal Kim Su Hwan, leader of South Korean Catholic Church.

Some leading members of the ruling party appear to favour the release, while others are apparently resisting any change.

GRAPHIC: Picture Kim Young Sam

Document 315

Copyright 1988 The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London)
May 9, 1988, Monday

SECTION: SURVEY; Pg. I
LENGTH: 1496 words
HEADLINE: South Korea; A Whirlwind Of Change
BYLINE: Maggie Ford

HIGHLIGHT: The country’s rapidly increasing prosperity is being matched by demands for a political system comparable to those of other industrial nations. A bumpy transition from authoritarian rule to democracy is likely to affect many issues, as Maggie Ford reports
BODY:

Few people a year ago would have imagined that a whirlwind of change was about to sweep through South Korea, a country known mainly for its role in the Cold War, its tendency to authoritarian rule and, more recently, its startling economic growth.

For more than 40 years the bottom half of the divided peninsula has seemed a satellite of the United States, armed to the teeth and run by a succession of rulers who denied political rights to the people in the name of economic development and national security.

In 1986 their efforts led to the country’s first ever substantial current account surplus after years of hard slog by workers and management alike.

Six months later the people loudly demanded the right to have a political system that goes along with prosperity in developed countries. The result is a South Korea that can probably never be the same again.

But that is not to say that it is yet a fully-functioning democracy. For at least the next few years the country will endure what most think will be a rather bumpy transition, likely to affect the whole range of issues from regional security, relations with communist North Korea, links with the US, China, Japan and the Soviet Union, as well as the way the political and economic system is to be run.

Internally, the change will have to be substantial to meet people’s wishes, for numerous problems relating to authoritarianism must be solved and vested interests are unlikely to give up their power voluntarily. Although there is little concern now about a military coup, the power of the intelligence agencies, the police, and some parts of the bureaucracy has not yet been touched.

A good start has already been made in the labour sphere, however, after an outburst of suppressed rage let to nationwide strikes and several violent incidents last year.

This year’s wage round, which is still under way, has featured weeks of peaceful negotiations at many companies accompanied by some strikes, but on a much smaller scale. Both workers and management appear to be quickly learning bargaining skills, helped in many cases by young professional managers who themselves disapprove of the repressive methods used against workers in the past.

The fact that last year’s nation-wide month-long strikes resulted in a loss of only Dollars 250 m from South Korea’s current account surplus of nearly Dollars 10 bn suggests that workers are just as committed to the improvement of the economy as managers. The hide-bound confrontaional tactics once typical of Europe are unlikely to develop in the future.

Politically, the startling result of the National Assembly elections last month, in which the ruling Democratic Justice Party lost its majority for the first time in the country’s post-war history, suggests that a change in attitude towards the parliament may take place.

This election, unlike the presidential poll last year won by Mr Roh Tae Wood of the DJP, was not subject to allegations of fraud. But the National Assembly has never previously been allowed by the Government to function as anything other than a rubber stamp and it is too early to say whether or not it will exercise any power.

All three Opposition parties, led by the three Kims so long a feature of South Korean politics, have promised to cooperate with the ruling party as long as it proceeds sincerely with democratisation measures.

The Assembly was given strong new powers under the new constitution negotiated last year after Mr Roh’s concessions to the public demonstrations and theoretically will be able to investigate such sensitive topics as corruption by the previous regime, election fraud and the Kwangju incident, an uprising in 1980 in which at least 200 people were killed by the military.

While Mr Kim Dae Jung, the chief opposition leader, will want to pursue these matters, he has said that in the interests of stability, some or all of them may be deferred until after the Olympic Games in
September.

The appointment of Mr Park Jun Byung, who commanded the Kwangju troops in 1980 as secreary general of the DJP suggests that the Governemnt is determined to deflect an issue which could affect many senior members of the present Administration, including the President.

Mr Roh, who promised to hold some kind of vote of confidence in his presidency after the Olympics, may also face difficulties over the issue of election fraud last December.

But public opinion over the movement to democracy has now evolved into a strong national consensus which may be temporarily checked, but not diverted, by dramatic events. The ruling party may be able to delay the change, but will probably be forced to make concessions in the end.

The same is true of the economy. South Korea recorded a growth rate of 12 per cent last year for the second year running and this year’s result is expected to reach double figures. Its current account surplus jumped from Dollars 4.8 bn in 1986 to Dollars 9.7 bn last year, and all indicators suggest that a repeat performance can be expected this year.

The country’s foreign debt has been reduced from Dollars 46 bn in 1985, the fourth largest in the developing world, to Dollars 35 bn and creditor status is expected within about two years. Accompanying this success South Korea has faced mounting protectionist pressures, especially from the US, to which it has responded with a liberalisation of trade restrictions, and an appreciation of the won currency.

The US has intensified pressure in this election year, a policy which is likely to continue, amid loud complaints that Seoul is doing too little, too late. European officials and businessmen have joined the chorus that the South Koreans are not giving them equal treatment with the Americans.

Seoul officials and companies are scrambling to deal with the management problems of having a surplus rather than a deficit economy, focussing particularly on the danger posed by inflation, which was heading for a year on year rate of about 8 per cent compared with the rates of 3 to 4 per cent experienced over the past few years.

Their main efforts were directed at controlling the inflow of funds, which resulted in a large increase in outward foreign investment, and the first signs that overseas portfolio investment might be allowed soon.

Draconian travel restrictions have been eased, resulting in a surge of Koreans booking overseas holidays.

The bright economic prospects have prompted growing demands for the introduction of free market forces into what has been a highly centralised economy. Arguing that controls in the financial sector are stunting companies abilities to compete internationally, the free marketeers are likely to continue their campaign for liberalisation with the movement offshore of manufacturing, either to cope in advance with protectionism in the US or Europe to avoid the problem of higher labour costs at home.

Perhaps the most interesting area of potential change for South Korea over the next year lies in the possibility of new regional realities emerging. Almost all nations are now signed up for the Seoul Olympics, including the Soviet Union and China, the first time all have competed for more than a decade, and hints are emerging that new relationships may be forged

Relationships on the peninsula have been frozen since 1953 at the end of the Korean War, with no contact between North and South, no confidence-building measures and 40,000 US troops present with the dual role of defending the south and playing a part in regional security. North Korea has relationships with both China and the Soviet Union, and the situation has remained stable.

But analysts believe that a number of changed realities could augur a new conception by the superpowers of the best way to maintain stability in Korea. One argument suggests that although unification of the peninsula is very unlikely in the near future, something approximating more to the German situation might be desirable.

Others point out that North Korea is also in a state of transition, as Kim II Sung hands over power to his son Kim Jong II, and that an opening up would be in its own political and economic interests. The strong emotional desire on both sides of the demilitarised zone for unification is widely understood.

Some Western diplomats believe that concern over the rise in tension between the two Koreas leading to an accidental conflict in the region is causing a reappraisal of the past. The pragmatic approach of Mr Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader, and signs of greater warmth between Beijing and Moscow could also contribute to change.

On almost all fronts, South Koreans are expecting progress in the near future, and years of experience tell them that it will not be without surprises, some of them perhaps unpleasant. But as the Olympic Games draws closer, optimism prevails that last year’s events were a watershed, and that the only way to go is forward.

GRAPHIC: Picture Kim Dae Jung, Chief Opposition leader, addresses a PPD mass rally on Touido Island; Map, no caption

Document 316

Copyright 1988 The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London)
May 9, 1988, Monday

SECTION: SURVEY; Pg. II
LENGTH: 1049 words
HEADLINE: South Korea 2; Time For The Roller Coaster To Come Down To Earth
BYLINE: Maggie Ford

HIGHLIGHT: In spite of the consensus in favour of political change, so far President Roh has altered little apart from his style
BODY:

For the past year Seoul’s Opposition politicians could be forgiven for thinking that they were travelling on a particularly bizarre Disneyland roller coaster, veering between Fantasyland and the House of Horror.

Though they have not been sure where they - or indeed the country - were going, the sensation nevertheless has been exhilarating, requiring strong nerves and a stout constitution. Contrary to all expectations, all three leaders have survived so far.

Take the experience of Mr Kim Dae Jung. A year ago he was confined to his house under arrest, surrounded by riot police. Newspapers were forbidden to publish his picture or report his views, many of his supporters were in jail and he was regarded by most South Koreans as a dangerous radical.

By September Mr Kim’s life was changing drastically. After the June demonstrations against the government of ex-President Chun Doo Hwan, his successor Mr Roh Tae Woo promised presidential elections and Mr Kim was a candidate.

By December he was drawing crowds in the millions in Seoul and the provinces, with not a riot policeman in sight. Even the sceptics dared hope that the election could be won by the Opposition. But when Mr Roh triumphed, it was Mr Kim who took most of the blame for dividing the Opposition and allowing the ruling party candidate to win with only 36 per cent of the vote.

By last month, many had written his epitaph as an old guard veteran whose time had passed. Few would have believed that he could emerge from last month’s National Assembly elections as leader of the largest Opposition party in a legislature where the Government has lost its majority.

Mr Kim is now portrayed in the controlled press as a moderate and is potentially a power in the land.

Or, take Mr Kim Jong Pil, who did not even have a political party this time last year. This Mr Kim, Prime Minister in the Government before President Chun Doo Hwan’s 1980 military coup, had apparently been sulking ever since the coup, his assets confiscated by the latter regime and his power removed..

He too seized the opportunity offered by Mr Roh’s election pledge, ran predictably fourth in the presidential poll and then expanded his support in the National Assembly elections.

Mr Kim can look forward to a potential pivotal role in a minority assembly.

Mr Kim Young Sam, the third Opposition leader, has had an equally tumultuous year. Though never treated as harshly as Mr Kim Dae Jung, he has had his share of persecution over the years.

Favourite until the last minute in the presidential election, he suffered a humiliating result and was eventually forced to step down as leader of his party in response to a shower of criticism over the failure of the Opposition to unify.

Voted into third place in the National Assembly election, Mr Kim has probably suffered most in the past year, and seen the least compensatory success. Of all three Opposition leaders, he has the most rebuilding to do.

The pace of change also seems to have produced a bumpy ride for the ruling Democratic Justice Party, especially some of its founding members. No sooner had President Chun Doo Hwan accomplished his dream last February of handing over power peacefully for the first time in South Korea’s history than a campaign against corruption was unleashed against his family.

His brother is in jail awaiting trial on charges of nepotism, bribery and misappropriation of funds, his wife and father-in-law are under suspicion and, to make matters worse, all the allegations appear to be emerging from the camp of Mr Roh, his chosen successor and colleague from his Army days.

Many of his appointees have either been dropped or voted out in the National Assembly elections and there are even rumours of military and Cabinet reshuffles to reduce further any residual power he may have established.

The future looks even gloomier, for removing the legacy of Mr Chun’s regime is a top priority of an Opposition looking for genuine democratic stability.

The new National Assembly has investigative powers which are likely to focus on corruption and on the facts of the Kwangju incident - in which at least 200 people were killed in the south western city of Kwangju when demonstrations against imposition of martial law by the new Chun government were forcibly put down by the military.

The truth of the matter, and those responsible have never been revealed.

For the moderates in the ruling party, however, political life is looking noticeably more interesting than it was a year ago. Many younger politicians will now join the National Assembly and the level of debate is expected to rise.

Intra-party democracy in the DJP, previously non-existent, is likely to become the norm under President Roh’s new style.

But observers remain cautious, pointing out that President Roh has so far altered nothing apart from his style and has not surrendered any of the power that the Government has always held.

He has delayed the issuing of licences for new newspapers which might go some way to fulfil the demand for a free press; he has released only a very few polticical prisoners; he has dealt only halfheartedly with key matters such as the Kwangju incident, and he has failed to convince people of his sincerity over the corruption inquiries.

All the elements of the former regime including the security police, the judiciary and the local government structure remain entrenched.

Against that, Mr Roh must be aware of the breadth and depth of the national consensus in South Korea in favour of change. It was he who responded to the public anger in June with the offer of elections and the consensus has now spread across all sectors and classes, from businessmen and workers to students and farmers.

All the opposition parties have said that they will cooperate with the ruling party if it shows signs of sincere progress towards democratisation. As Mr Kim Jong Pil put it: “Korea was formerly run by the logic of power. The people have moved on to the next phase and the politicians must follow.”

While those on the roller coaster were not prepared to predict any less bumpy a ride this year, optimism prevails that the route might now move on, from the realm of the funfair to the serious business of the real world.

GRAPHIC: Picture, no caption; Picture Political demonstrators face helmet-clad police, has the “logic of power” now moved on?; Map, no caption; Map, no caption

Document 317

Copyright 1988 The Financial Times Limited Financial Times (London)
May 9, 1988, Monday

SECTION: SECTION I; UK News; Pg. 4
LENGTH: 531 words
HEADLINE: Moderation Gains Ground In S Korean Politics
BYLINE: Maggie Ford, Seoul
BODY:

A wave of moderation appears to be rolling over South Korea in the wake of parliamentary elections last month in which the ruling party lost its majority. Such a change could affect internal politics and external relations.

Mr Kim Dae Jung, re-elected leader of the main opposition Party for Peace and Democracy, stressed reform and stability in his acceptance speech at the weekend, while the US signalled hopes that a new era of co-operative, rather than fractious, negotiations with its ally could be on the way.

Outlining his programme for the National Assembley, Mr Kim said he would concentrate on three areas - progress towards democracy, economic improvement and ending the legacy of the former regime of President Chun Doo Hwan.

His party would push for the release of political prisoners, a free press and an end to the involvement of police and intelligence agencies in politics. He would support medium and small business, better housing and health care, free trade unions and workers’ rights so as to produce an equilibrium between business and labour. He also supports the independence of the central bank and help for farmers.

Mr Kim last week called for the displacement of the chief justice and the supreme court members as a first step towards a fair deal system.

He plans to use the National Assembley’s new powers to look into corruption by the previous regime, alleged fraud in the presidential’s election last year, and the Kwangju incident in which at least 200 people were killed by the military in a 1980 uprising.

Mr Kim has emphasised his commitment to negotiation and to a successful Olympic Games in Seoul this year.

However, two new appointments made by President Roh Tae Woo suggest that the opposition faces an uphill task. Mr Roh removed the Interior Minister and the intelligence chief in favour of the two men who had been linked to the military or to law enforcement agencies. Following the appointment to party secretary-general of one of the military men held responsible for the Kwangju incident, observers believe that the Government plans to resist demands for investigation of sensitive areas.

Meanwhile, after trade talks with the US last week, South Korean officials are adopting conciliatory tone over the visit to Seoul this week of Mr William Taft, US Deputy Defence Secretary.

He is touring European and Asian capitals to persuade allies to shoulder more of the cost of Western defence. South Korea has been asked to pay more for the 40,000 US troops in the country, to help fund US activities in the Gulf and to contribute towards an aid plan for the the Philippines.

A Defence Ministry official said yesterday cost-sharing was being positively reviewed. Although Seoul did not wish to become involved in the Gulf conflict, it would be willing to give indirect support by providing maintenance for US aircraft operating in north-east Asia.

A Foreign Ministry official said South Korea already paid Dollars 1.3 bn towards the cost of the US troops and spent nearly 6 per cent of gross national product on defence. South Korea is likely to ask the US to share more defence technology in return for any help.

Document 318

Copyright 1988 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd. The Toronto Star
May 9, 1988, Monday, FINAL EDITION

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A10
LENGTH: 461 words
HEADLINE: ‘Red’ Kim looking to change image
BYLINE: (REUTER)
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

SEOUL (Reuter) - Kim Dae Jung, once dubbed the “Red under South Korea’s bed,” is trying to bury his radical image and project himself as a political moderate following his party’s success in parliamentary elections.

In the new, fluid political climate in Seoul, South Korea’s best-known dissident is proclaiming that his Party for Peace and Democracy (PPD) will no longer “oppose everything the government proposes.”

The 63-year-old two-time presidential candidate, long vilified by officials here as a Communist sympathizer, is even reported, astonishingly, to be planning visits to police and army units “to boost their morale.”

The dramatic swing in Kim’s fortunes, following a period of political eclipse after the divided opposition went down to defeat in the December presidential election, came with the April 26 national assembly polls.

Against all predictions, President Roh Tae Woo’s party lost its majority and the PPD emerged as the largest opposition bloc in a chamber which, for the first time in modern South Korean history, was in a position to block government legislation.

Suddenly all the rules were changed.

“In the opposition camp, the main development in recent days has been Kim Dae Jung’s efforts to re-cast himself as a moderate,” a foreign analyst said.

“Mr. Kim has made numerous pro-business statements, emphasizing his support for laissez-faire capitalism and a thriving stock exchange,” he added.

Kim surprised many political observers last week by even hinting that the opposition might postpone until after the Olympic Games end on Oct. 2 a series of highly sensitive probes into political scandals under the rule of former president Chun Doo Hwan.

Opposition parties have long demanded investigations into the army’s bloody crushing of a civilian uprising in the southwestern city of Kwangju, and the alleged corruption of Chun and his relatives.

(Chun jailed Kim for sedition in connection with the Kwangju incident and later placed him under house arrest more than 50 times.)

Shortly after Chun handed over power in February to Roh, Chun’s younger brother was arrested and charged with embezzling about $10 million in state funds.

Re-elected PPD president at Saturday’s national party convention, Kim again made it clear he would not provoke a confrontation by trying to force President Roh’s government into political reforms.

“We want neither confusion nor a catastrophe. Our party’s prime goal is to maintain stability amid reforms,” Kim told more than 1,000 supporters gathered at a convention site in central Seoul.

“I believe the era of extremist struggles by a hopeless minority against the absolute majority of the ruling party has passed away,” he declared to loud applause.

Document 319

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
May 1, 1988, Sunday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 5; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1455 words
HEADLINE: S. KOREA DEMOCRACY SEEN STILL FRAGILE AFTER VOTE; ROH’S LEADERSHIP, MILITARY’S STANCE IN DOUBT AFTER OPPOSITION WINS ASSEMBLY
BYLINE: By SAM JAMESON, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

In many respects, South Korea’s National Assembly election last week seemed like democracy’s finest hour in a nation long governed by military-backed authoritarian regimes.

A former miner won election over the president of his old coal mining firm.

An anti-government retired general who promised an expose was elected.

A ruling party candidate caught mailing out nearly $120,000 to voters was defeated.

Ten former generals running with the ruling party went down to defeat but so, too, did all but one of the 49 candidates fielded by a radical splinter group of dissidents.

Most of all, the unthinkable became the reality: The opposition, for the first time in 40 years of South Korean constitutional history, won a National Assembly election, three parties emerging with a combined total of 165 seats to 125 for the ruling Democratic Justice Party. Independents won nine. A majority in the 299-seat Assembly is 150.

The State Department professed to be elated.

“This election shows that democracy in Korea is alive and well and getting stronger every day,” spokesman Charles Redman said in Washington.

But few insiders, diplomats or analysts believe that democracy, or even the two-month-old government of President Roh Tae Woo, have taken firm root in South Korea.

Indeed, the ruling party’s failure to win control of the assembly has brought into the open new questions about Roh’s leadership and his support from the ultimate arbiter of South Korean politics: leaders of the 625,000-strong military.

It was overconfidence that brought Tuesday’s surprising setback for the ruling party, which owes its power not to public support but to a coup in 1980 and a split of the opposition in 1987, in the view of Prof. Han Sung Joo of Korea University.

“If the ruling group had been really scared, I think things would have turned out differently,” Han said.

His implication was clear: The election would have been rigged or, at least, not held with the single-member district format that was used for the first time in 17 years.

