586개의 게시물을 찾았습니다.
Yesterday's K. Times reported that "Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon asked President Lee Myung-bak to grant a pardon to eight people convicted of violence during the clash between riot police and tenants over a redevelopment project in Yongsan, central Seoul, back in 2009. The city government said Park sent a written proposal to the President Tuesday, asking him to consider releasing the former tenants and labor activists who are currently in jail..."(*)
Today's Hankyoreh editorial demanded that "Yongsan victims deserve presidential pardon"!
JUSTICE & LIBERTY FOR THE "YONGSAN EIGHT"!!
* It seems that Seoul has - for the first time in history - a mayor who's not (only) interested in the wellbeing of the rich(i.e. the ruling class)... Instead he's (at least) trying to show/execute his responsibility for the "ordinary"(i.e. the poorer, but hardworking) citizens! Well, that's just my opinion... And I hope that's not only my wishful thinking!!
Last Month(1.11) we'd to learn that (according to a facebook source) "Our friend, photographer (social and political activist) Park Jeong-geun who has been inspected by the 'National Security Law', became under arrest by 'infringing the National Security Law' today, as accepting an arrest warrent. Jung-geun has been RETWEETING the twitter account @uriminzok (account from North Korea) and made some black humor of 'Viva la Kim...!"
Last Thursday NYT reported that the "South Korean prosecutors indicted a social media and freedom-of-speech activist this week for reposting messages from the North Korean government’s Twitter account..."
And today's (bourgeois/reactionary newspaper) JoongAng Ilbo published the following piece (*):
Sarcastic tweeter indicted for aiding the enemy
The prosecution of a 23-year-old Twitter user who reposted messages from a North Korean propaganda site has reignited a perennial controversy. Was he practicing his freedom of speech or was he serving the interest of the enemy?
Park Jung-geun, who runs a photo studio in Amsa-dong, eastern Seoul, was indicted Tuesday on charges of violating the National Security Law. According to the prosecution, Park, a member of the Socialist Party, retweeted messages posted on the Twitter account of the North’s official propaganda site, Uriminzokkiri.
It was the first time that the prosecution indicted a suspect for retweetting pro-North Korea messages.
Park is an active Twitter user, having posted tens of thousands of messages after creating his account three years ago. From December 2010 to late last year, Park retweeted 96 postings from the Uriminzokkiri account and posted 34 pro-North messages, the prosecution said.
All the messages retweeted from the North’s account praised Pyongyang, and Park’s own messages included arguments that were deemed in violation of the National Security Law.
“Dear eternal president [of the North], just order us and we will race to sweep the American imperialist enemies from this country,” Park wrote on Dec. 15, 2011. After the North’s shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, Park wrote, “This is why Seoul needs a nuclear attack.”
Park was arrested Jan. 11 for investigation, and prosecutors made the indictment with a pretrial detention of Park Tuesday. He was detained at the Suwon Detention Center and could face up to seven years of imprisonment.
Park and his lawyer argued the postings were meant to mock the North Korean regime. A member of the Socialist Party, Park said his party is critical of the North’s third-generation, dynastical power succession.
According to the prosecutors, it is rare for them to seek pretrial detention for a suspect charged with violating Article 7 of the National Security Law, which forbids the act of praising, inciting or propagating anti-state activities.
But the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office said it sought pretrial detention because Park continued to post and retweet allegedly anti-state messages even after the investigation began.
On Jan. 17, Park made public a letter addressed to President Lee Myung-bak saying, “My sexual desire was reduced after the law enforcement authorities’ raids and questioning.”
“It’s true that his postings were funny, but 80 of the 130 allegedly pro-North postings were made even after we began the probe,” a prosecution source said. “There was a concern that he would continue to do so. Taking into account his attitude and messages in the postings, he was well-aware that his actions benefit the enemy.”
A source at the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office also said Twitter’s strong influence was taken into consideration. “Park was a famous Twitter user with 5,900 followers,” the source said. “There was an incident in which a middle school student retweeted one of his posts and also wrote a post to praise the North.”
Park and his lawyer said Park did not realize his actions were considered advantageous to the North. They said pretrial detention of Park was an excessive application of the law and violated his freedom of speech. They said they will prove Park’s innocence in court.
Amnesty International issued a statement Wednesday to demand the release of Park, calling the indictment “ludicrous.”
“This is not a national security case,” said Sam Zarifi, Asia-Pacific director of the human rights group. “It’s a sad case of the South Korean authorities’ complete failure to understand sarcasm.”