Han is not the only Korean with little confidence in the government’s genuine commitment to democracy. The three opposition parties that pulled off the victory announced even before voters went to the polls that the election was rigged. Two of the parties planned a post-election rally to protest the fix.

The rally was canceled. But the doubts about the future remain.

“I don’t see any commitment to the process of democracy,” a Western diplomat said. “They (the ruling group) want democracy as one of the trappings of economic development -- like tall buildings for the (summer) Olympics.”

All governments since 1972 have won support from only about a third of the voters but kept control over the legislature by such devices as appointing large numbers of representatives or taking the lion’s share of blocks of seats allotted by proportional representation.

This time, though, Roh and the ruling party counted on the opposition’s split to pull them through and did not stack the deck, said Korean and foreign analysts, who before the vote shared the assumption that Roh’s party would win.

Millions of dollars were poured into the 18-day campaign, said a knowledgeable foreign source who requested anonymity. But resentment at eight years of high-handed control by the ruling party under former President Chun Doo Hwan proved stronger than disgust with the splintered opposition for its internecine feuds.

“It looks like the voters went through the process of figuring out which opposition candidate had the best chance to beat the ruling party and voted for him,” a Western diplomat said.

Prof. Han said voters looked not at the new open atmosphere that Roh has brought since he took office Feb. 25, but rather “at the empty half of the glass.”

“They were dissatisfied that more wasn’t done,” he said.

For President Roh, the outcome was a devastating setback.

The southwestern Cholla region rejected his apology for branding demonstrations in Kwangju against Chun’s coup in 1980 an “insurrection” and elected candidates backing opposition leader Kim Dae Jung to all 37 seats there.

The nation’s voters seemed to be saying they had no confidence in Roh’s promises of reform. From the 36.7% voter support for him in December’s presidential election, backing for his party slipped to 34% in Tuesday’s voting for the National Assembly.

His decision to override ruling party objections and accept the opposition’s demand for single-member constituencies, instead of two-member districts in which at least one government candidate was likely to have won, was viewed by the ruling camp as a blunder, not an act of statesmanship.

Roh compounded his trouble, Han said, by nominating his candidates on the basis of loyalty to him, “not on their electability.”

The result was that Roh threw away help from many Chun backers, a significant supporting faction in his own party, one Korean insider said.

Han said “the ruling camp” -- particularly the military -- will not forget Roh’s handling of the election if the outcome ultimately undermines political stability.

A mood of “play it cool” through the Olympic Games, to be held in Seoul from Sept. 17-Oct. 2, promises to keep a lid on potential explosions until autumn. And the military, its reputation tarnished by its intervention in politics in 1980, is not likely to act again without a pressing cause, foreign and Korean analysts agree.

The military, Han said, “don’t have any other place to go.” But after the Olympics, “If the system becomes completely immobilized so that it affects the economy and national security, then, I think they certainly would have second thoughts.”

Han added that he does not expect that kind of turmoil.

A Korean insider, however, was not so optimistic. He flatly predicted trouble after the Olympics.

There are doubts about Roh’s ability to contain demands for a full airing of the army suppression of the Kwangju uprising in which at least 194 people were killed, and to protect Chun, his mentor.

The new National Assembly, which no longer can be dissolved, now has the power to summon officials and carry out investigations of “state affairs.”

Full investigations of either Kwangju or Chun would strike at Roh’s own roots -- in the coup he supported and in the ruling Establishment that Chun and he set up in 1980.

Worse yet, no longer is the assembly a safe venue for a vote of confidence that Roh pledged to seek from the people after the Olympics.

“The government is in a very difficult situation,” Han said. A member of the Establishment said the three opposition parties “can do anything they want if they can agree on it.”

The Rev. Kim Kwan Suk, honorary president of the Christian Broadcasting System, questioned Roh’s leadership ability. He also noted what he called surprising political instability in the apparent conflict between Chun’s and Roh’s forces in a scandal involving Chun’s brother, who is under arrest on embezzlement charges, and in nominations Chun approved for the National Assembly election.

“Roh’s leadership is disappointing,” Prof. Han said. “His administration is drifting. There are many issues he hasn’t even started addressing.”

High on the list of such issues are U.S. demands that South Korea open its markets and pay a larger part of the cost of maintaining 43,000 American troops here -- issues Roh ignored in public statements in his presidential campaign and since taking office.

Roh’s administration “seems (to have made) no real effort to understand what should be done and how to do it in both trade and security,” Han said.

Both he and diplomats here predicted that the opposition-dominated legislature would “adversely affect U.S.-Korea relations.”

“Every major issue (between the two countries) is going to be debated in the Assembly . . . by a lot of guys who know nothing about the issues,” one diplomat said, noting that two-thirds of the new assembly members were elected Tuesday for the first time.

Han and others criticized Roh for failing to get a grasp on issues. Han said the president has surrounded himself with “protocol men.” One source called Roh’s aides “idealists with no idea of how to carry out politics.”

“Roh’s been a nice guy,” Han said. “He carries his own briefcase. He holds meetings at round tables. But the country needs strong leadership, . . . especially if it’s going to have democracy.”

Still, Roh may be the kind of man needed to lead the country now that dialogue and compromise between ruling and opposition parties have become necessary. Those commodities have not been hallmarks of South Korean politics under a succession of governments that had no need to deal for opposition votes.

Document 320

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
May 1, 1988, Sunday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 4; Page 2, Column 1; Week in Review Desk
LENGTH: 958 words
HEADLINE: THE WORLD; Pragmatism and Principle in Korea
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

South Koreans, blessed and maybe also a bit cursed with a limitless capacity for political surprise, put their democratic progress to a tough new test last week and wandered into wholly uncharted territory. It was anyone’s guess whether the journey would turn out well.

Koreans elected a new National Assembly and, for the first time in the country’s history, the ruling party lost its legislative majority. It still had more seats than anyone else, and for real power it still controlled the presidency. But it was suddenly outnumbered in the Assembly by three divided opposition parties, 174 seats to 125. Now if it hopes to pass new laws or adopt a budget, the Government must find partners. And that will force President Roh Tae Woo to learn the arts of concession and accommodation. In a country long dominated by repressive governments and a winner-take-all mentality, those are not skills conspicuously in long supply.

The usually divided opposition, which was as stunned as anyone else by its triumph, has a few lessons of its own to learn about compromise. For now, all that the three rival parties can do is make life wretched for the Government. That is no small thing; it may bring them important concessions. But unless they manage to form a coalition of some sort, they will have no way to push through their own agenda. Time is needed to see how - and if - they can work out serious regional, class and ideological differences.

It was tempting for some Koreans to treat last week’s events as proof that democracy was well under way in their land. The Government lost, after all, and seemed prepared to accept the consequences. Yes, legislative affairs might get a little messy, the optimists said, but that was a small price to pay for true debate instead of the knee-jerk rubber-stamping of the past. But many Korean intellectuals took a less sanguine view. They strongly suspected that if the ruling camp had not been blinded by overconfidence, it might have resorted to a healthy amount of ballot-tampering, a not-unknown phenomenon here. No one could say so with certainty, of course.

Inherent in that attitude are suspicions that Mr. Roh’s democratic leanings are born of pragmatism, not conviction. ‘‘I don’t see the commitment,’’ a foreign diplomat said. ‘‘They want democracy as one of the trappings of an advanced nation, along with tall buildings and the Olympics.’’

The voters recognize that Mr. Roh had championed democratic improvements last year only at the last hour, when it became clear the Government would have to resign or call out the troops.

Limited Freedom

Since taking office in February, all of Mr. Roh’s important public gestures seem grudging. He named a new Cabinet, but kept holdovers from the nine-year rule of President Chun Doo Hwan in top positions. He apologized for taking eight years to come to grips with the painful legacy of the Kwangju massacre, in which 200 anti-Government protesters were officially reported to have been killed by soldiers. But Mr. Roh stopped well short of apologizing for the killings themselves. He freed about 125 political prisoners. But hundreds of others are still in jail.

While the newspapers are less fettered than they were a few years ago, and Koreans do not look over their shoulders as often to see who is following, they are well aware that little at root has changed. Repressive laws remain on the books, and the intrusive security and intelligence-gathering machinery is still in place, ready to be cranked up in a minute. And for all the exhilaration over the democratic wind that blew unexpectedly through the National Assembly last week, there were ample reasons to fear serious confrontations. University students, the shock troops of South Korean protest, have been shunted temporarily to the side, and the focus is on their elders in the legislature.

Last week’s election results showed that none of the four major parties are broad-based national organizations as much as baronies of regional ambitions and hatreds. Regional animosities consumed the presidential campaign last fall. Now they are institutionalized, and that will narrow the avenues for possible compromise.

If in the past the Government ran roughshod over the opposition inside the Assembly, the opposition is poised to strike back and settle a few old scores. Dominated by the implacable Kim Dae Jung, it can be counted on to kick up storms by demanding investigations into the Kwangju incident, corruption in the Chun Government and alleged ballot-rigging in the recent presidential election. As though that were not enough, Mr. Roh also must contend with hard-liners in his own party who are unhappy that after only two months in office he already seems to have lost control.

Never far below the surface in South Korea are questions about whether a few army generals are hanging about, waiting to intervene if they decide this is all too disorderly for them. In recent years, fears about military intervention have proved to be overwrought. But they are never misplaced. Anything could happen if the country is perceived to be in a state of paralysis, especially after the Seoul Summer Olympics, which will serve as a restraining force for the next few months.

Mr. Roh must also fret about an unusual campaign promise to put himself to a post-Olympics public vote of confidence. No man who slid into office with barely one-third of the vote, as Mr. Roh did in
December, can take such a self-assignment lightly. After making that pledge, Mr. Roh began to step away from the idea of a plebiscite, suggesting that the National Assembly would be a reasonable forum. It seemed safe enough at the time. What does he do now that the Assembly is hostile territory?

GRAPHIC: Photo of Kim Dae Jung (Sygma/Allan Tannenbaum)

Document 321

Copyright 1988 Guardian Newspapers Limited The Guardian (London)
April 29, 1988
LENGTH: 465 words
HEADLINE: Korean firebrand cools after poll success
BYLINE: By JASPER BECKER
DATELINE: SEOUL
BODY:

Firebrand politician, Mr Kim Dae Jung, who has emerged from elections as the head of South Korea’s largest opposition party, yesterday said he now intends to become a moderate.

Korean politics have never been a gentlemanly game, but Mr Kim said he would eschew revenge against the men on the government benches who five years earlier had sentenced him to death for sedition.

‘The time has come for the opposition to discard its adherence to an all-or-nothing struggle,’ the stern and gravelly voiced former dissident declared at his first news conference after Tuesday’s election.

Written off as a self-seeker and a has-been after he broke his promise to renounce his presidential ambition in return for direct elections last year - in which he came third - Mr Kim’s remarkable career is entering a new phase.

he failed twice before to win presidential elections, and was sentenced to death by the former President, General Chun Doo Hwan, for inciting the Kwangju uprising in 1980, in which nearly 200 people died.

Two legislators from the ruling Democratic Justice Party, including Lee Hak Bong, the former deputy head of military intelligence, were responsible for the sentence which was later commuted to a life term.

With them in the Assembly will be the opposition MP, Mr Chong Sang Wong, condemned to death for leading the uprising, and Chung Ong, the general in command at Kwangju who was dismissed for refusing to fire on the rioters.

Mr Kim said yesterday the new assembly would invoke its right to investigate state affairs and expose the truth about the uprising, but said his party would ‘never’ seek revenge.

Mr Kim’s party for Peace and Democracy would delay the investigation if it proved detrimental to the smooth running of the Olympic Games, he said.

Korean analysts believe that Mr Kim is preparing to stand again for the presidency in 1992 and is anxious to moderate his image and widen his appeal beyond his native province of Cholla, where he has nearly a messianic statu.

‘All politicians must develop the art of compromise and mutual concession,’ he said, while at the same time attributing his party’s success to unbending opposition to the Government.

The Stock-Exchange index fell by a record 25 points after the results were announced, reflecting the fear that Mr Kim’s advocacy of labour rights and social-welfare benefits would damage profits. The election is also expected to end the close relations between Government and the large business conglomerates.

In a separate development, the former Mayor of Seoul, Mr Yum Bo Hyun, was formally arrested for bribery.

A crony of Mr Chun, he is accused of accepting 100 million won (Pounds 71,428) in return for awarding a contract through a building company.

Document 322

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
April 29, 1988, Friday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 2; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 96 words
HEADLINE: THE WORLD
BODY:

South Korea’s Kim Dae Jung, flushed with his new position as the leader of the nation’s strongest opposition party, declared he will insist on “liquidating the legacy” of the regime headed by former President Chun Doo Hwan. In his first news conference since his Party for Peace and Democracy emerged from Tuesday’s National Assembly election with 71 seats, or 24% of the total, Kim said his party will demand an investigation of the army’s role in the 1980 Kwangju uprising, in which at least 194 people were killed, and of alleged corruption by Chun and his relatives.

Document 323

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
April 29, 1988, Friday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 3, Column 3; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 580 words
HEADLINE: Kim Dae Jung on the Rebound: Taking Off the Gloves
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, April 28
BODY:

Kim Dae Jung, who appeared to be in political decline in the aftermath of the presidential election earlier this year, emerged from this week’s National Assembly election as South Korea’s strongest opposition figure.

Today he put the Government on notice that he would use his new power to seek legislative investigations into high-level corruption and the 1980 Kwangju massacre.

At the same time, Mr. Kim warned that anti-American sentiment was rapidly growing here because of Washington’s support for President Roh Tae Woo, who he said has no legitimacy.

Much of the hard feeling against the United States also centers on trade issues, and the opposition leader said he would press for a tough South Korean line against imports of United States beef and other agricultural products. ‘‘Our farmers should not be made scapegoats for America’s trade problems,’’ he told foreigner reporters.

Mr. Kim’s statement that he would challenge the Roh Government head-to-head on sensitive issues came on the first full day after stunning legislative election results had suddenly altered the political landscape here.

Rules Out Opposition Merger

For the first time in the country’s history, the ruling party does not have a majority in the National Assembly. It means that after four decades of having its way with little challenge, the Government must now seek accommodation with an opposition splintered into three major parties.

As the guiding force behind the anti-Government group with the single largest block of lawmakers - and as the most fiery opposition leader - Mr. Kim enjoys power that was undreamed-of only a few days ago. He ruled out a formal merger with the other opposition parties, but said he would seek ‘‘common ground’’ with them in pressing for expanded democracy, the release of political prisoners and increased autonomy for local governments.

Mr. Kim said the time had come to end the ‘‘all-or-nothing attitude’’ that has prevailed in South Korean politics. Singling out the Kwangju investigation as an example, he also suggested he might delay some of his demands if they appeared likely to disrupt the Summer Olympics that will open in Seoul in September.

The Government has already said it considers any reopening of the Kwangju killings to be divisive. In that incident, soldiers gunned down, by official count, nearly 200 street protesters. Many Kwangju residents say the actual death toll was 2,000.

‘Extension of Chun Regime’

Nevertheless, Mr. Kim’s overall tone made clear that in general he would not shrink from direct confrontation. Many times in the past, he has sounded similar notes of conciliation, only to toughen his stand on the grounds that the Government showed no sign of willingness to change.

Along that line, he called the Roh administration nothing but ‘‘an extension of the Chun Doo Hwan regime,’’ a reference to the previous Government, which came to power through a military coup and was known as the Fifth Republic.

His goal, Mr. Kim said, was to ‘‘settle the whole legacy of the Fifth Republic.’’ That included investigating not only Kwangju, he said, but also corruption scandals swirling around Mr. Chun and his family, and the cheating that he says cost him victory in last December’s presidential election.

In addition, Mr. Kim said he would demand revisions of ‘‘all immoral and evil laws,’’ including the National Security Act and other statutes often invoked to imprison anti-Government dissidents.

GRAPHIC: Photo of Kim Dae Jung (Reuters)

Document 324

Copyright 1988 The Washington Post The Washington Post
April 29, 1988, Friday, Final Edition

SECTION: OPINION EDITORIAL; PAGE A20
LENGTH: 386 words
HEADLINE: Korean Surprise
BODY:

THE VOTERS have administered the second sternest test to the government of South Korea, and the government has met it with admirable grace. The hardest test would be if the voters decided to throw the government out of power; that has not happened. But this week the voters did elect South Korea’s first opposition legislature in its nearly 40-year history, and President Roh Tae Woo said he ‘‘humbly accepts’’ the condition of power sharing and political turbulence that now results.

The Korean presidency is a strong institution, and the Cabinet reports to the president. But parliament can conduct independent investigations, recommend dismissal of ministers and vote on the budget. With the veteran Kim Dae Jung now back in the assembly as leader of the principal opposition party, the stage seems to be set for vigorous probes of high-level corruption and of the celebrated 1980 Kwangju massacre, and, if the early evidence is borne out, for Mr. Kim’s calculated use of anti-Americanism as a bludgeon against the government. There is a certain anxiety about the uncertainty and conflict that could accompany the transformation of the assembly from rubber stamp to political challenger, but Koreans appear to believe that the likely alternative -- a return to the time when debate was repressed and forced into the streets -- is no longer tolerable.

More than anyone, President Roh is responsible for the fact that when Koreans rioted for democracy last year the result was not another dose of military law but a turn to the liberalization demanded by the country’s rising middle class. He separated himself politically from the authoritarian-minded former president Chun Doo Hwan (his partner in the coup of 1979), altered an electoral system that the Korean military had designed for its own institutional benefit and won the presidency in an election that marked the country’s first peaceful political transition.

It is suggested that, with the Olympic games coming and with the opposition always ready to resume demonstrations, President Roh had no real choice but to accept the outcome of the assembly elections. It would be fairer to say that his performance reflects a flowering of the democratic enterprise in a Third World place where too many Koreans, and Americans, had written it off.

Document 325

Copyright 1988 Guardian Newspapers Limited The Guardian (London)
April 28, 1988
LENGTH: 811 words
HEADLINE: Rough road for Roh after poll setback: Ruling party takes less than half of assembly seats
BYLINE: By JASPER BECKER
DATELINE: SEOUL
BODY:

For the first time in 40 years, a South Korean President will have to govern withoug a parliamentary majority after the ruling Democratic Justice Party(DJP) won only 125 of the 299 seats in the National Assembly.

After the full results of Tuesday’s elections, President Roh Tae Woo said he would ‘humbly’ accept the will of the people and hoped that the result would ‘expedite the process of political maturity.’

But most observers expect a rough road ahead.

The President’s authority will be challenged by the new legislature, making the most of the wider powers to inspect state affairs granted under a revised constitution adopted last year, a revision that also stripped him of the right to dissolve the assembly.

The opposition is committed to uncovering the corruption of the regime of theformer president, Chun Doo Hwan, and the truth about the 1980 Kwangju uprising, both of which could weaken President Roh’s chances of winning a vote of confidence after the Olympics.

The Government will also be pressed to accelerate the liberalisation of controls over trade unions, censorship of the arts and media, and local autonomy.

The assembly convenes in mid-May, but conflict with the Government may lead to stalemate and paralysis.

It will be the first time for nearly 20 years that the opposition leaders, Mr Kim Dae Jung and Mr Kim Young Sam, will enjoy a share of genuine political power instead of relying on illegal street protest.

The stock market index fell by 4 per cent - reflecting business fears that the opposition’s success will result in instability and higher wage demands. A handful of labour leaders were elected for the first time.

In Mr Kim Dae Jung’s home province, supporters celebrated after his Party for Peace and Democrary (PDD) defied expectations and emerged as the largest oppostion party with 70 seats. Mr Kin graciously accepted the result, although he had charged the ruling parties with computer fraud and had railed bitterly at irregularities during the campaign.

He promptly demanded the release of the remaining political prisoners, an issue which will immediately bring him into conflict with the Government.

His more moderate rival, Mr Kim Young Sam, demanded an inquiry into election fraud after his party won 23 per cent of the total vote, but only 59 seats. His party’s candidate had received the brunt of efforts by the Democratic Justice Party and was forced to concentrate its attentions on Mr Kim Young Sam’s home turf around Pusan - so losing out in the capital, analysts said.

The third oppositon party, led by Mr Kim Jong Pil, former prime minister in Park ChungHee’s regime, provided another surprise by winning 35 seats.

More rightwing than the other Kims, he bears a grudge against the Chun regime, which stripped him of his wealth and position after seizing power in late 1979. Mr Kim Jong Pil only returned to politics last year, when he ran a poor fourth in the presidential elections.

With the DJP and the few other opposition parties roughly in balance, he will be in a strategic position in the new assembly.

Mr Kim Jong Pil said yesterday he would use his casting vote judiciously, sometimes supporting the ruling party, and sometimes siding with the oppositon - but would not enter into a coalition with either.

The election again highlighted the dangerous regional antagonisms in an already divided country, which President Roh said ‘have become so deep as to alarm all of us.’

Mr Kim Dae Jung won exclusively in the two Cholla provinces, as well as picking up votes among the underprivileged in Seoul, while Mr Kim Young Sam won in all but one constituency in his regional power base in the south east.

The DJP chairman, Mr Chae Mun Shick, resigned yesterday, accepting responsibility for what the Dong-A Ilbo newspaper termed ‘a miserable defeat.’ Other senior party figures are expected to join him, and President Roh is likely to announce a big cabinet reshuffle in the near future.

Mr Chae attributed the DJP setback to the recent series of scandals, including the arrest of General Chun’s younger brother.

The accidental broadcast by a local television station on Monday of an election day rehearsal that declared the DJP candidate a winner, also aroused suspicion and anger.

Mr Kim Jong Pil said the DJP had been ‘arrogant and complacent’ and had mistakenly resorted to ‘old-fashioned intimidation which the public was no longer prepared to tolerate’.

Others believe the Government had badly miscalculated the impact of the exposure of corruption under Mr Chun.

Yet the result also leaves the debilitating split in the opposition unchanged.

Both Mr Kim Young Sam and Mr Kim Dae Jung will now feel justified in prolonging their presidential ambitons and blocking the development of a unified opposition party.

Document 326

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
April 28, 1988, Thursday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 12; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1123 words
HEADLINE: SOME PREDICT MORE STABILITY IN LONG TERM; S. KOREA ASSESSES A DIVIDED GOVERNMENT
BYLINE: By SAM JAMESON and KARL SCHOENBERGER, Times Staff Writers
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

A new political landscape faced South Koreans on Wednesday, with their government split between the ruling party of President Roh Tae Woo and a disparate opposition holding sway in a more powerful National Assembly.

Assessments were still under way on the implications of Tuesday’s election, which left Roh’s party 25 seats short of a majority in the assembly, but many analysts agreed that while it probably means uncertainty and some confusion in the near future, in the long term it may promote political stability by broadening participation and giving the opposition a strong hand in legislating and in scrutinizing the administration.

Roh and his Democratic Justice Party will have to strike alliances with members of opposition factions in the assembly, dealing and compromising to get legislation passed. Also, the assembly, under the country’s new constitution, now has the power to investigate government activities, and the assembly can no longer be dissolved by the president. That could mean the assembly will press to investigate scandals during the regime of Roh’s predecessor and mentor, Chun Doo Hwan, whose younger brother has been indicted for embezzlement.

Forum for Debate

The three main opposition leaders will be members of the new assembly, heightening its standing as a forum for debate and decision on national policy.

While foreign relations were not a significant element in Tuesday’s voting, American diplomats braced for reverberations in U.S.-Korean relations, particularly trade and security issues. It probably will be more difficult for the government now to deal, for example, with the U.S. demand that South Korea pay more of the cost of maintaining American troops here.

All of this is a far cry from the pattern of the last 40 years in South Korea, where strong, often authoritarian leaders in Seoul have run the country without having to contend with a legislature dominated by the opposition.

Reflecting the political shock, the Seoul Stock Exchange suffered its biggest one-day drop, with average prices falling 4%. Two key officials of the ruling party offered to resign.

Roh said he regrets that the voters did not provide him with stability for carrying out the democratic reforms he has promised, and he expressed alarm at “regional schisms” that threaten to revive the issue of the 1980 Kwangju uprising, suppressed by troops with at least 194 deaths.

Roh pledged to cooperate with his critics, but he said that a “willingness to engage in dialogue and negotiation has become even more important.” That spirit of cooperation has been conspicuously absent in South Korean politics.

Some saw a turn for the better in a legislature no longer dominated by the ruling party.

Western diplomats, requesting anonymity, said the election, in the long term, could promote political stability because it brought dissidents and critics of the government into the National Assembly and “showed students they have a voice in the political system.”

“Can you imagine what the political situation would be now if the ruling party had won 60% of the seats?” one diplomat asked.

In the short run, however, Roh and political analysts predicted “many troubles.”

The results resuscitated the political career of Kim Jong Pil, 61, a strongman of the 1961-79 rule of Park Chung Hee. Kim Jong Pil was purged by Chun in 1980 in a coup supported by Roh. Although Kim polled only 8% of the votes in last December’s presidential election, finishing a distant fourth, his New Democratic Republican Party got 15.3% in the assembly election.

With 35 seats, the conservative Kim now holds the swing votes between Roh’s 125 assembly followers, on one hand, and the 130 legislators led by the two longtime opposition advocates of democracy, Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam, on the other. Nine seats were won by independents. A majority in the 299-seat unicameral legislature is 150.

“We’ll cooperate with other opposition parties in fighting against the government but I oppose going into the streets,” Kim Jong Pil said Wednesday. “We will never participate in that kind of struggle.”

Diplomats predicted that the former strongman, with hopes of someday seeking the presidency himself, would continue to act as an opposition leader to distance himself from the ruling party.

The widespread unpopularity of the ruling party, founded by Chun after the 1980 coup, was the chief cause of its stunning defeat Tuesday, one Western diplomat said.

Kim Dae Jung, who still controls the Party for Peace and Democracy although he resigned as its president, said his party emerged as the No. 1 opposition group as a “reflection of the people’s desire to see a powerful opposition that will check the ruling party.”

The often-jailed leader, however, offered to cooperate with Roh. He said his party “will not oppose everything the government proposes” but will “seek reforms through stability.”

However, Kim Dae Jung is expected to use his party’s new strength in the assembly to demand an investigation of the 1980 Kwangju incident. Roh ruled out such an inquiry in an official government apology he issued earlier this month.

The outcome Tuesday could echo in South Korea’s foreign relations. A U.S. diplomat, who asked not be be named, said the opposition victory may make friction over trade and other issues between Washington and Seoul “more public,” although “U.S.-Korean relations will not necessarily suffer.”

In the wake of a $9.9-billion trade deficit with South Korea last year, the United States has lodged complaints against Seoul about beef, cigarettes, advertising, telecommunications, copyrights, shipping and the dollar-won exchange rate. Now, sources said, those issues are expected to get an airing in the assembly.

Another possible source of friction is the recent U.S. demand that South Korea shoulder more of the burden of maintaining the 43,000 U.S. troops stationed here to help guard against possible attack by North Korea.

South Korea is not being singled out; similar demands are being made of Taiwan, Japan and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries because of pressure in Washington for budget cuts, the diplomat said. But South Korea’s large trade surplus is highly visible, and trade negotiations are not going smoothly, raising the likelihood that the question of cost-sharing on defense will be a contentious one.

South Korean has a per capita income of $2,800 a year, and South Koreans still regard their country as a developing nation.

South Korea paid $34.3 million toward the upkeep of U.S. forces here in fiscal 1985, the most recent period for which figures are available. Indirect subsidies, mostly rent-free real estate, amounted to $1.2 billion.

Document 327

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
April 28, 1988, Thursday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 14, Column 3; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1155 words
HEADLINE: Korean, Accepting Setback, Foresees Difficulties
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, April 27
BODY:

President Roh Tae Woo, saying he ‘‘humbly’’ accepts his Government’s election defeat, cautioned today that ‘‘many difficulties’’ lie ahead since his party has lost its legislative majority.

But Mr. Roh added that his setback in Tuesday’s balloting could eventually prove to be a boon. ‘‘Depending on how we do from now on, the election results could expedite the process of political maturity,’’ he said.

Still, for the most part the ruling camp made no attempt to put a good face on the election, in which Mr. Roh became the first leader in South Korea’s 40-year history to lose absolute legislative control.

The governing Democratic Justice Party still has the largest number of National Assembly seats, 124 of a total of 299, according to an unofficial tally by the state-run television network. But that is well short of the 150 needed for firm control. The party’s share of popular vote, 33.6 percent with nearly all ballots counted, also declined from Mr. Roh’s 36.6 percent in South Korea’s presidential election last
December.

Regular Compromise Ahead

To accomplish anything of importance, like passing the budget, the ruling party is now required to find partners. And that will force Mr. Roh into something no South Korean leader has had to face: regular compromise with opposition parties committed to toppling his Government.

Korean political scientists and foreign diplomats predicted that when the legislature convenes in May it will become a focal point for a debate on delicate, even once taboo, subjects like high-level Government corruption and United States-South Korean relations.

Some, including members of the business community, expressed concern about political instability. On the Seoul Stock Exchange prices suffered their largest single-day decline ever.

Other Koreans, interviewed at polling places on Tuesday, said they had voted for Mr. Roh in the presidential election, but said they were now voting for opposition candidates to provide a counterbalance.

Still others argued that the Roh Government, an outgrowth of an authoritarian, military-installed regime, was getting its comeuppance after years of treating the legislature as a rubber stamp.

Cabinet Overhaul Predicted

A more immediate concern for Mr. Roh is an imminent shake-up in his party’s leadership and perhaps also in his Cabinet, formed only two months ago. Although he has sought to distance himself from his unpopular predecessor, Chun Doo Hwan, Mr. Roh retained many Chun holdovers. These officials are likely to be among the first to go in a Cabinet reorganization, political commentators said.

For the next four years in the National Assembly, the ruling party must contend with three fragmented opposition parties, whose dominant figure once again is the hard-line Kim Dae Jung.

Mr. Kim was severely criticized for the split in the anti-Government forces that helped Mr. Roh win the presidency. Now, for the first time in more than 15 years, he is back in the assembly as perhaps the Government’s most implacable enemy.

Strength in the Southwest

By concentrating its strength in the southwestern Cholla region, Mr. Kim’s Party for Peace and Democracy parlayed a relatively poor showing in the popular vote into a startling gain in assembly seats. It tripled its total, to 70 seats in unofficial tallies, including those won in district races and those awarded to it nationally on a proportional basis.

Thrown into third place was the Reunification Democratic Party of Kim Young Sam, with 59 seats. After Mr. Roh, Kim Young Sam was Tuesday’s big loser, even though his share of the popular vote was higher than the other Kim’s, 23.7 percent to 19.2 percent.

Assuming the rival Kims can get back together again - not an immediate likelihood - Kim Young Sam is certain to be the junior partner.

The two men might also seek as allies 10 assemblymen elected from minor parties or as independents.

A New Man to Watch

At a news conference, Kim Dae Jung said today that there was ‘‘no reason why I should not cooperate with Kim Young Sam.’’ He added: ‘‘I have learned my lesson in this election, and I believe Kim Young Sam has learned his lesson, too.’’

The last big block of legislative seats, 35, went to still another Kim, Kim Jong Pil, who emerged surprisingly as the man to watch. Mr. Kim, whose New Democratic Republican Party drew only 15.3 percent of the popular vote, is likely to be the power broker because his assembly votes will be courted both by the Government and the other two Kims. Without him, no side can put together a working majority.

A former Prime Minister in the regime of President Park Chung Hee, Mr. Kim also lost in the December presidential election and is widely believed to be looking to run again in four years. He ruled out any coalition with the Government, which he intensely dislikes. But then he also has no affection for the other opposition leaders, especially Kim Dae Jung.

To Float Back and Forth

So he is expected to float back and forth between the various camps, depending on the issue. ‘‘I know we hold the casting vote, and we are ready to exercise it in a very constructive way,’’ he said today.

The opposition parties are likely to spend the next few weeks and months figuring out new working relationships to press their various agendas effectively. Because of their relatively small size, and their own divisions along regional, ideological and class lines, all they can do for now is say no to the Government. They cannot put through programs of their own.

Kim Dae Jung in particular is expected to be a gadfly in the legislature. Among sensitive topics that might be raised, they said, are corruption scandals surrounding former President Chun Doo Hwan, calls for an investigation of the 1980 Kwangju massacre, demands for local autonomy and even foreign-policy matters such as South Korea’s increasingly nasty trade disputes with the United States.

Every Issue a Battle

‘‘Quiet government-to-government diplomacy is not going to work,’’ a diplomat said. ‘‘Every major issue is going to be battled over in the National Assembly.’’

A big factor in the election was South Korea’s deep regional antagonisms. They figured prominently in the December presidential balloting, and, if anything, they have solidified.

None of the four major parties could claim true national support. Mr. Roh’s strength was centered on Taegu; in Seoul, the most intensely contested area, his party won only 9 of 42 seats.

Kim Young Sam dominated in and around Pusan, and Kim Jong Pil in southern Chungchong Province.

But Kim Dae Jung’s party demonstrated the regional problem most vividly. It captured all 37 seats but one in his native Cholla, and that one is expected to switch over to the party soon. At the district level, Mr. Kim’s group did not win a single seat anywhere else except in Seoul, where many former Cholla residents live.

Document 328

Copyright 1988 Guardian Newspapers Limited The Guardian (London)
April 2, 1988
LENGTH: 436 words
HEADLINE: Seoul will honour dead of Kwangju
BYLINE: By MIKE BREEN
DATELINE: SEOUL
BODY:

South Korea’s Government formally apologised yesterday for a massacre of protesters by martial law troops in the southern city of Kwangju in 1980, and announced that victims would be honoured and their families compensated.

‘The Government truly regrets that nearly 200 civilians and members of the military and police were killed and many more wounded in the turmoil,’ Mr Chung Han Mo, the Minister of Culture and Information, said yesterday in an announcement.

By official count 193 were killed and over 800 wounded during a nine-day uprising, which was sparked by the brutal suppression by troops of a minor demonstration during a period of martial law. Many of the victims were defenceless students bayoneted and clubbed to death by special forces troops.

The Kwangju Incident, as it became known, marked a step in the assumption of power of General Chun Doo Hwan, who ruled Korea from 1980 until February this year, and was the fundamental cause of his unpopularity.

The move by the Government of his successor, Mr Roh Tae Woo, is designed ‘to promote national reconciliation,’ according to the announcement. ‘The wounds of the tragic Kwanghu turmoil of May 1980 must be healed as quickly as possible,’ Mr Chung said.

Mr Chung, who serves as the government spokesman, said the Government plans financial support for the wounded and the families of the dead and the children of victims; it also plans to erect a monument to the dead and to turn the cemetery where many are buried into a national park.

The Opposition leader, Mr Kim Dae Jung, who has his political stronghold in Kwangju, had ‘no comment’ last night on the Government’s announcement, an aide said. In 1980 Mr Kim was sentenced to death by a military court for having instigated the ‘rebellion.’ His sentence was commuted as a result of American pressure and Mr Kim now enjoys near-messianic status in the city.

The government spokesman yesterday asked citizens to come forward to register victims so that a final tally of the dead can be made. Dissidents have claimed that as many as 2,000 were killed. American human rights officials have estimated the number at 600.

Yesterday’s statement comes just as political parties began campaigning for parliamentary elections on April 26. The Government redefined the Kwangju uprising as ‘part of the democratisation efforts of the students and citizens’ of the city. Previously it has been classified as a ‘rebellion’.

The Kwangju affair was mythologised be radical opponents of Mr Chun’s rule and the May 17 anniversary became an occasion for demonstrations.

Document 329

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
April 2, 1988, Saturday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 7; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 560 words
HEADLINE: SEOUL APOLOGIZES FOR ACTION IN 1980 KWANGJU UPRISING
BYLINE: From Times Wire Services
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

The government, in a bid to promote national reconciliation, apologized Friday to the South Korean people for the bloody repression of the 1980 Kwangju uprising, and offered compensation for hundreds of people killed and wounded by troops.

“The government offers its sincere apology, not only to the victims of the turmoil, but also to all residents of Kwangju and the general public,” Culture and Information Minister Chung Han Mo said in a statement.

It was the first official government apology for its handling of the citizens’ uprising, the worst in modern South Korean history.

Government Concession

Chung, the official government spokesman, also said the resistance was “part of the democratization efforts of the students and citizens in Kwangju,” a concession demanded by Kwangju residents.

His description was a sharp departure from the stand taken by the government of former President Chun Doo Hwan, which used the terms “rebellion” and “rioters” to describe what happened in Kwangju.

President Roh Tae Woo, who took office Feb. 25 with promises of reform, pledged during his campaign to change the government’s official account of the violence and offer financial compensation for victims.

Kwangju, 170 miles south of Seoul, is the capital of the home province of opposition leader Kim Dae Jung.

Kim was arrested in a crackdown on opposition leaders May 17, 1980, when the former military-controlled government expanded martial law and moved to suppress political dissent and widespread opposition to the growing power of Chun, then an army general.

The Kwangju uprising erupted the next day. Citizens armed with rifles and machine guns taken from government arsenals drove out security forces and took over provincial government buildings. But the government moved martial-law troops into the southwestern city, and retook it nine days later.

By official count, 193 people were killed and more than 800 injured. Dissident sources put the casualty figure much higher.

“The government truly regrets that nearly 200 civilians and members of the military and police were killed and many more wounded in the turmoil, and that furthermore, many other citizens suffered losses and pain,” Information Minister Chung said Friday.

Political Controversy

The Kwangju affair has remained a major political controversy over the past eight years.

Kim Dae Jung, who ran unsuccessfully for president last December, was convicted of masterminding the uprising -- which broke out while he was under arrest -- and was sentenced to death. The sentence was later commuted to a 20-year prison term. He was pardoned last year and allowed to participate in politics again.

The government spokesman said that President Roh believes a satisfactory resolution of the Kwangju issue is essential to promoting national reconciliation.

Roh, a former general and schoolmate of Chun, helped Chun gain power in a 1980 takeover.

The government spokesman said the administration will offer financial support and employment to bereaved families and wounded victims. The government also vowed to beautify a cemetery where many of the Kwangju victims are buried.

Civic leaders in Kwangju welcomed the government’s offer of financial aid. But they have insisted that the government investigate the cause of the deaths and punish those responsible.

Document 330

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
April 2, 1988, Saturday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 1; Page 3, Column 4; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 658 words
HEADLINE: Seoul Apologizes for a ‘Tragic Incident’
BYLINE: By SUSAN CHIRA, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, April 1
BODY:

The Government apologized today for its long silence over the 1980 killings of hundreds of protesters in the city of Kwangju.

But the statement, an attempt to ease the passions surrounding an incident that has haunted South Korea, appeared to fall short of a formal apology for the killings themselves. Instead, the Government expressed ‘‘regret over the pain and suffering’’ of the victims, their families and the Korean people.

Kwangju has lived as a symbol of brutality, tarring the Government of President Chun Doo Hwan and that of his successor and protege, Roh Tae Woo. For many Koreans, the Kwangju incident was unforgiveable and the Government’s silence intolerable.

Chung Han Mo, South Korea’s Minister of Information, said today that the Government ‘‘offers its sincere apology not only to the victims of the turmoil but also to all residents of Kwangju and the general public for failing to solve this problem even though eight years have passed.’’ He also announced that the Government would pay compensation to the victims and their families.

Citizens Not Appeased

But it appeared unlikely that the Government’s actions would appease the citizens of Kwangju. Korean newspapers tonight questioned the wording of the statement and predicted that an expression‎ of regret would be inadequate. According to press reports, Mr. Chung said he had used ‘‘regret’’ instead of ‘‘sorry’’ because he thought it ‘‘more sincere and courteous.’’

Moreover, the Government rejected a crucial request of the victims and their families: a reinvestigation of the Kwangju incident and punishment of those responsible. The statement omitted any mention of a new investigation.

In the past, officials have said that it would needlessly reopen wounds.

Several of the measures announced today had already been proposed by a committee appointed by Mr. Roh to consider possible compensation. Along the lines of the committee’s report, issued on Feb. 23, Mr. Chung said the Government would support efforts to convert a cemetery where many victims are buried into a park and would establish national and municipal committees to discuss further compensatory measures. The Government also proposed that a committee made up of Kwangju citizens and representitives of the victims serve as a liaison to the national committee.

For the first time, the Government agreed that the Kwangju incident could be considered ‘‘a part of the democratization efforts of students and citizens.’’ In the past, officials have described the events as a rebellion and the protesters as rioters.

In May 1980, Government troops were sent into the southern city of Kwangju to quell an uprising protesting the Government’s failure to make democratic changes. They called for the resignation of Chun Doo Hwan, then a lieutenant general, who along with Roh Tae Woo had seized power in a 1979 coup. Some protesters were armed, and soldiers stormed the city. By official count, 191 people died, but opposition groups insist that as many as 2,000 people were killed. With the crushing of the uprising, Mr. Chun was able to consolidate his power.

Today’s announcement represented a sharp break from the past. During most of his tenure, President Chun refused either to discuss the incident or to consider compensation. In one of his first public allusions to Kwangju, Mr. Chun told foreign correspondents on Jan. 29, while he was still President, that Kwangju was ‘‘a most unfortunate and tragic and regrettable incident.’’

In announcing the Kwangju measures today, the Government said it ‘‘appeals to all concerned parties - the surviving victims, the citizens of Kwangju and the general public - to understand and forgive each other and put the pain of the turmoil behind them so that everyone can join hands to achieve grand national harmony.’’

But such harmony appears elusive. Opposition parties criticized the Government today for failing to reinvestigate the case.

Document 331

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
March 27, 1988, Sunday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 6; Page 42, Column 1; Magazine Desk
LENGTH: 4231 words
HEADLINE: THE QUARRELSOME KOREANS
BYLINE: By Ian Buruma; Ian Buruma is the author of ‘‘Behind the Mask,’’ a study of Japanese popular culture. He lives in Hong Kong and writes frequently about Asia.
BODY:

ON THE DAY BEFORE HIS inauguration as President of South Korea on Feb. 25, Roh Tae Woo posed in front of his party headquarters to be photographed with giggling cleaning ladies in overalls.

The former general smiled, a little absurdly, like an American candidate pressing the flesh on television. Roh’s two predecessors, Park Chung Hee and Chun Doo Hwan, both stern military men, never smiled in public; to them it would have appeared unseemly. ‘‘My, oh my,’’ said an assemblyman, who had clearly spent some time in America, ‘‘how the atmosphere has changed around here.’’

He was right. The atmosphere, if little else, has changed. President Roh is doing his best to convince Koreans that he is ‘‘an ordinary man.’’ Mrs. Roh, said a newspaper headline, is an ‘‘Average Woman Suitable for Average Man.’’ The new President has promised a ‘‘Great Era for Ordinary People.’’

When the ordinary people open their newspapers in the morning they see evidence of change: editorials and cartoons are sometimes mildly critical of the Government. And new papers and journals are being published. Books by authors who had been banned because of their political sympathies are now on sale. There is a boom in experimental theater, heralding a new age with such startling statements as ‘‘Happiness Doesn’t Always Come From Good Academic Records’’ -the title of a new dance drama.

Affluent ordinary people in Seoul go shopping in Myongdong, a fashionable area filled with restaurants and fancy boutiques, as fancy, almost, as the ones in Tokyo. Not too long ago the shops were dingy, the clothes dowdy. Now the only shop I recognize from my first visit to Seoul, 13 years ago, is an art shop selling ghastly drawings of such celebrities as Gen. Douglas MacArthur and Steve McQueen. Myongdong looks prosperous, safely bourgeois, the perfect basis, one would think, for a bourgeois democracy. Even the young riot policemen, lurking at the entrance of every subway station and at every intersection, look less thuggish, more bourgeois in their brand-new designer-style gray and white ski jackets.

Who, then, were those 2,000 young people throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at policemen in those very same streets on the day of Roh’s inauguration? Were they extraordinary people, perhaps, an isolated group of fanatics, ignored by the average men and women, who protected their noses from the tear-gas clouds with Burberry scarves and linen handkerchiefs as they blithely carried on shopping? The rioters, mostly from prosperous, bourgeois universities, looked incongruous in the shoppers’ paradise, shrilly denouncing American imperialism and military dictators. And yet these same young people were cheered on by the ordinary shoppers only last summer. Without the students there would not have been an election, let alone a Great Era for Ordinary People. Could they have become an anachronism virtually overnight?

And what about the two opposition leaders, ‘‘the two Kims,’’ Dae Jung and Young Sam, who split the opposition votes and so lost the presidential election? To the outside observer, their behavior often appears inexplicable. The opposition cannot afford to be divided in the coming legislative elections, yet the Kims find it almost impossible to compromise, for no clear ideological reason. One day they are pictured shaking hands, smiling at the cameras (never at each other); the next day talks are off.

Earlier this year, Kim Young Sam resigned as leader of the Reunification Democratic Party and took to the mountains to clear his mind and purify his heart, only to return with an offer to share the leadership of a brand-new party with Kim Dae Jung. The negotiations broke down after a few weeks. Finally, 10 days ago, Kim Dae Jung resigned formally as leader of his Peace and Democracy Party, while remaining the most powerful figure behind the scenes. Perhaps unification will be achieved, perhaps not: the two leaders have engaged in such symbolic conciliation before, only to return to their quarrelsome ways. The conventional wisdom in Seoul is that the two Kims are anachronisms, like the rioting students in Myongdong, holdovers from a more violent past, when freedom fighters were pitted against military dictators. Now, one is told, it is time for them to go.

‘‘The two Kims must step down,’’ says Lee Shin Bom, a bright young spark in the opposition ranks, ‘‘so the new generation can take over.’’ The new generation, like Roh’s ordinary men, is a popular and equally vague social category one hears much about in South Korea. Lee was a student radical once, expelled from Seoul National University, the elite institution par excellence. He spent some time in the United States.

Now, in his neat blue suit, he looks like an average Korean politician. He hopes to appeal to what he calls ‘‘middlebrows,’’ by which he means the new middle class - the professionals and educated ‘‘salarymen,’’ most of them born after 1945, beyond the direct influence of Japanese colonialism. He does not indulge in the student rhetoric about American imperialism and so forth; instead, Lee talks of constitutional government and party reforms, though he has not yet committed himself to any specific party.

What, I asked, made him different from members of the ruling party. Not much, it seemed, except that the rulers often have military backgrounds and are from the most industrialized region of South Korea, in North Kyongsang province, whose main city is Taegu, near the birthplace of Roh Tae Woo. ‘‘We call them the ‘T.K. (for Taegu-Kyongsang) Mafia,’ ‘‘ says Lee.

The new generation, he explains, is nationalistic, but in an analytical way, unlike the emotionalism of previous generations: ‘‘We want to be equal partners with the United States. The U.S. Government must understand the feelings of the Korean people, who have been invaded hundreds of times by foreigners.’’ Lee believes that United States pressure on the Korean Government to import American beef and cigarettes is deeply resented, and could galvanize the students to stage demonstrations, which the opposition would support.

I had heard the same thing from Lee Chul, another so-far-unaffiliated new generation politician equally anxious to see the two Kims go. He is also a reformed student radical in a blue suit. On the issue of opening the Korean market to foreign products, he is adamant: ‘‘We must protect our market against American attacks. We agree with the students. Our Government is too obedient to the United States.’’

Like Lee Shin Bom, Lee Chul sees little ideological difference between his ideals and those of the ruling party, except for the military background of the party. He would like Canada or West Germany to be models for Korean democracy. But ‘‘the American two-party system will do for a few decades, until the reunification of North and South Korea.’’

Lee was simply stating an article of universal faith in South Korea. Just as it is an article of faith among oppositionists of all persuasions that the 1980 Kwangju incident - as the Government insists on calling the citizen uprising against the new military rulers - was not a rebellion, but, as Lee put it, ‘‘a holy resistance against an evil power.’’ Roh Tae Woo, who had been one of the generals behind the military coup, is widely blamed for having crushed this resistance violently. ‘‘He is a criminal,’’ says Lee, ‘‘who came to power by unfair methods; I hope he can harmonize the people.’’

I asked Lee Shin Bom whether he expected the opposition to win many seats in the coming elections. ‘‘If we are united we will get 45 percent of the votes.’’ What if you don’t? ‘‘But we will.’’ Yes, but what if. . . . ‘‘Then the elections would be rigged.’’ This was precisely what the two Kims said after losing to Roh: Roh’s victory had to be an immoral fraud.

NEITHER OF THE Lees, or the two Kims, for that matter, are radical ideologues. The Lees, especially, are moderates who simply want a new generation of civilian politicians - themselves, that is - to take power. But listening to them talk, one begins to realize that extremist ideology is not the only road to violent confrontation, fractiousness and lack of compromise, which make democratic politics so difficult to establish in South Korea. If one tries to understand Korean politics by looking for ideological differences one often gropes in the dark, but if one examines much stronger forces, such as regional chauvinism, extreme nationalism, personal loyalties, a kind of moral purism and the confusion of often contradictory values, things begin to fall into place. Korean politics, the changed atmosphere notwithstanding, is not yet a matter of balancing class interests, represented by parties willing to compromise and share power.

‘‘You must understand,’’ says Lee Shin Bom, ‘‘that in Western card games you can drop out; in Korea, you can never give up, and the winner takes all.’’ Each of the Korean parties, ruling or opposition, believes that it, and only it, represents the will of the people. To compromise this belief is at best to lose face, at worst to be seen as a traitor. Roh, lest we forget, did not give in to the demand for an election last year because it was in his nature to compromise, but because a refusal to do so might have led to an even worse loss of face: a violent crackdown on demonstrators could have cost Korea the Olympic Games, scheduled to take place in Seoul next fall. So how can the Kims, or the student radicals, simply get up and go away? And even if they did, would the old attitudes go with them? And without their constant pressure, can the Government be trusted to implement the promised reforms?

The Rev. Moon Ik Hwan, a 70-year-old Presbyterian minister whose message of popular liberation is influential among radical students, shook with rage as he blamed the foreign press, from ‘‘supposedly Christian countries,’’ for condoning Roh’s election as President. He handed me a poem he had written just after the election:

. . . Now is the time to say no to presidential candidate number one, who hides a dagger behind his smile, and no to Reagan, who holds a sword, and to Takeshita . . .

While our pride is like weeds that remain mute even when trampled on over and over, once we rise up against you bastards, we will turn heaven and earth upside down.

Now is the time to say no A time for our conscience and pride to say no by all means to this fraud, this immorality, this treason, this national disgrace.

This is the language of Korean radicalism: emotional, romantic, xenophobic and religious. It is the language of resentment, of a people always feeling victimized by powers one cannot control. Pop songs, novels and poems are suffused with it. ‘‘We Koreans like sad and gloomy things,’’ said a young woman when I asked her why she liked Edgar Allan Poe.

Koreans call it ‘‘han,’’ a smoldering bitterness about past wrongs. Han is not regarded as a negative quality; indeed, it bestows a kind of moral superiority. Kim Dae Jung is filled with han about his ill treatment by military regimes. When one asks his supporters why they think he ought to persist in his presidential ambitions, even though it might destroy the chances of a united opposition victory, they will often say: ‘‘He must fight on, for he suffered so much.’’

KIM DAE JUNG’S political base is his native province of South Cholla, in the southwest. Of the 24 elected legislators who belong to his Party for Peace and Democracy, all but six are from Cholla, and the loyalties of those are in doubt. The capital city of South Cholla is Kwangju, where hundreds of people (according to the Government), or perhaps thousands (according to people in Kwangju) were killed by soldiers in 1980 during the violent rebellion that began as a protest against the arrest of Kim Dae Jung.

Kwangju is a lively city full of the spunk for which Cholla people are renowned or notorious (depending on one’s point of view). It is also a city seething with han. People are bitter about social discrimination - Cholla people are often regarded as shifty characters; even a cosmopolitan former journalist in Seoul admitted that he would hesitate before allowing his daughters to marry Cholla men. They are bitter about the lack of political power - against the ‘‘T.K. Mafia’’; about economic underdevelopment - most South Korean industry is in Kyongsang; and about the Kwangju massacre.

A hundred-odd victims of the massacre, some of them schoolchildren, are buried in the cemetery just outside town, not far from the main prison. It is a beautiful place, surrounded by mountains, green in summer, brown in winter, studded with gravestones. A sign near the graves of the victims, reads - in English as well as Korean: ‘‘This place has become an eternal sacred land where 101 of thousands of democratic patriots lie buried. They were bitterly slain with military dictator’s firearms.’’ The people of the ‘‘Kwangju People’s Revolutionary Movement,’’ the sign goes on to say, ‘‘cried out for the true democratization of fatherland, people’s liberation and national unification.’’

A young man in an anorak beckoned me over to one of the graves. Tears trickled down his cheeks. He said: ‘‘These heroes gave their lives for democracy. I could never do what they did. How can I ever repay them? Even now, students and workers are still tortured to death.’’ The man was overcome. He was a factory worker, making dolls to be sold in the United States. He was born in Cholla, but worked in Seoul, whence he had come to spend his holiday visiting the Kwangju cemetery.

‘‘Think about it,’’ said a university professor, gripping my arm, ‘‘why did they choose Kwangju for the massacre, why not Seoul, Taegu or Pusan? Why here? Think it over, and over and over.’’ His meaning was clear: the massacre was deliberately engineered by people from Kyongsang, backed by the Americans, just as last year’s presidential election was rigged by Kyongsang rulers, supported by the American press. Han dominated the judgment even of this intelligent political scientist, who had spent years studying in the West. ‘‘You will never know how we feel,’’ he said as we parted. ‘‘We will never forget. Cholla people led the student revolts, we led the workers and we shall rise again.’’

Cholla represents about 15 percent of the population, and their han is clearly a political problem. To do something about it, Roh set up a Democratization and Reconciliation Council shortly after his election, made up of people from various walks of life. The council recommended that the Government apologize for ‘‘excessive military suppression’’ and pay full compensation for deaths and injuries in Kwangju. The revolt was no longer to be called a rebellion, but a struggle for democratization. Roh took note of the recommendations but has not yet acted upon them.

‘‘Even if Roh came here to apologize in person, we would not accept it,’’ said a Protestant minister in Kwangju. ‘‘The council is a fraud,’’ said an elderly lawyer, who was offered a place on it but refused, ‘‘because it was not created by the popular will, but by Roh himself.’’ Roh and Chun have to be tried and punished in Kwangju, said two students at Chonnam University. ‘‘Past wrongs can only be wiped out if Kim Dae Jung becomes president,’’ said a local newspaper reporter. Few people in Kwangju commented on the actual recommendations of the council; what counted were the personal motives behind its creation, its lack of moral legitimacy.

The Kwangju massacre and the fate of Kim Dae Jung are very much linked in the minds of Cholla people. Both are matters not of sober analysis, but of faith, patriotism, morality. Kim Dae Jung simply could not have lost an honest election. Those that say he did, according to a man running the Kwangju Young Men’s Christian Association, ‘‘do not love their country.’’ Kim loves his country, he suffered for democracy. ‘‘Roh does not love his country, only himself.’’ What about Kim Young Sam, does he love his country? ‘‘No, he is just the same as the Government,’’ said the professor, who had joined us at the Y.M.C.A. ‘‘His politics are the same, and, remember, he is from Kyongsang.’’

IF KWANGJU IS LIVELY and provincial, Taegu, the capital of North Kyongsang, is dull and metropolitan, an industrial city whose burghers cherish nothing so much as stability. Few people talk about electoral fraud; many appear relieved that Roh, the local boy, has matters firmly in hand. Almost nobody in Taegu voted for Kim Dae Jung, a few for Kim Young Sam.

The local representative of Kim Dae Jung’s party, a friendly man with long hair, cuts a lonely figure. He lives in a cramped apartment, where he was visited on the first day of the lunar New Year by a group of university students. One was dressed in traditional Korean clothes of purple silk, the rest in neat blue suits, like young corporate men. All seemed much exercised by foreign influence in South Korea. They held forth in long emotional monologues:

‘‘We want mental and political independence. We want to protect our own identity. Europeans have a Christian framework. We must find a Korean framework. . . .’’

The politician tried to bring the discussion down to earth: ‘‘The reason for the students’ nationalism is that American interests dominate our society and the opposition is oppressed.’’ The students nodded and carried on their philosophical discourse: ‘‘The Japanese, they have their national myths about racial purity and the divine ancestry of their Emperor. That is why they can absorb foreign influence without being harmed.’’

Were they seriously suggesting that Koreans should believe in similar myths? ‘‘Yes, of course.’’ And they explained how the Korean race also had a divine progenitor, called Tangun, who supposedly established the first Korean kingdom on Oct. 3, 2333 B.C. His father was a god, his mother a bear.

‘‘Yes, but the background of all this is the influence of United States security interests that back the military dictatorship,’’ said the politician, clearly bored by all this talk about divine ancestry.

When the students spoke about politics, their jargon sounded more familiar to a Western ear: American imperialism in the third world, redistribution of wealth to the oppressed masses, and so on. But it is nevertheless difficult to pin them down ideologically. They are not exactly the counterparts of American, or even Japanese student radicals of the 1960’s. At a university in Kwangju, students had articulated similar positions to the ones in Taegu, using the same mixed jargon of Marxist textbooks and nationalist mythology. One student in business administration, the son of a poor farmer, said that only a revolution could implement the will of the masses. What convinced him was the sight of his parents’ poverty: ‘‘It was like this under the Japanese, it is like this under the Americans.’’

More than anything, he said, the masses want reunification with North Korea. When I voiced my doubts about the feasibility of this ideal, the student asked: ‘‘Which is more important, ideology or the people?’’ He believed that the American anti-Communist ideology, backed by Korean military dictators, was the only obstacle in the way of national unification.

His models were not Che Guevara, the Sandinistas or Fidel Castro, but the Tonghak rebels of the late 19th century, who were anti-Western, anti-Japanese and anti-government -less Communist revolutionaries than religious patriots. The same could be said about many student radicals today. The extraordinary irony is that they sound exactly like right-wing fanatics in prewar Japan, the agrarian socialists who hoped to save the country from corrupt politicians and foreign influence - indeed, the very people who justified Japanese expansion in Asia before World War II.

There is something startlingly reactionary about this romantic patriotism, something at odds with the economic modernity of South Korea. This points to a fundamental problem with Korean modernity itself. Modern institutions, such as the bureaucracy, the railways, the armed forces, the police, industry and the education system, were not the work of a bourgeoisie influenced by ideas of the Enlightenment but, to a large extent, that of Japanese colonialists, whose empire was founded upon very different ideas: militarism and a Japanized form of Confucianism that stressed absolute loyalty to Emperor and state. Japanese colonialism, which began around the turn of the century and led to formal annexation of Korea in 1910, effectively aborted possible efforts by Koreans to modernize themselves. The Tonghak peasant rebellion, to which the radical romantics hark back, had failed in the 1890’s. The only other massive rebellion, constantly referred to in Korea and still celebrated as a national holiday, took place in
March 1919. It was led mostly by Christians and old Tonghak rebels who founded a national religion called Ch’ondogyo.

This confrontation between religious patriots, often Christians, and modern military authoritarians has persisted to this day. As the Rev. Moon Ik Hwan put it, ‘‘In my blood the Christian faith and nationalism cannot be separated.’’ His father was an old Tonghak rebel who received his education from a Christian nationalist. Since 1945, left-wing nationalists have consistently been persecuted -sometimes imprisoned, sometimes even killed - in South Korea, usually with the tacit backing of the United States. And the rulers were military men, trained by the Japanese and later by the Americans.

This resulted in a dilemma. The men who knew how to run a modern economy were authoritarian soldiers and bureaucrats tainted by foreign support, and many of those crying out for democracy often felt deeply uncomfortable with the results of industrial development. The feeling is especially acute among graduates who cannot find jobs, an increasing number of people in this overeducated nation.

IT IS WIDELY BELIEVED THAT economic progress inevitably is followed by a transition to democracy. But in a country in which modernity is so often associated with oppressors and foreigners, things don’t proceed so smoothly. One obstacle to be overcome is the authoritarianism of the rulers, but the other is the reactionary bent of the radicals. The former offer stability, the latter patriotism and moral purity. Most Koreans are stuck uncomfortably in between.

It would be nice if the opposition parties could fill the gap, but they, too, lurch from one end of the spectrum to the other. Too much compromise with the position of the ruling party elicits cries of treachery and lack of patriotism, and too radical a stance scares off the burghers. Most of the time, most people wish the students would stop throwing bombs and concentrate on their studies. But sometimes, as happened last year, the young radicals become the conscience of this divided, confused nation.

President Roh will try to avoid that happening again. The ex-general has promised economic development without its former military trappings, in which case he might try to become a leader in an older, more Korean mold. In a Confucian society, the ruler must conform to a moral standard; he must be deemed a virtuous man, in public at least; hence Roh’s efforts at seeming ordinary and posing with people in overalls.

On the day after the names of Roh’s ministers were announced, I had lunch in Seoul with a businessman and a writer. ‘‘The new Government stinks,’’ said the writer, and proceeded to comment on some of the appointments. ‘‘He’s not a sincere man,’’ said the businessman. ‘‘No, not sincere, a very sly character,’’ said the writer. ‘‘And as for him,’’ said the businessman, ‘‘he is not straightforward.’’ Indeed not, said the writer; ‘‘he has an impure heart.’’ Even these two conservative men took a moral rather than an analytical view of politics.

And the new President must not only be virtuous, but a patriot, who does not toady to foreign powers. Here, he might run into trouble. As the manager of a modern capitalist economy he will have to do something about the increasingly bitter trade conflict with the United States, which means opening up the Korean market more to foreign competition.

Unfortunately, Washington is not making things easier for him by choosing to break into that market with two sensitive products: beef and cigarettes. One threatens the farmers, the very people left behind in the Korean Miracle, and the other threatens farmers and the nation’s health. It is a perfect example of how anti-Americanism abroad is exacerbated by an American foreign policy that is unduly influenced by lobbying groups.

If Roh manages, despite everything, to convince Koreans that he is a virtuous, patriotic, great ‘‘ordinary’’ leader, he might finally secure political stability in his country. He might even get what his party so clearly wants: the modern Japanese system of benevolent one-party rule, opposed but unthreatened by a small, docile, permanent opposition. Then again, he might not; Koreans are not Japanese. From what one can gather, the Korean opposition parties want the same as the Government, but only on one condition: that they can be the permanent rulers. And permanent rulers, however virtuous and patriotic, are the enemies of democracy.

GRAPHIC: Photos of security guards shielding Korean presidential candidate Roh Tae Woo from rocks and eggs during a campaign rally in Kwangju in late 1987 (Charlie Cole/Picture Group); an exhausted demonstrator during lull in demonstrations in Myongdong in June 1987 (Heimo AGA/Contact); opposition leaders Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam at a politiocal rally in Seoul in Dec. 1987 (Charlie Cole/Picture Group); trainees at a management training session at the Dongbang Life Insurance Company in Seoul (Heimo AGA/Contact) (pg. 76); campaign posters at a DJP rally in June 1987 (Heimo AGA/Contact) (pg. 77)

Document 332

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
March 13, 1988, Sunday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 1; Column 5; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1949 words
HEADLINE: S. KOREANS FIND NEW HOPE OF DEMOCRACY IN ROH STYLE
BYLINE: By SAM JAMESON, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

When President Chun Doo Hwan met with foreign correspondents earlier this year, for the first time in his eight years in office, reporters were ordered to remove the rings from their fingers before shaking hands with him.

They also were banned from smoking in Chun’s presence, although Chun lit up immediately.

By contrast, when newly inaugurated President Roh Tae Woo meets officials, reporters and citizens, he rejects the traditional seat of honor at the head of long, rectangular tables. Instead, he takes his place at round tables where no distinction in rank is possible.

President Roh, who has given up smoking, also tells his guests to feel free to smoke, brushing aside a Confucian tradition that requires abstinence in the presence of superiors as a sign of respect.

Such small, symbolic contrasts have attracted major attention here where half-hoping, half-doubting South Koreans are examining their new president. They are trying to judge whether he really is the man that, since last June 29, he has portrayed himself to be: a Thomas Jefferson of South Korea.

Their conclusion for now appears to be that a former general who began his political career with a mutiny and a coup that brought to power the authoritarian Chun eight years ago promises to bring South Korea more democracy than it has ever had.

In addition, the more divided and weak the traditional advocates of freedom in the opposition remain, the better are the prospects that sweeping reforms will be carried out.

Suddenly, with little fear of challenge from an enfeebled and split opposition, South Korea’s Establishment finds that retaining power, its ultimate goal, may be better assured through democracy than repression.

But the predictions are still based at least as much on hope as on conviction. A wait-and-see attitude prevails.

On Feb. 23, a commission appointed by Roh delivered to him a 192-page package of reform proposals that, if implemented, “would be Korea’s Magna Carta,” according to Park Ok Jae, chairman of the Kwangju Wounded Colleagues Assn. A former reporter and an outspoken critic of Chun, he added that the prospects for democracy under Roh are better than ever.

Park said that a consensus that emerged from an explosion of popular rage last June, when street protests swept 33 cities for 18 days against Chun’s haughtiness, repression, press censorship and corruption, capped by his attempt to rubber-stamp a successor, “dictates” that Roh “will have to try” to carry out widespread reforms.

“I think he will,” he added.

“The (new) government promises to be more democratic than any of its predecessors,” said Prof. Han Sung Joo of Korea University.

‘Positive Progress’ Seen

Since Roh’s election victory, there has been “very positive progress,” said the Rev. Kim Kwan Suk, honorary president of the Christian Broadcasting System. “We should be encouraged -- but remain cautious in eval‎uating it.”

Through gestures such as inviting “ordinary people,” including street sweepers, laborers, and farmers to receptions and to his Feb. 25 inauguration, Roh “is trying to create an image different from that of Chun,” Rev. Kim said. “He seems very interested in trivializing the issue of democracy through mannerisms, appearance and behavior. We are not sure whether his real intention is to establish a democratic government.”

But there has been a dramatic change in substance as well as form, Kim acknowledged.

As a result of a new press law enacted last fall, 19 organizations have filed applications with the Ministry of Culture and Information to start publishing newspapers, a reversal of the trend in the Chun era.

Chun Squeezed Media

Not only did the authoritarian Chun permit no new publications, but he also forced 172 periodicals to shut down, amalgamated all news agencies into one, and put all television broadcasting under the wing of the state-owned Korea Broadcasting System. He also purged 488 newspaper reporters, while at least 300 others lost their jobs at television networks and in Chun’s forced mergers.

Although the new publications have not started operations, the ministry is empowered only to check whether they possess a minimum of facilities before registering them.

The Rev. Kim called official tolerance of new publications “the most important progress” to date. His own Christian Broadcasting System, he said, has won back the rights it lost in 1980 to broadcast news and advertising.

“That is a very good sign,” he said.

Lifted Kwangju Taboo

In an even more abrupt reversal of policy, Roh lifted the lid on the taboo subject of the 1980 Kwangju uprising -- striking at the heart of Chun’s claims of legitimacy to rule. Until last summer, the former general had blamed opposition leader Kim Dae Jung, asserting that he instigated an insurrection in the southwestern city in which at least 194 people were killed.

Retired four-star Gen. Lee Hui Sung, the South Korean army chief of staff at the time, recently admitted publicly for the first time that brutality by army paratroopers transformed protests there against Chun’s coup into a rebellion.

“There were many factors in the Kwangju incident. But a direct cause was excessive action by martial-law forces in putting down the demonstrations,” Lee told a Roh-appointed Council for Promotion of Democracy and National Reconciliation. “No one, including me, thought that such an incident could occur. My heart aches to think of it.”

U.S. Role Clarified

The former army commander also acknowledged for the first time that retired Gen. John A. Wickham, commander of U.N. forces at the time, had nothing to do with sending the paratroopers to Kwangju. Lee noted that only South Korean troops not under Wickham’s U.N. Command had been sent -- contradicting a claim by Chun in 1980 that Wickham had approved the move.

For nearly eight years, American officials have tried, with little success, to dispel the widespread belief in South Korea that the U.S. government was partly responsible for the deaths in Kwangju.

Another change came when the Education Ministry approved the revision of campus regulations by Seoul National University that will permit students to engage in political activities. The new rules at Seoul National are expected to provide a model for all 103 college campuses in South Korea.

Briefings for Opposition

President Roh has instructed top government officials to give opposition leaders briefings on national security, diplomacy and dealings with Communist North Korea. Previous governments never confided in the opposition.

He has ordered the Defense Ministry to loosen controls on reporting military news, chiding it for “neglecting public relations by overemphasizing secrecy.”

He has pledged that “government will be small when power is concerned, big when the convenience of the people and their welfare is involved.”

When 441 graduates and cadets of the National Police Academy issued a statement Jan. 30 condemning the police force as a “(hand)maiden of government power” and demanded police neutrality, Roh’s party surprisingly responded by commending the rebels.

No less astonishing was a Supreme Court decision the day before ordering a lower court to try a policeman on charges of sexually torturing an anti-government woman student. The lower court had suspended an indictment against the man.

Convicted of Cover-Up

On Saturday, a former National Police chief was convicted of covering up the torture death of a student in January, 1987. He received a suspended sentence.

So far, Roh has not broken any campaign promises. Government leaders have pledged that every one of 438 economic projects that Roh promised, many of them pork-barrel undertakings, will be carried out by the time Roh steps down in 1993.

Critics fault Roh for retaining eight of Chun’s Cabinet ministers in naming his new government, a move that indicated to South Koreans the difficulty Roh will have in breaking with the discredited Chun regime.

Similarly, while reprimanding 12 officials and trimming the sails of the Saemaul (New Village) Movement that had been a fiefdom for Chun’s brother, Roh stopped short of bringing criminal charges against anyone, despite widespread reports of corruption in the organization.

Recommendations by his Council for National Reconciliation and Democracy also called for no prosecution of those responsible for the deaths in Kwangju.

A Break With the Past

Roh made his most dramatic ideological break with the past in his inaugural speech. He declared that “the day when freedoms and human rights could be slighted in the name of economic growth and national security has ended.”

That sentence struck at the justification used by the governments of both Chun and the late President Park Chung Hee for authoritarian rule over most of the last 27 years.

The security-before-democracy argument also had guided U.S. policy toward South Korea for most of that period. More than 40,000 U.S. troops are stationed here to help provide security against the Communist north.

Despite the many liberalizations, few analysts credit Roh with an ideological commitment to democracy. Indeed, until last June 29, when he pledged to carry out sweeping reforms and accept the direct presidential elections that the opposition had demanded to choose Chun’s successor, he had the image of a Chun clone.

The clone image is fading fast but analysts remain cynical, although a bit optimistic.

‘A Management Approach’

Roh’s administration, still a very conservative one, takes “a management approach, not an ideological one” to politics, said a Western diplomat who asked not to be identified by name. “But if you have a management approach, as long as your (power) is not challenged, (you may want) to democratize.”

Indeed, Roh must overcome “the deficit that nearly two-thirds of the people voted against him,” American missionary Edward Poitras said. Roh, who won with only a 36.6% plurality, finds reforms are a way to broaden his support, Poitras added.

“There is no question (that) the government is taking a softer line. It’s not a deep moral commitment (to democracy) but a way to stay in power,” Poitras said. “Everything will get better and better incrementally, as long as they don’t feel threatened.”

Prof. Han disagreed, saying that a weak and divided opposition will slow down democratic reforms.

“Because of the weakness of the opposition, democratization will have to depend on the good will and farsightedness of the government and the ruling party, rather than upon a struggle led by the opposition or even by the press,” Han said. “To that extent, the process will be slower than if the opposition had been strong. But it will proceed.”

Backlash Threat Reduced

Roh’s Establishment credentials, on the other hand, will lower resistance to reform among authoritarian elements in ruling circles, Han said.

Roh will find it easier to carry out democratic reforms without a conservative backlash than would either of the opposition’s longstanding advocates of democracy, Kim Dae Jung or Kim Young Sam, the professor said. No one in the Establishment will have to worry about losing power in reforms under Roh, he noted.

The leaders of the 625,000-man armed forces, too, are less likely now to stir up trouble.

“They realize they have no alternative to Roh, and no matter how compromising he may become, he’s preferable to any alternative,” Han said.

“I just can’t imagine the (democratization) process reversing itself,” the professor added. “We have crossed some kind of threshold. If we can proceed steadily, even if slowly, it’s better than some kind of zigzag process.”

GRAPHIC: Photo, President Roh Tae Woo Los Angeles Times

Document 333

Copyright 1988 The Christian Science Publishing Society The Christian Science Monitor
February 25, 1988, Thursday

SECTION: International; Pg. 7
LENGTH: 865 words
HEADLINE: ‘Acceptance, not joy’ marks S. Korea inaugural
BYLINE: Daniel Sneider, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
DATELINE: Seoul

HIGHLIGHT: Shadow of student protest hangs over first peaceful presidential succession
BODY:

The subdued atmosphere leading up to today’s inauguration of South Korean President Roh Tae Woo does not diminish the import of the moment.

For the first time in the post-war history of the republic, a sitting President peacefully left office, handing over power to an elected successor.

‘‘There is a time for a man to serve the country and a time for him to leave the scene,’’ outgoing President Chun Doo Hwan said in a farewell speech last night.

The readiness to act on that seemingly simple idea marks the most significant achievement of former General Chun’s troubled years in power.

President Roh, a fellow ex-general and a close Chun associate, was eager to wrap his ascension to office in paeans to democracy. The text of his inaugural address, to be delivered Thursday morning, was largely void of policy initiatives. Instead Roh sought to extend the imagery of reconciliation and desire for democratic change that he has stressed since his victory last December.

‘‘The great democratic choice made by the people last December eliminated the sources of strife that had built up over the past 40 years,’’ he declared.

But Roh’s status as the choice of a minority, barely 36 percent of the electorate, was reflected in the absence of large-scale public celebration of his inauguration.

One Western diplomat described the mood as ‘‘more of a feeling of acceptance rather than joy.’’

Among some Koreans, notably the determined ranks of antigovernment students, even acceptance is absent. Scattered violent clashes with police by protesting students took place yesterday, including the brief attempted occupation of the United States Information Service office in Seoul by five students. US authorities called in police to remove the demonstrators after they broke windows and threatened violent actions.

Last June students led the way in massive protests that forced the election and other reforms. Today, student protesters are at the extreme end of public opinion in Korea. But there is a general sense of apprehension among Koreans about how things will change from the authoritarian rule of Chun. Those concerns were strongly expressed last week when Roh announced a Cabinet which included holdovers from the Chun regime in key posts, including those dealing with internal security.

Roh clearly hopes to allay such concerns. ‘‘An era of ordinary people has arrived,’’ he said. ‘‘I do not want to be a president who pushes his fellow countrymen around.’’

But Roh was quick to follow that with a warning to the potential street protesters. ‘‘But I will not be one who is pushed around by mobs either.’’ Police authorities pointedly announced intentions to block plans for protests on inauguration day.

The Roh administration has been helped so far by the divided state of its main political opposition, which split into two camps during the presidential campaign. The government is hopeful the split will allow a follow-up victory in the elections for the National Assembly which are likely to occur in mid-April.

But ruling party officials got a shock on Tuesday when the two rival opposition leaders, Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam, met for the first time since last October. The two men emerged pledging to take up again talks aimed at reunifying the opposition in preparation for those parliamentary polls. The announcement has been met by great skepticism by most Koreans, including the media, but even the slim prospect of merger may act to put pressure on the new government to live up to its promises of reform.

Observers are watching for changes in the role of powerful institutions like the Korean central intelligence agency and the military’s Defense Security Command, an internal political unit. Such institutions, a Western diplomat noted, are ‘‘unlikely to change quickly. But they are increasingly subjects of discussion.’’

One key measure of Roh’s democratic image will be how he handles the recommendations of the Democratization and Reconciliation Council, an advisory body set up after the election. The council’s report, delivered to Roh this week, contains numerous reform measures, including improvements in human rights, independence of the judiciary, curbing of the role of the Army and intelligence organizations, and strengthening of the parliament.

The commission surprised many people by its willingness to take up the sensitive issue of the Kwangju incident of 1980. The Army’s suppression of an antigovernment revolt in that city left hundreds dead and is a rallying cry for antimilitary sentiment in the country.

Even government critics were pleased that the council’s deliberations aired suppressed information about the Army’s role for the first time. Their report called on the government to apologize for the suppression of what it said was a struggle for democracy, not a revolt. This will not satisfy those who call for pointing a finger of responsibility at either Chun, who was then in effective control of the Army, or at Roh, who had a key command position.

An early gesture on Kwangju, and an expected amnesty and release of political prisoners next week could help the new government get off on the right foot.

GRAPHIC: Picture, Roh: inauguration speech replete with paeans to democracy, NEAL MENSCHEL - STAFF

Document 334

Copyright 1988 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
February 25, 1988, Thursday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 24; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 1582 words
HEADLINE: ANALYSIS; LEADER ‘BORN TO WEAR PURPLE’ FEELS UNAPPRECIATED; FOR CHUN, IT’S BITTERSWEET PARTING
BYLINE: By SAM JAMESON, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

Eight years ago, the American commander in South Korea called Chun Doo Hwan a man who believed that he was “born to wear the purple.” But today, the former general did what no other leader of his country has ever done: leave office voluntarily.

For Chun, 57, who has publicly acknowledged being an unappreciated, unpopular president, it was a bittersweet parting. For most of the 42 million South Korean people, it brought a collective sigh of relief.

Wednesday was his last day in office, and Chun spent it pinning medals on South Korean diplomats and Korean Air officials who helped bring to Seoul a North Korean saboteur who had blown up a jet with 115 aboard Nov. 29. He also presided over his last Cabinet meeting and visited the National Cemetery to pay tribute to Koreans who sacrificed their lives for the nation.

Cites Economic Progress

In the evening, at a farewell banquet from which all but a handful of reporters were excluded, Chun said he did “not have any regret about my departure.” He claimed as his chief accomplishment the transformation of South Korea’s economy from stagnation and inflation in 1980 to boom and stability in 1988.

“The legendary stability and growth of our dynamic economy, which has generated balance of payments surpluses, is considered a miracle by the rest of the world,” he boasted.

Referring to the staging of the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul next September, he declared that “we are no longer a weak nation in the backwaters of world history.”

He also added a xenophobic note, saying he had come to realize that Koreans “are superior to any other people.”

Earlier, he made it clear that he was hurt, even angered that South Koreans did not appreciate the fulfillment of his pledge to step down at the end of a constitutionally limited, single term of seven years. The reigns of all other South Korean leaders since the repub1818845991with upheaval or violence.

‘Dug Up Other Issues’

“Not many people believed my promise,” Chun complained to South Korean reporters over the weekend. “And when it became clear that I was going to step down, many people dug up other issues and criticized me rather than viewing my act positively.

“I was really saddened -- and angered.”

Among the early skeptics was now-retired Gen. John A. Wickham, commander of U.S. Forces and the U.N. Command in South Korea.

In an August, 1980, interview shortly before Chun ended junta control and assumed official leadership, Wickham, who knew Chun better than did any other U.S. official at the time, declared that Chun “feels he’s born to wear the purple” and predicted that he would “wear it right into the grave.”

Wickham was half right. Chun did assume the airs of royalty that have traditionally surrounded rulers in this Confucian nation. He remained a distant and often forbidding presence. Scandals involving relatives helped alienate him from his people. But unlike his predecessors, Chun chose not to make his reign a lifetime proposition.

Chun’s trouble, diplomats here said, stemmed from the former general’s belief that merely stepping down was the only thing the South Korean people expected of him in the way of loosening the screws of control of a rapidly diversifying society.

In that expectation, Chun was wrong, as proven by massive nationwide demonstrations last June against his plans to anoint a successor through a rubber-stamp electoral system.

“My sincere intention was misunderstood by the people,” he complained.

Any other leader during whose rule the economy had scored the gains that Korea’s did under Chun would be leaving office as a near-hero. The gross national product doubled -- to $118 billion. A chronic trade deficit was replaced with a burgeoning surplus. Rampant inflation disappeared. An expanding foreign debt turned around to the point that South Korea now expects to become a creditor nation by 1991.

However, Chun departs under a cloud of scorn -- even hatred -- among broad segments of his people. His future is uncertain, filled, some say, with personal danger.

Although earlier speculation that Chun would attempt to hang on to power after stepping down has largely vanished, fears persist that he might be assassinated in retirement.

Many South Koreans, especially from the southwest Cholla region, will never forgive him for riding to power over the bodies of 194 people, by official count, in a carnage that troops spurred in Kwangju while repressing demonstrations against his May, 1980, coup.

Blamed Critic

The Kwangju incident, which Chun for years blamed on his chief critic, Kim Dae Jung, a prominent opposition leader, dogged Chun throughout his rule, depriving him of legitimacy. It “kept him inevitably defensive in dealing with political dissension,” wrote Kim Myong Sik, political editor of the Korea Times.

Any physical attack upon Chun now, however, both Western diplomats and Korean analysts agree, could wipe out the contribution that he has made to Korean democracy in turning over the reins to Roh Tae Woo, a friend and former Korean Military Academy classmate. Roh won a four-way race Dec. 16 in a direct presidential election that the opposition had demanded in place of Chun’s rubber-stamp electoral college.

“Korea must establish a tradition of allowing retired rulers to live with peace of mind if rulers are going to step down voluntarily,” one Western diplomat said.

Chun’s disappointment at lack of appreciation from his people also sprang from his view that he had no choice but to assume power in the aftermath of the 1979 assassination of President Park Chung Hee.

“The nation was on the brink of collapse in 1980,” he said over the weekend. He even contended that he was forced “involuntarily” to take power.

‘Unavoidable Course’

On Wednesday night, Chun said he came to power “in accordance with an unavoidable course of events” that flowed from a power vacuum and “a national security crisis.”

But that was not how the South Korean people saw it. To a majority, it was a power grab.

Chun’s promise to step down after one term, said Prof. Han Sung Joo of Korea University, “was far from adequate to mollify the anger and frustration of those who saw their democratic aspirations . . . nullified by a group of ambitious military officers.”

In 1980, there was a consensus in Park’s old ruling party and the opposition that the country should chose a new leader through a direct presidential election and not through an electoral college. Moreover, nearly all the needed reforms were in place when Chun sabotaged the process by staging his coup, disbanding all political parties and purging the leading candidates for president.

“There was nothing inevitable” that brought Chun to power in 1980, Han said. “. . . Due process was ignored and popular aspirations betrayed.”

Kim Jong Pil, a strongman of the 1961-79 Park era who was purged in 1980 as the ruling party leader, charged that South Korea finally did late last year what it could and should have done in 1980: elect a new president in a direct popular vote. Chun’s years in office, he said, were a “waste of time.”

The Rev. Kim Kwan Suk, honorary president of the Christian Broadcasting System, disagreed.

‘Learned Through Struggles’

The eight years of Chun’s rule “were a very valuable experience for the Korean people,” he said. “Because we have been through such an ordeal under a repressive regime, we understand now how valuable freedom is. We also learned through our struggles the power we hold.”

To Chun, adopting policies beneficial to the nation, rather than yielding to popular causes, led the people to view him as “stern and authoritarian,” he told reporters.

“It is true I set a strict example of maintaining law and order and stability. The public’s impression of me may be due to the way I carried out those tasks,” he said.

“I think I was destined from the beginning to be an unpopular president.”

Despite his disavowal of seeking popularity, Chun carried out a series of reforms that, indeed, were designed to curry public favor.

He ended a midnight-to-4 a.m. curfew that had been maintained for more than three decades. He abolished a requirement that pupils wear military-style school uniforms. And he approved color television broadcasting and professional baseball, both of which Park had forbidden. He also doubled the number of students permitted to enter college.

Yet, none of these moves won him gratitude or popularity.

Koreans, the Rev. Kim said, “believed such measures should have been promoted in a democratic way, not handed down from the top.”

Now, ironically, if the promises of Chun’s successor are carried out, South Korea stands on the brink of the best democracy it has ever had -- a change to which Chun, in a back-handed way, made a major contribution.

‘Blessing in Disguise’

“That Chun was not a good politician,” said Prof. Han, “was perhaps a blessing in disguise for South Korean democracy. It made authoritarian rule vulnerable and democratic movement stronger.”

Chun left office making one prediction that almost certainly will come true.

“Our country will join the ranks of the advanced nations of the world in four or five years,” he said. “Before long, the entire people will enjoy a quality of life and a living standard the same as that of the people of advanced nations today.”

That the balding former general did not stand in the way of that destiny ultimately may give Chun his place in Korean history.

GRAPHIC: Photo, Bowing out -- South Korean President Chun Doo Hwan and wife, Lee Soon Ja, visiting National Cemetery in Seoul to honor country’s war dead on his last day in office. Reuters

Document 335

Copyright 1988 The Washington Post The Washington Post
February 24, 1988, Wednesday, Final Edition

SECTION: FIRST SECTION; PAGE A17
LENGTH: 535 words
HEADLINE: Roh Urged to Apologize for Kwangju; S. Korea’s 2 Main Opposition Leaders Hold Talks on Party Merger
BYLINE: Fred Hiatt, Washington Post Foreign Service
DATELINE: SEOUL, Feb. 23, 1988
BODY:

A blue-ribbon commission today urged President-elect Roh Tae Woo to apologize for the violent suppression of citizen protests eight years ago following the coup that brought Roh and current President Chun Doo Hwan to power.

The Committee for Democracy and National Reconciliation, appointed by Roh after his Dec. 16 election, urged him to restore the honor of those who took part in the Kwangju uprising, in which at least 200 civilians were killed, and to pay compensation to victims’ families.

Government opponents criticized the panel for opposing a full investigation of the May 1980 incident, which has cast a long shadow over Chun’s government and the nation’s politics ever since. The panel also recommended against punishment for the Army generals responsible for suppressing the protests.

But the panel, which heard testimony from Kwangju victims in wheelchairs and many others, offered the first acknowledgement from the establishment that the Kwangju massacre was the fault of the Army and not of mutinous citizens, as Chun’s government has always maintained.

In a separate development today, two longtime opposition leaders who have been at odds since the December election met for the first time in four months. Kim Young Sam and Kim Dae Jung, whose candidacies last fall split the antigovernment vote and helped Roh win the nation’s first free election in 16 years, embraced and promised to work toward a merger of their two parties.

Political observers here said the opposition would have a good chance of winning a majority in the National Assembly if the two Kims cooperate. General elections, delayed by squabbling among the parties, are now expected in April.

“If we fail to form a unified party, we will die a second time,” Kim Young Sam said, referring to the opposition’s bitterly criticized failure in the presidential election.

But politicians in both camps said that, despite the unexpected meeting between the two Kims, prospects for a merger remain cloudy. Kim Young Sam two weeks ago officially resigned as president of his party, and his supporters are urging Kim Dae Jung to follow suit.

In addition, a merger would force the Kims to allocate candidacies among their supporters. Both Kims raised money during their unsuccessful presidential campaigns by promising places on the ticket this spring, according to knowledgeable politicians, and they will have difficulty honoring those promises in a merged party.

The reconciliation commission was composed of 56 generally progovernment citizens. Nonetheless, the committee openly debated many previously taboo subjects during 38 days of deliberations.

The committee recommended that teachers and government officials discharged for political reasons be rehired. It also urged Roh to approve a sweeping amnesty for political prisoners after he takes office.

Its most sensitive recommendations, however, concerned the Kwangju incident, which more than anything else has prevented Chun from winning acceptance as a legitimate president. In a nation where political protest is fierce but ritualized and deaths are rare, the violent suppression of the Kwangju protests were unprecedented and, many said, unforgivable.

GRAPHIC: PHOTO, KIM YOUNG SAM, LEFT, AND KIM DAE JUNG, WHOSE RIVALRY SPLIT THE OPPOSITION VOTE IN LAST YEAR’S ELECTION, MET YESTERDAY FOR THE FIRST TIME IN FOUR MONTHS. UPI/REUTER

Document 336

Copyright 1988 The Christian Science Publishing Society The Christian Science Monitor
February 17, 1988, Wednesday

SECTION: International; Pg. 9
LENGTH: 924 words
HEADLINE: Gentlemen, ink your presses!
BYLINE: Takashi Oka, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
DATELINE: Seoul

HIGHLIGHT: Purged South Korean editors launch independent newspaper
BODY:

In a gleaming glass-walled building not far from the sweeping tiled roofs of 15th-century Changdok Palace, a group of optimistic journalists is preparing to launch South Korea’s first major independent newspaper, Hangyoreh Shinmun (One Nation).

Editor in chief Song Kun Ho, managing editor Imm Jae Kyong, and half of the 60 men on the staff belong to an elite brotherhood: They were expelled by government fiat from their media jobs - in 1980, during the first year of the outgoing Chun Doo Hwan government, or by the Park Chung Hee regime that preceded it.

It is a measure of the progress South Korea has made towards democracy that Mr. Song, Mr. Imm, and their friends can think openly of publishing a newspaper like Hangyoreh.

‘‘We will be independent. Not neutral, but independent,’’ said Song in his airy fifth-floor corner office. By ‘‘independent,’’ Song said, he meant free of government control and of control by wealthy owner-proprietors, as is the case with all of the country’s existing national newspapers.

A small, neat, gray-haired man of precise speech and intense look, Song is one of South Korea’s most respected anti-establishment journalists. So is managing editor Imm. Song was purged in 1975; Imm in 1980. Both express continuing dissatisfaction with the state of press freedoms in South Korea.

‘‘Political control is less blatant than it used to be,’’ said Imm, ‘‘and the emphasis is laid on stiff financial conditions rather than on outright censorship. For instance, in order to be licensed by the authorities, a newspaper must have a rotary press printing at least 20,000 copies per day.’’

Still, Hangyoreh is well on its way to achieving an initial funding of 5 billion won (nearly $1.3 million) by public contributions. So far, Imm said, more than 12,000 people have contributed an average of 200,000 won each.

As of the end of January, Imm said, 2.9 billion won had been raised, and the newspaper hopes to have enough funds in hand by the end of February to buy a secondhand rotary press and to start printing late the following month.

Many of the contributors are Christians, Imm said. Some of the Christian churches, Protestant and Roman Catholic, were in the forefront of the movement for direct presidential elections last spring and summer.

With the election and imminent inauguration of Roh Tae Woo as president, many members of this community, as well as academics and intellectuals in general, feel the need to keep strict watch on the words and actions of the incoming government.

‘‘This is an absolutely secular newspaper,’’ said Imm, ‘‘but Hangyoreh and the Christian community share a common goal: democracy and human rights.’’

The paper has been flooded with applications for work, even though the salaries are far smaller than what established papers pay. A recent advertisement for 20 trainee reporters drew 1,700 responses.

In 1975, Song was editor of Dong A Ilbo, South Korea’s leading liberal newspaper. Song championed his newsroom’s independence from government dictation, especially by the Korean CIA (now known as the NSP or National Security Planning Agency). The government, then under President Park Chung Hee, forced businesses to cancel all advertising in the paper, which responded by getting subscribers and supporters to buy ad space. After months of intense pressure, Dong A Ilbo’s owner finally caved in. Song and 32 others were sacked and forbidden to hold jobs in journalism. Altogether 130 journalists were purged at this time.

In 1979, Park was assassinated and a new democratic dawn seemed on the horizon. But a military coup brought Chun Doo Hwan to power. In May 1980, the bloody Kwangju uprising took place, in which hundreds if not thousands of civilians were killed by government troops. During that year the Chun government purged over 700 journalists, including Imm, then an editorial writer for Hankuk Ilbo.

Purged journalists could not hold permanent jobs in the newspaper field, although some of them published in smaller magazines. ‘‘Some of us became proof readers in small publishing firms,’’ recalled Imm. ‘‘Others worked as part-time translators, or even peddled cabbages.’’

Only last summer, after mounting public demonstrations, did Roh propose, and Chun accept, reforms extending from direct presidential elections to the freeing of political prisoners. Then, and only then was the ban on the purged journalists lifted.

Song’s transition from affluent editor to father of six with no income was sudden and sharp. The Park government offered him good jobs, if he would toe the official line. He turned them down. In 1980, Song says, the Chun regime arrested him on trumped-up charges and tortured him into a false confession.

‘‘I learned that, under torture, people can make you say almost anything,’’ says Song.

Kim Keun, one of Song’s former subordinates at Dong A Ilbo, took his family to France to study for his doctorate after being purged in 1980. He obtained his PhD and returned to Seoul just in time to sign up with Hangyoreh. Dong A Ilbo offered to reinstate him at more than three times what Hangyoreh could offer him. But ‘‘I wanted to write for a truly free newspaper,’’ says Kim.

South Korea presently has six national newspapers. Two are government-owned. The other four, including Dong A Ilbo, belong either to wealthy families or to a conglomerate.

‘‘We need a newspaper that can investigate fearlessly and criticize what is wrong,’’ says Song. ‘‘We hope to serve as the conscience of our nation and our people.’’

GRAPHIC: Picture, Vendors distribute newspapers on the streets of Seoul, R. NORMAN MATHENY - STAFF

Document 337

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
February 7, 1988, Sunday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 4; Page 2, Column 1; Week in Review Desk
LENGTH: 959 words
HEADLINE: THE WORLD; Skeptically, Koreans Await Demonstrations of Democracy
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

FOR optimists, here are some signs of a democratic breeze that has been blowing sweetly through South Korea since the mid-December election of Roh Tae Woo as President:

A former national police chief was indicted in the coverup of a torture death. The South Korean Supreme Court reinstated charges that had been dismissed against a policeman who was accused of sexually abusing a female prisoner in a political case. Four publishers applied for permission to start newspapers. A Government committee created to recommend ways of achieving ‘‘national reconciliation’’ decided it was time to re-examine the 1980 Kwangju massacre, which has haunted this country like a specter that cannot be exorcised.

Although an architect of the present military-installed regime, Mr. Roh has persuaded many Koreans that he will prove to be a different style of leader, just as he promised. He still talks, as he did during the stormy campaign, of the need to erase authoritarian behavior, and burnishes his reputation as a ‘‘common man,’’ raising hopes for genuine democratic advances after he takes the oath of office Feb. 25.

But one election does not make a democracy. If there has been change - and many South Koreans challenge that assumption - it has been mostly at the edges.

Newspapers, for example, are now permitted to post reporters outside their home territories, a right that was sought long before the presidential election. For months the papers also have been liberated from Government guidelines that had ‘‘advised’’ them what should or should not be printed. Yet the dailies seem to be more bland - downright unadventurous, some say - than during the campaign. Opposition attacks on the Government, including continued charges of election fraud, are buried more deeply than ever. Perhaps the newspapers are politely extending a grace period to the incoming President. But some Korean journalists are convinced that, after years of official censorship, essentially conservative publishers consider self-censorship a safer, even preferable course.

At the same time, South Korea’s ubiquitous intelligence agencies have not gone away. Mr. Roh has promised to end domestic surveillance and turn the attention of these groups toward North Korea and other external threats. But the intelligence network is so entrenched that many Koreans cannot imagine that improvements are likely soon.

The Ubiquitous Police

As ever, the streets of Seoul are full of hard-eyed plainclothes police officers who stand guard at major corners and at the entrances to underground passageways. Their intrusive presence is resented by South Koreans who believe that such constant vigilance is unnecessary and insulting. But Mr. Roh says that even if the domestic-intelligence units go, the police saturation will stay. It makes people feel safer, he argues.

A potential obstacle to change is the discombobulation of the political opposition, a ragtag group these days, devoid of ideas and still shellshocked from its disastrous performance in the presidential election. Some political scientists and foreign diplomats fear that the opposition’s weakness could embolden hard-liners in the Government and ruling party who have been less than enchanted with Mr. Roh’s stated commitment to change.

South Korea’s rising expectations of democracy could turn to dangerous letdown if the new Government is perceived to be dragging its feet. While most political analysts expect Mr. Roh to enjoy a honeymoon that should carry him through this summer’s Seoul Olympics, he may not be so lucky. He must contend with National Assembly elections in the next two months and the prospects of spring labor unrest and renewed campus protests by college students, now on a long winter’s recess. Any of these elements could turn into a serious test of his willingness to accommodate dissent.

There will be a few indicators to watch early on. One is Mr. Roh’s pledge of amnesty for political prisoners. According to human rights groups, the number of such prisoners has actually grown since the election, and now stands at about 1,300. Undoubtedly, many will be freed. The question is how many and, just as important, who. Local autonomy is another touchy issue. Every official in South Korea, down to the village leader, is appointed by the Government in Seoul. The ruling party promises local elections soon, but it has yet to spell out how extensive they will be. It seems likely that the opposition, which wants balloting for everything from Seoul Mayor on down, will be displeased.

And then there is Kwangju. If the Government is telling the truth, army troops gunned down nearly 200 people there eight years ago during an anti-Government protest. Some residents of the southwestern city say the number was more like 2,000. Either way, the present Government of President Chun Doo Hwan has acknowledged Kwangju’s pain only on occasion and has never apologized. ‘‘Restoring the honor’’ of Kwangju is yet another Roh Tae Woo pledge, but, again, how?

One thing Mr. Roh has going for him as he begins his five-year term is that he will have to plummet far before he rivals Mr. Chun in unpopularity. Even politicians in the ruling party acknowledge that their present leader is broadly disliked, although it took them nearly eight years to feel bold enough to say so openly. Once General, now President Chun has certainly never been a champion of democratic progress, and he remains skeptical to the end. ‘‘It would never do for national security or the economy to be destroyed in the name of democracy,’’ he said in a valedictory to foreign reporters just over a week ago. The great imponderable is the extent to which once General, soon-to-be President Roh shares that view.

GRAPHIC: Photo of woman visiting grave of anti-government demonstrator killed in 1980 Kwangju massacre (Picture Group/Charlie Cole)

Document 338

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
February 2, 1988, Tuesday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 4, Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 865 words
HEADLINE: New Leader In Seoul Finds Honeymoon
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, Feb. 1
BODY:

It was a small gesture, but South Koreans nonetheless took note the other day when President-elect Roh Tae Woo presided over a public meeting and said that people could smoke if they wished.

To many Koreans, that was an invitation to informality, and suggested that Mr. Roh was intent on preserving his cultivated campaign image of being a ‘‘common man,’’ someone quite different from the aloof, authoritarian incumbent leader, Chun Doo Hwan.

Symbolism of this sort has brought Mr. Roh many new supporters as he prepares to take office as South Korea’s first popularly elected President since 1971.

With almost a month to go until his inauguration, he is a honeymoon period. He remains untested, of course, since he has no real authority yet. But he has also managed to win relatively broad public acceptance for a man who got little more than one-third of the vote in the Dec. 16 balloting.

Even opposition politicians think so. ‘‘In my opinion,’’ said Hong Sa Duk, a young National Assemblyman, ‘‘President-elect Roh is very successful so far.’’ Mr. Hong then added with a smile, ‘‘Unfortunately.’’

Rivals Question His Legitimacy

Mr. Roh’s main election rivals, the squabbling opposition leaders Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam, insist that he has no legitimacy because, they say, he won through widespread fraud. But their charges lack fire these days, and they acknowledge that, six weeks later, they still have not come up with indisputable evidence that the election was stolen by Mr. Roh rather than lost by them through their bickering.

More and more, the Kims are resigned to the inevitability of a Roh presidency. ‘‘Politics has to deal with both idealism and reality,’’ Kim Young Sam said in an interview today.

Both Kims say they see little likelihood of major demonstrations around the scheduled inaugural on Feb. 25. Their attention is turned instead to National Assembly voting expected in the next two months or so, when they and their rival parties seem destined to go their separate ways again.

With Mr. Roh, the major uncertainty is the speed with which he will turn symbolism into substance after he takes the oath of office. He has promised sharp departures from the often iron-handed rule of Mr. Chun, a fellow former general whom he helped install in power through a military uprising eight years ago.

But some Koreans are already questioning how free of his predecessor he will be. Doubts flared last month when Mr. Chun rearranged the leadership of three key military units - the Defense Security Command, the Capital Garrison Command and the Third Army. Traditionally, all three serve as a power base for the President.

New Policies Not Expected

Of themselves, the moves were not considered unusual. But foreign diplomats and other observers say that evidence suggests that Mr. Chun never consulted Mr. Roh before acting.

On relations with the United States and other core economic and diplomatic issues, the new President seems unlikely to veer much from South Korea’s present course. ‘‘I don’t think we should be looking for a lot of daylight between their policies,’’ a diplomat said. ‘‘I would expect the main differences to be in their styles and their differing degrees of openness.’’

A critical test, many political analysts say, will be Mr. Roh’s ability to put through a thick agenda of campaign pledges. Two items stand out -promises to improve South Korea’s human-rights record and to erase the bitter legacy of the Kwangju massacre that accompanied Mr. Chun’s consolidation of power in 1980.

Officials say there will be a post-election amnesty for political prisoners, but whether this will include all, or even a substantial majority, of the roughly 1,300 people who fall into this category is uncertain. South Korean human rights groups complain that, if anything, the number of prisoners has grown since the presidential election.

Restoring Honor to Kwangju

As for Kwangju, Mr. Roh has talked of the need to ‘‘restore the honor’’ of that southwestern provincial capital. Exactly how has not been spelled out, but a committee to promote ‘‘national reconciliation,’’ formed by Mr. Roh in December, said today that it would reopen the Kwangju incident by taking testimony from 16 people who were involved in it.

Many political analysts expect the honeymoon period for the new South Korean leader to last through the Olympic Games that will be held in Seoul from Sept. 17 to Oct. 2. After that, they say, anything is possible. Some skeptics, such as Kim Dae Jung, warn that Mr. Roh could be dogged by unrest as early as the spring, when students return to college campuses from a long winter’s recess and labor unions enter a new round of wage negotiations emboldened by a burst of largely successful strikes last summer.

Beyond that, Mr. Roh may be dogged, too, by one of his own promises - to resign if he fails to win a public vote of confidence that he says will be held after the Olympics.

He has begun to hedge his bets on this one. Originally, he gave the impression that he would call a national referendum. Lately, he has suggested that a more manageable vote in the National Assembly might be just as good.

GRAPHIC: Photo of President-elect Roh Tae Woo (Agence France-Presse)

Document 339

Copyright 1988 The Christian Science Publishing Society The Christian Science Monitor
February 1, 1988, Monday

SECTION: International; Pg. 9
LENGTH: 819 words
HEADLINE: S. Korea’s Chun assesses his legacy; Takes pride in economic boom, peaceful shift of power
BYLINE: Takashi Oka, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
DATELINE: Seoul
BODY:

When Chun Doo Hwan became President of South Korea seven years ago, he promised to step down at the end of his term and carry out the first peaceful transfer of power in the history of the republic.

Few people, Korean or Western, believed him then. But in less than a month, the dour, stiff-backed former general will indeed give way to his successor, Roh Tae Woo, whom voters chose Dec. 16 in a three-way contest - Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam being the main opposition candidates.

Last Friday, at a press luncheon he hosted under the glittering chandeliers of the State Guest House, Mr. Chun said that ‘‘achieving a peaceful transfer of power to a popularly elected government’’ was one of his proudest achievements. The other, he said, was doubling South Korea’s gross national product from $60 billion in 1980 to $120 billion at the end of 1987.

Chun has not been much in the limelight recently, as the media has concentrated on President-elect Roh’s plans and policies. The two men, classmates at the Korean Military Academy, have very different personalities.

Chun has been unbending, a kind of general’s general, mistrustful of political give-and-take aimed at reaching consensus. Roh has shown himself much more accommodating, even towards opposition politicians, and so far at least, less concerned about the trappings of office.

A small incident before the press luncheon illustrated the atmosphere of the Blue House (the presidential compound, of which the State Guest House is a part) under its present incumbent. Journalists were admonished to wear business suits, to place their name badges on the left sides of their jackets, and if they had any rings on the their right hands, to transfer them to their left hands. The President was going to shake hands with each visitor, it was explained, and security guards did not want his hand scratched by an untowardly placed ring.

Roh has indicated that he is going to run a much simpler and less ostentatious operation. Conscious that he won the election by a plurality - 36.6 percent of the votes cast, compared to 55 percent for the two Kims and another 8 percent for a third Kim, Kim Jong Pil - Roh has gone out of his way to be conciliatory towards his opponents. There is even said to be friction between Roh’s staff and Chun’s entourage, with the latter openly skeptical that Roh can achieve the kind of reconciliation he hopes for and still govern effectively.

Yet, for all the difference in style between the two men, Chun does deserve credit, Western and Korean observers say, both for keeping his promise to transfer power peacefully and for keeping South Korea on the fast track of economic growth begun by his predecessor.

One Korean editor purged in the first year of Chun’s regime (when many politicians, intellectuals, and media people were summarily dismissed) said that South Korea was able to grow rapidly in the Park and Chun years because economic bureaucrats were on the whole dedicated individuals who could devise and carry out plans without being frustrated by democratically elected legislators representing special interests.

Economic development in turn created a middle class which demanded, with ever-growing insistence, the kind of democratic election that Chun was forced to concede.

Chun’s opponents say that his original intention was to transfer the post of President to a designated successor who was to be elected indirectly and who would give Chun a continuing behind-the-scenes role. That may or may not be the case, but unquestionably Chun’s repeated declarations that he would step down at the end of his term brought about public expectations that he would indeed do just what he had promised.

The emphasis shifted from the promise itself to the way in which it would be implemented. When Chun proved unyielding on the subject of indirect versus direct elections, a widening series of public demonstrations led Roh to advise, and Chun to accept, the principle of direct popular elections open to all candidates, even to Kim Dae Jung, whom Chun had arrested and sentenced to death at the very beginning of his rule.

At Friday’s press luncheon, Chun unbent a bit, expressing regret, for the first time, for the bloody Kwangju incident of May 1980. A student-led rebellion in the southern city was crushed with great loss of life among noncombatant civilians as well as the young people involved, leading to endless, continuing controversy over the government’s responsiblity.

(President-elect Roh has appointed a National Council for Democratization and Reconciliation, one of whose purposes is to get to the bottom of the tragic affair.)

Chun also said he was excited by the prospect of recovering his ‘‘personal liberty’’ as well as freedom for his family, once he had retired from the presidency, and that he looked forward to ‘‘cuddling up with books’’ - even, perhaps, writing one.

Document 340

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
January 30, 1988, Saturday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section 1; Page 4, Column 5; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 971 words
HEADLINE: South Korea Chief Says He Never Sought Power
BYLINE: By CLYDE HABERMAN, Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea, Jan. 29
BODY:

Although he seized control in a military coup eight years ago, President Chun Doo Hwan insists that he never actively sought power. ‘‘The country was in peril,’’ he said today. ‘‘The job was thrust upon me.’’

Despite the fact that his Government has imprisoned thousands of people over the years on politically related charges, Mr. Chun says no South Korean has had less freedom than he. ‘‘The one person in the country who has been deprived of this valuable commodity, personal liberty, is the president,’’ he told foreign journalists.

When one gets right down to it, Mr. Chun added, ‘‘it is a rather stressful occupation’’ to be South Korea’s national leader, and he said he was glad to be turning over the reins soon to someone else. ‘‘I can assure you,’’ he said, ‘‘it was not all pleasurable duty.’’

With less than a month to go before he leaves office, Mr. Chun cannot shake free of his past, and he is still called upon to justify the bloody means by which he took power and the often harsh methods he has used to retain it. It happened to him again today as he briefly threw open the gates of the Blue House, the presidential residence, for his first - and presumably last -news conference with foreign reporters.

Dismisses Legitimacy Issue

In the opinion of many Koreans, he has never established his legitimacy, at least not according to their Confucian traditions. Asked about that today, however, Mr. Chun replied: ‘‘The question of legitimacy does not exist as far as I’m concerned. That legitimacy issue is political rhetoric.’’

A more important point, he insisted, was that he is about to step aside voluntarily, something no major South Korean leader has ever done before. It will be an ‘‘epoch-making event in the democratic development of Korea,’’ he said, and will end a four-decade cycle of ‘‘protracted one-man rule and changes of government by revolutionary means.’’

Not only that, Mr. Chun added, but he is also turning over the Government to someone who has won South Korea’s first genuine presidential election since 1971, Roh Tae Woo, an old ally and fellow former general. The election last month was ‘‘a fair and just and open process,’’ he said, and Mr. Roh, the Government party candidate, won with ‘‘overwhelming’’ support.

Left unsaid was the fact that Mr. Chun had long opposed such an election and agreed to hold one only after it became clear that he could no longer resist popular demands for it. Also unmentioned was the reality that Mr. Roh, far from winning overwhelming support, captured only 36.6 percent of the vote.

For most of his eight-year rule, Mr. Chun has been a remote figure, and so his decision to have a luncheon and question session with 100 foreign reporters represented a significant last-minute shift in style.

He Seems Relaxed

In televised speeches, he often comes across as wooden and humorless. But he seemed relaxed today, telling a few mild jokes and smiling at obviously anticipated questions.

Still, tension was never far below the surface in the gilded banquet hall. Reporters were ordered to leave their tape recorders outside the door - for security reasons, they were told. For apparently the same purpose, they were also instructed to remove all rings from their right hands before shaking hands with the President.

By many standards, Mr. Chun should be able to leave office to ringing cheers. Under his stewardship, the South Korean economy has boomed, and the country has greatly enhanced its diplomatic standing, most conspicuously by winning the 1988 Summer Olympics for Seoul.

And yet he remains what he has always been - a highly unpopular figure, a point conceded by members of his own party. Even Mr. Roh had concluded that to win the election he had to run against Mr. Chun’s record as much as against the opposition candidates. His campaign speeches were filled with denunciations of authoritarian government, official torture and official corruption.

All along, Mr. Chun’s albatross has been the Kwangju massacre of May 1980, when he consolidated his control under martial law.

Anti-Government demonstrators took to the streets then in Kwangju, a southwestern provincial capital. From May 18 to May 27, troops sent into the city by then-General Chun killed nearly 200 people, by official count, or many times that number, according to local residents.

To many South Koreans, the word ‘‘Kwangju’’ is as instantly evocative as ‘‘Sharpville’’ and ‘‘My Lai’’ are in other countries. It clings to the South Korean President like tar paper.

‘Unfortunate and Tragic’

‘‘It was a most unfortunate and tragic and regrettable incident, and the thing to do is to heal the wounds of that incident,’’ Mr. Chun said today. He did not apologize, though, and never has, though many Kwangju residents insist on an apology as a condition of reconciliation.

After he steps aside on Feb. 24, Mr. Chun will automatically become head of a group of political elders called the State Advisory Council, and he will receive a pension and lifelong security protection.

Before the election, rumors were rife that he feared for his personal safety in the event of an opposition victory, and he reportedly had begun searching for property in the United States, Australia and New Zealand. Now, it is widely assumed that he will stay in South Korea, although that is not a certainty.

There have also been persistent reports that he will somehow try to retain behind-the-scenes power, perhaps from a post-retirement job at the Ilhae Foundation, a Government-sponsored research center.

Nothing is clear, though, except for one thing, Mr. Chun says, and that is that the days of military takeovers are over.

‘‘It will not happen again,’’ he said. ‘‘It should not happen again. If it should, Korea would bring a misfortune upon itself.’’

Document 341

Copyright 1988 The Washington Post The Washington Post
January 30, 1988, Saturday, Final Edition

SECTION: FIRST SECTION; PAGE A14
LENGTH: 862 words
HEADLINE: Chun Says He’s Eager To Exit; S. Korean President Seeks Appreciation
BYLINE: Fred Hiatt, Washington Post Foreign Service
DATELINE: SEOUL, Jan. 29, 1988
BODY:

South Korean President Chun Doo Hwan, who seized power in an Army coup eight years ago, said today that he is not only willing but eager to cede power when his term ends next month.

Speaking at an elaborately staged news conference amid the regal trappings that have helped make him deeply unpopular in this country, Chun said he hopes to be remembered as the nation’s first chief executive to retire willingly. His friend and former Army colleague, Roh Tae Woo, is scheduled to be inaugurated Feb. 25 after winning last month’s presidential election.

Chun defended his seizure of power as having been essential for the nation’s survival. “The question of legitimacy does not exist as far as I am concerned,” he said.

He urged Koreans not to “reopen the wound” of Kwangju, where soldiers gunned down hundreds of civilians protesting Chun’s takeover in May 1980. Many Koreans have urged an investigation to determine what role Chun, Roh or other leaders may have played in ordering special forces into the city.

The 57-year-old retired general said he has “many things he can be very proud of.” Asked what he regretted or might do differently, Chun cited no mistakes.

“The job was thrust upon me, and I can assure you it was not all pleasurable duty,” Chun said. “It was hard work and very demanding duty, and soon I will be liberated from it. . . . Nowadays, I am not getting very much sleep because I’m so excited about moving out.”

Visitors who have seen Chun recently have reported finding the normally steely president misty-eyed and displaying some “Richard Nixon-esque recriminations about not being appreciated,” as one said.

He told Korean reporters three weeks ago that he finally understood why his predecessor, Park Chung Hee, who was assassinated in 1979 after 18 years in office, held on to “such a painful job for so long.”

“I had expected that if I said I would leave here at the end of my term, people would try to understand and cover my mistakes, if any,” Chun said. “But such an expectation went amiss. . . . They dug into me and intensified their attack.

“Frankly speaking, in the face of such a situation, one would hardly feel like giving up power, from anger,” he added. “In a country like ours, it requires a lot more courage to give up power than to grab it.”

One year ago, Koreans still wondered whether Chun would really step down and whether, if he did, he would seek to wield power from behind the scenes. But widespread street protests against his regime last June persuaded Chun to allow direct elections.

During the fall campaign, opposition leaders openly attacked Chun as a military dictator. Even Roh, whose campaign literature carried photographs of President Reagan but not Chun, implicitly criticized him for tolerating torture, financial scandal and other abuses.

Instead of wondering how Chun would hold on to power, Koreans began to wonder whether he could remain in the country -- or, more broadly, whether a man widely viewed as an ex-dictator would be tolerated or investigated in the new era.

Roh’s victory Dec. 16 dampened that speculation, too. “I sense that Chun’s future in this country before the election was a burning question, but I don’t think it’s much of an issue anymore,” a western diplomat said.

But a Korean political analyst said he believes that Chun eventually will have to leave South Korea.

“Maybe he will be safe while Roh is still in power,” he said. “But eventually, he will not be safe. People will not forget. He is too guilty.”

An opposition legislator, Hong Sa Duk, said he hopes that Chun “will be respected by the majority of the people for the accomplishment of stepping down.”

But asked whether history will take a kinder view of Chun than do many of his contemporaries, Hong said, “No, never.”

“He committed criminal mistakes in the course of taking power, and he was one reason for corruption and financial scandal,” Hong said.

Chun is disliked by many Koreans for his coup, for the Kwangju incident and for his willingness to allow relatives to hold government jobs and, according to widely circulated reports, to enrich themselves.

But Chun also has been disliked for his imperious style, for his habit of lecturing his people on values and morality and for his aloofness.

Some of those traits were evident today as Chun hosted his first news conference for the foreign media in an ornate dining hall rich with gold leaf. Chun sat in a gold-backed chair larger than everyone else’s and smoked a cigarette in a gold-tipped holder.

Presidential aides instructed reporters to rise and applaud when Chun entered and to remove all rings before shaking Chun’s hand. Two of the five reporters selected to ask questions had agreed beforehand to deliver short speeches of gratitude.

Chun indicated that he has found such trappings of power a burden.

“I have been deprived of my personal liberty,” he said. And, although his imprisonment of political dissidents has been a major issue during his tenure, there was no intended irony apparent when he added, “The one citizen of Korea who is most deprived of this valuable commodity, personal freedom, is the president.”

GRAPHIC: PHOTO, “NOWADAYS, I AM NOT GETTING VERY MUCH SLEEP BECAUSE I’M SO EXCITED ABOUT MOVING OUT,” S. KOREAN PRESIDENT CHUN DOO HWAN TELLS REPORTERS YESTERDAY. AP

Document 342

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
January 29, 1988, Friday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 34, Column 6; Editorial Desk
LENGTH: 370 words
HEADLINE: Democracy Is Far In South Korea
BODY:

To the Editor:

Contrary to Daryl Plunk (‘‘The Main Challenge Facing South Korea,’’ Op-Ed, Jan. 8), most foreign observers did not declare the Korean election fair. I was a member of an election observer delegation of 18 Congressional aides and specialists on Korea sponsored by the Council for Democracy in Korea. We expressed concern about abuses we witnessed and reports from credible Korean sources. Another delegation raised questions about absentee voting and the Government’s unfair media advantage in the campaign. The National Coalition for Democracy, representing Korean groups, collected evidence of more than 1,000 voting and ballot-counting abuses.

Without open investigation, we may never know the extent of election fraud. Illegalities committed by the Government, the ruling party and their supporters to aid Roh Tae Woo’s campaign raise doubts whether Mr. Roh and the Government respect democracy any more now than over the last seven years of dictatorial rule. Information given to our delegation by reliable sources in Seoul adds to these doubts. The Korean Government was prepared to carry out schemes to prevent opposition victory, but dropped its plans after a poll five days before the election convinced the ruling party that it could beat the split opposition.

Mr. Plunk seems to forget that even before the campaign Mr. Roh promised freedom of speech and press, and release of nonviolent political prisoners. But the press is still controlled. The police recently invaded the National Coalition for Democracy office and seized reports on election abuses. Hundreds detained for political reasons are still imprisoned.

The National Assembly elections will represent progress only if the Government agrees to change an election law that gives the ruling party a legislative majority with far less than 50 percent of the popular vote.

Finally, Mr. Plunk’s reference to palliatives for the pain and resentment of the Kwangju massacre neglects the real and still-unresolved issue - the Korean military’s role as final arbiter of important domestic political matters.

JAKE DOHERTY Cambridge, Mass., Jan. 19, 1988 The writer is a graduate student in East Asian studies at Harvard.

Document 343

Copyright 1988 The Washington Post The Washington Post
January 16, 1988, Saturday, Final Edition

SECTION: EDITORIAL; PAGE A22; LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
LENGTH: 615 words
HEADLINE: South Korea: ‘Silence Would Have Been Golden’
BODY:

Rep. Stephen Solarz [op-ed, Dec. 27] accepts the legitimacy of the electoral outcome in South Korea, contending that the process was relatively fair and that Roh Tae Woo’s victory margin of 2 million votes was too large to have been manufactured by fraud.

If voting and ballot counting went honestly, why did the government stop an independent vote count by the National Coalition for Democracy, a nonpartisan coalition of 26 labor, intellectual and religious groups? The NCD tally, halted after 62.2 percent of the votes were tabulated, showed considerable discrepancy from the government figures. If manipulation was immaterial to the election results, why did the government confiscate 2,000 copies of an NCD report that documents widespread fraud?

Rep. Solarz also concludes that “the regional breakdown of the results [was] . . . what one would have expected” because the two Kims scored decisively in their home regions.

But highly anomalous voting patterns emerged in key areas. For example, in 14 of the 15 electoral districts in Seoul, with 25 percent of the national votes, Kim Dae Jung came out on top. He was first in most of the 420 or so precincts in these districts. Curiously, however, in one precinct in each of the districts, Mr. Roh out-polled Kim Dae Jung heavily, while trailing him elsewhere in Seoul. This anomaly enabled Mr. Roh to stay close to Kim Dae Jung and to finish ahead of Kim Young Sam in Seoul. In Inchon, which is a geographic and demographic extension of Seoul, Mr. Roh led Kim Dae Jung by a 2-to-1 margin, an inexplicably sharp reversal of the trend in Seoul.

Condescendingly remarking that “electoral chicanery has even taken place in Brooklyn,” Rep. Solarz asserts that the electoral process was legitimate unless fraud and abuses altered its outcome. But how can the extent of wrongdoing be chronicled and its significance assessed when the government prohibits an independent verification of the official vote count and documentation of fraud?

Koreans can ill afford to treat electoral shenanigans as trite and inconsequential because they may again raise their ugly heads in the upcoming National Assembly election and future presidential elections. Even if fraud did not figure in the outcome of the December contest, only an immediate, open and full investigation can point up ways to reduce the likelihood of a recurrence. Otherwise, Korean democracy will stall at the gate. It is inappropriate and ill-advised, therefore, for an American congressman to discount the significance of electoral abuses.

Rep. Solarz’s cavalier comments on electoral fraud have only agitated the already angry students and religious groups. Their anti-Americanism has its origin in the presumed complicity of the United States in the May 1980 Kwangju massacre and in the Reagan administration’s Korea policy -- which has consistently backed the Chun dictatorship.

This brings into question Jarol Manheim’s argument [op-ed, Dec. 30] that Koreans are anti-American because of “a new assertiveness . . . of their independence and national pride,” “[r]ather than inherently negative feelings about the United States.” Anti-Americanism is a worrisome development that demands a critical eval‎uation of U.S. policy toward Korea, not a positive phenomenon from which Americans can walk away, congratulating Koreans for their newly found “independence” and “pride.”

The condescension, bad timing and inaccuracy of the remarks of Rep. Solarz and Mr. Manheim are certain to add more fuel to anti-American feelings in South Korea. Silence would have been golden in this case. CHOI SUNG-IL Executive Director, Korean Institute for Human Rights Alexandria

Document 344

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
January 6, 1988, Wednesday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 23, Column 2; Editorial Desk
LENGTH: 690 words
HEADLINE: The Main Challenge Facing South Korea
BYLINE: By Daryl M. Plunk; Daryl M. Plunk monitored the South Korean election for the National Republican Institute for International Affairs, an arm of the Republican Party.
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
BODY:

A new political era is dawning in South Korea. While significant tensions linger from the presidential vote last month, the election may be the nation’s most dramatic progress in political development since its formation in 1948.

Roh Tae Woo, chosen president in an electoral process judged fair by most South Koreans as well as most foreign observers, will be sworn in on Feb. 25, marking the first peaceful transfer of power in South Korean history. A new, democratic constitution, drafted earlier this year by all major parties, will also take effect that day.

This represents a dramatic turnaround from the turbulent days last June when large street demonstrations erupted in support of constitutional revision and a direct presidential election system. Opposition leaders Kim Young Sam and Kim Dae Jung led the campaign that pressured the Government into making the sweeping concessions.

But while the ‘‘two Kims’’ had pledged to run a single opposition candidate to avoid splitting its ranks, they ultimately ran on separate tickets, contributing to their defeat.

Mr. Roh, with only some 36 percent of the votes, now faces an urgent challenge to achieve national reconciliation. Some wounds can be soothed by fulfilling campaign promises, such as guaranteeing freedom of speech, press and assembly. He also said he would release the remaining political prisoners, prohibit intelligence agencies from conducting domestic activities and offer to include opposition members in his cabinet.

One of his first concerns should be to defuse the intense regional animosities, which flared during the campaign. Many citizens of Cholla Province, a predominantly agricultural region and Kim Dae Jung’s political base, asserted that they have been denied the fruits of South Korea’s rapid industrialization. Since Kyungsang Province has produced much of South Korea’s military, business and political leaders, including Mr. Roh, these tensions have increased in recent years.

Regional sentiments are still strong from the so-called Kwangju incident. In 1980, some 200 people were killed in the south Cholla capital after soldiers were called in to contain demonstrators protesting the arrest of Kim Dae Jung. Many Cholla residents hold Mr. Roh, then an army general, partly responsible.

Mr. Roh has extended an olive branch by calling for an investigation of the incident. He has also raised the possibility of monetary compensation for the victims’ relatives and possibly erecting a memorial to those who died. Finally, Mr. Roh has said he will give special attention to improving economic development in Cholla.

Despite these daunting problems, the post-election mood suggests that most citizens are willing to give Mr. Roh a chance to prove himself. He must act decisively on his election promises as well as satisfy the people’s growing demand for a stronger voice in their government.

Mr. Roh should reopen a dialogue with his political opponents as soon as possible. For their part, the two Kims, who continue to allege election rigging, should accept the people’s choice if they cannot produce evidence of systematic fraud.

The two Kims’ political reputations have been severely damaged by their failure to unite, and they are widely viewed as having placed their personal ambitions above all else. Some opposition members, particularly young politicians who have been prevented by the old guard from rising to leadership positions, now openly criticize the Kims’ 20-year domination of their respective factions. The Kims may not suddenly fade away, but they will likely lose their iron grip on the opposition movement.

South Koreans want political development commensurate with their economic success. The next measure of progress will be the National Assembly elections in February.

Democracy in South Korea will not likely spring up in full bloom as a result of the presidential race. Neither is democracy simply a set of political rules spelled out in a constitution. It is, rather, a process that allows differing views to achieve consensus on important national issues. This is the real challenge facing South Korea.

Document 345

Copyright 1988 The New York Times Company The New York Times
January 5, 1988, Tuesday, Late City Final Edition

SECTION: Section A; Page 18, Column 6; Editorial Desk
LENGTH: 312 words
HEADLINE: SOUTH KOREA TESTS BLIND U.S. ANTI-COMMUNISM; Unmet Aspirations
BODY:

To the Editor:

With the election of Roh (pronounced ‘‘No’’) Tae Woo in South Korea, the world will watch to see if true democratic changes occur. For beyond political democracy, lies the democratic organization of society, including its laborers.

On July 17, I visited a factory in Seoul. Conditions were reminiscent of the 19th-century Lawrence, Mass., textile mills. Teen-age women, recent arrivals from the countryside, work 13-hour days, 6-day weeks, for 65 cents an hour. They live in hostels above the factories, 10 to a room, returning half their wages to the American-owned company for ‘‘room’’ and meals. The average hourly pay for all industries is $1.75; for females it is $1.02. Piece work, speedup and nonvoluntary overtime are commonplace in South Korea.

Industrial accidents are among the highest in the world. In 1986, 141,809 accidents, with 1,600 fatalities, were reported (with statistics kept for only 4.5 million of the 15.5 million employed). No data are available on work-related illnesses.

Such working conditions are generating upheavals in many countries today. They contribute to trade imbalances and continue the debt crisis, which threatens to destabilize us all.

Roh Tae Woo, who was elected by 37 percent of the voters, is a military classmate of the current leader. Together, they trained at Fort Bragg, N.C., and together they served in Vietnam. They were army officers at the time of the 1980 Kwangju massacre, an event whose resolution, many believe, must preceed lasting peace in the hearts of South Koreans.

If peace does not now come to South Korea, the blame for ‘‘unrest’’ will surely be placed on ‘‘the opposition,’’ on the students, the laborers and the human rights activists. But the underlying reasons will be the unmet aspirations of the South Korean people.

PAUL ROBERT EPSTEIN Cambridge, Mass., Dec. 22, 1987

Document 346

Copyright 1987 The Times Mirror Company Los Angeles Times
December 31, 1987, Thursday, Home Edition

SECTION: Part 1; Page 8; Column 1; Foreign Desk
LENGTH: 799 words
HEADLINE: KOREAN ASKS UNITY BUT BLASTS RIVAL; KIM YOUNG SAM SEEKS TO PREVENT SPLIT IN ASSEMBLY VOTE
BYLINE: By DAVID HOLLEY, Times Staff Writer
DATELINE: SEOUL, South Korea
BODY:

Kim Young Sam, who finished second in the Dec. 16 presidential election, declared Wednesday that all opposition forces should unite in his Reunification Democratic Party to contest a National Assembly election next year.

Although presented as a call for unity, Kim’s declaration, made in a press conference at his home, amounted to an attack on his opposition rival, Kim Dae Jung, third-place finisher in the presidential race, whom he accused of responsibility for the victory of ruling-party candidate Roh Tae Woo.

Kim Dae Jung split away from Kim’s party to create the Party for Peace and Democracy and launch his own campaign.

Unity Around His Party

“Kim Dae Jung should recognize the fact that he quit the Reunification Democratic Party and turned away from efforts to field a single opposition candidate simply to enable him to run,” Kim Young Sam said. “It is in accord with reason and the people’s aspirations that the opposition camp be united around the Reunification Democratic Party.”

In an interview later in the day, Kim Young Sam said that his finish ahead of Kim Dae Jung in the presidential election -- it was by only a single percentage point, 27.5% to 26.5% -- showed that responsibility for splitting the opposition rested with Kim Dae Jung. Roh Tae Woo won with 36.6% of the vote.

“By the result of this election, people know who should have been the single opposition candidate,” Kim Young Sam said. “I am the winner in that regard.”

Kim Young Sam said at his press conference that he is not seeking a formal merger of the two parties.

“There is no time to follow the complicated procedures required for mergers,” he said. “The integration can be achieved when those who left the Reunification Democratic Party just return to their old home.”

Kim Young Sam’s statement drew sharp criticism from a spokesman for the Party for Peace and Democracy, who denounced it as “nonsense” and a “hollow political show” designed to boost Kim Young Sam’s image before a convention of his party planned for early January.

Sees Different Ideologies

Kim Dae Jung said that “the two parties speak for different social strata and subscribe to different ideologies. Their merger is out of the question.”

Kim Dae Jung has recently sought to portray Kim Young Sam’s party as conservative, and his own as moderately reformist.

According to South Korean press reports, however, some officials of the Party for Peace and Democracy expressed hope that the two opposition parties could coordinate their efforts in the legislative elections, which are expected to be held either in February or April.

The Party for Peace and Democracy is especially strong in the two Cholla provinces, Kim Dae Jung’s home region, while Kim Young Sam’s party is strongest in his native Kyongsang region. Officials of Kim Dae Jung’s party expressed hope that the two opposition groups would agree to improve their chances by refraining from running candidates in each other’s strongholds.

Kim Young Sam, in the interview, predicted that Roh will face difficulties after taking office because of two pledges he made at a Dec. 12 rally, in his last major speech of the campaign.

At that rally, Roh pledged that “all major past scandals will be stringently investigated” and dealt with “sternly.” He also pledged to submit to “an interim appraisal” by the people after the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul. Roh told reporters later that day that if the appraisal, perhaps to be made through a national referendum, were negative, he would resign.

Roh’s pledge to investigate scandals is sensitive because a major scandal of the present administration involved the uncle of President Chun Doo Hwan’s wife. Also, reports are widespread that other Chun relatives have been involved in graft and corruption.

Sees Difficulty for Roh

Kim Young Sam said Wednesday that Roh would have difficulty keeping these promises, because Roh is personally close to Chun, but if he breaks them he will face the anger of the people.

In other developments Wednesday:

-- A riot policeman, Shin Sung Man, 45, died of burns suffered when hit by a gasoline firebomb during a Dec. 20 anti-government protest in the city of Kwangju. Shin’s death was the first reported from post-election violence.

-- Roh, as part of an effort to solidify support through meetings with civic leaders, visited Cardinal Kim Sou Hwan, one of the country’s most prominent religious leaders. The cardinal urged Roh to visit Kwangju in an attempt to heal the wounds left by the 1980 Kwangju uprising.

By official count, 194 people died in the anti-government uprising, which began when demonstrations were bloodily suppressed. Many opposition supporters believe that as many as 1,000 people died at the hands of government forces.

Document 347

Copyright 1987 The Christian Science Publishing Society The Christian Science Monitor
December 22, 1987, Tuesday

SECTION: International; Pg. 9
LENGTH: 780 words
HEADLINE: South Korea’s Roh faces key tests to establish his legitimacy
BYLINE: Daniel Sneider, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
DATELINE: Tokyo

HIGHLIGHT: Opponents look for delivery on election promises
BODY:

South Korea’s President-elect, Roh Tae Woo, has won power through democracy. But to many Koreans he still must prove that he is a democrat.

The former Army general must overcome deep-rooted suspicions that the ruling elite, particularly the military and police apparatus, will revert to their old authoritarian ways now that the immediate threat of opposition takeover is past.

During the presidential election campaign, South Koreans enjoyed an unprecedented degree of freedom of assembly and speech. ‘‘Can this be maintained?’’ asks eminent political scientist Lee Hong Goo. ‘‘People are half-believing, half-doubting. If not, the democratic restructuring will be artificial.’’

These doubts reflect the broader challenge Mr. Roh faces to establish the legitimacy of his rule. Though Roh emerged with a solid plurality victory in last week’s presidential election, the majority of the electorate voted against him. His three main opponents charge that the ruling party employed unfair and illegitimate means to win.

‘‘The winner has been born,’’ the influential leader of the Korean Roman Catholic Church said yesterday. ‘‘The joy of victory has not been shared wholeheartedly here by the people.’’

‘‘I have wished to have Christmas be a festival with all people taking part in the new days of democracy through a fair and square election,’’ Cardinal Kim Sou Hwan said yesterday, ‘‘but we must criticize ourselves for the wrong idea that we expected the harvest of democracy from one stroke, without the process of cultivation through our own sweat and blood.’’

So far, Roh has shown sensitivity to those concerns. ‘‘I am aware that a significant portion of the vote went to the opposition,’’ he said the day after the election. ‘‘I am willing to reflect those opinions ... into policies I am going to make and and implement in my administration.’’

While opposition leaders Kim Young Sam and Kim Dae Jung continue to deny the validity of the election, members of their own parties are saying it is time to move on. ‘‘Everything is over now,’’ said Chung Jey Moon, a Kim Young Sam supporter and a member of the National Assembly. ‘‘We should give some time to Mr. Roh ... (he) must find a way to calm down student demonstrations and keep (his) promises... .’’

Among the promises of democratic reforms Roh made during the campaign, Korean analysts say, there are four which will be key tests for his administration:

*Elections for South Korea’s legislature, the National Assembly, which could take place as early as mid-February;

*The inclusion of non-ruling-party opinions in the new cabinet;

*Limitations on the domestic role of intelligence agencies;

*Investigation of past abuses, including the 1980 Kwangju massacre, and corruption under outgoing President Chun Doo Hwan.

Roh does not actually take office until Feb. 25, but he will have to deal with problems surrounding the National Assembly vote before then. The ruling and opposition parties disagree on the timing of the vote, with the former seeking a ballot in February. The two sides also disagree on proposed revisions for the system of apportioning assembly seats for voting districts.

The opposition may refuse to talk on these issues, on the grounds it would legitimize what they say was a fraudulent election. Roh’s party may be tempted to push the changes through unilaterally. ‘‘Since Roh Tae Woo promised to build consensus politics,’’ Professor Lee points out, ‘‘that may look bad.’’

The willingness of the new administration to tolerate dissent is a sensitive subject. South Koreans have long lived in fear of the ubiquitous presence of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency. Roh, in a proposal for ‘‘democratic reconciliation’’ delivered last week, said the intelligence agencies would only be concerned with external threats.

During the election, campaign rallies were unimpeded. ‘‘At the same time,’’ a Korean analyst noted, ‘‘the dissident movement has been ruthlessly smashed.’’ Demonstrations called by the National Coalition for Democracy, an alliance of church, human rights, and other antigovernment activists, have been blocked and members arrested.

Roh, says legislator Chung, ‘‘must allow new voices in society, even if they are closer to the left.’’

Chung believes that there are reasons to hope that Roh will be more democratic in his approach than autocratic President Chun. ‘‘Roh Tae Woo got a lesson in the last one month: how difficult it is to be elected. He knows (the) people’s power. President Chun never experienced (that).’’

Still, as Cardinal Kim so poignantly put it, ‘‘The night is still long, and the dawn of a festive morning seems to be far away.’’

GRAPHIC: Picture, Roh vowed to bring opposing views to his administration, NEAL MENSCHEL - STAFF