Today's protest against censorship and restrictions on democratic freedom in front of Seoul's Nat'l Assembly
* Related articles:
☞ Relaying pro-NK messages on Twitter causes stir (K. Times, 2.07)
☞ South Korean Indicted Over Twitter Posts From North (NYT, 2.02)
☞ South Korea must release activist charged over Kim Jong-il tweet (AI, 2.01)
Recently published pieces, related to the "fascinating" S.K. "democracy", ruled by the NSL:
☞ Military to screen all mobile apps (Korea Herald, 2.07)
☞ Questions behind true motivation for blocking of N. Korean websites (Hankyoreh, 2.06)
Last Friday(2.03) the (somehow famous^^) actor/director Robert Redford(U.S.A.) published in onearth magazine "The Battle for Jeju Island: How the Arms Race is Threatening a Korean Paradise", an essay to support the resistance movement, fighting against the planned naval base on S. Korea's Jeju Island... (*)
And only two days later onearth received the following "reply":
Republic of Korea(R.O.K) Navy's standpoint on Robert Redford's article "The Battle for Jeju Island: How the Arms Race is Threatening a Korean Paradise"
1. The R.O.K Navy extends our regard for your interest and passion on environmental issues. However, we would like to point out that your article only cites few opponents' arguments that are far from the truth.
2. First of all, as the Republic of Korea Government already expressed to the public many times, the Jeju Naval Base is being built for the security of R.O.K and has no relations to U.S. defense policy whatsoever.
3. The Jeju Naval Base has undergone each and every legal and administrative environmental procedure including the assessment of environmental impact. In this assessment of environmental impact, related specialists and the locals participated hand in hand. Furthermore, the R.O.K Navy continues to preserve the environment with utmost interest and effort.
4. Last but not least, the Jeju Naval Base is being built as an "eco-friendly civil-military scenic port" that leads harmony with the locals. The Jeju Naval Base will be a leading model concerning any possible environmental issue."
Possibly there's no comment necessary!!(^^)
* Related articles:
☞ Robert Redford cries out against Jeju naval base construction (K. Herald, 2.06)
☞ Robert Redford protests naval base plan on Jeju (Korea Times, 2.05)
Seoul's Metropolitan Gov't announced on Monday that it will re-evaluate its “New Town" projects through a series of feasibility studies that could ultimately determine their fate. During a press conference Seoul's Mayor Park Won-soon said that the city will hear from residents and landlords in 610 areas that have been designated for the project, which aims to create new residential areas after old ones are demolished(*).
Well, as I already said before: that's "possibly(??) a first step in the right direction"...
Today's Kyunghyang Shinmun wrote in its editorial the following:
Seoul's 'New Town' Policy's Concept and Direction Are Correct
Two days ago, Seoul City announced new policies for "New Towns" and development projects that change in an innovative way the existing framework for housing development.
This would change the system to one centered on residents, not land and house owners, and one centered on building communities and villages, not business value or total evictions.
Specifically, the city presented a plan that would lift the designations of the 610 of 1,300 designated new town, redevelopment or rebuilding zones where building plans have yet to be approved and instead push small-scale alternative rehabilitation projects, while strengthening support for places where plans are going well in order to enable them to proceed more quickly.
It also put forth residency right guarantee measures that included supplying public housing to tenants and others marginalized by housing refurbishment projects.
Seoul's new policy is praiseworthy in that it ends or reduces the great harm done by existing housing rehabilitation projects such as real estate speculation, mass production of evictees, rises in rent and the collapse of communities.
The problem is that there are many obstacles to Seoul's policies actually being carried out. This is because of the interests of local residents bitterly entwined in housing rehabilitation projects.
More than anything, the key to the success of the policy is the issue of dealing with sunk costs resulting from the lifting of the designation. In places designated redevelopment zones, local residents have already sunk much money into the projects no matter how little they may have actually progressed.
If Seoul lifts the designations now, it cannot but compensate the residents. Seoul has asked the central government for support, saying it cannot bear the costs given its financial condition, but the solution won't be easy. For the central government to support losses suffered in autonomous projects carried out by local residents requires amending laws and social agreements.
It won't be easy to relax amplified tensions, either, in cases where local residents' opinions differ, in the process of lifting designations.
As Mayor Park Won-soon said, the new policy is not a solution that will satisfy everyone. Still, we think that if it has fewer side-effects than the existing policy and is of a better direction, it's worth pushing somehow.
Seoul City must do its best to put the new policy into practice. If support from the government is necessary, the city shouldn't unilaterally announce the policy without sufficient prior negotiations with the government. It must persuade the government while it bows its head and begs.
The Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs has already said accepting Seoul's request will be difficult. Seoul must keep in mind that if it pushes the new policy with only the justification that good things are good, the policy could flounder as even greater chaos is created. We call on Seoul to do its best.
http://english.khan.co.kr/khan_art_view.html?artid=201202011508577&code=790101
* Related articles:
☞ New Town projects crumbling (Korea Times, 1.30)
☞ 박원순 "서울시 뉴타운사업 610곳 재검토" (views&news, 1.30)
☞ City to re-evaluate its ‘new town’ developments (JoongAng Ilbo, 1.31)
Now the S. Korean ruling class wants to retaliate (according to yesterday's K. Times):
18-month prison term sought for female labor activist
The prosecution has sought an 18-month prison term for Kim Jin-suk, a labor activist who staged a sit-in on a giant crane in the shipyard of Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction in Busan for 309 days, on charges of interfering with business.
In a hearing at Busan District Court, Tuesday, prosecutors asked the court to hand down the jail term to Kim, who pled guilty.
“By holding the long-term protest, Kim paralyzed the company’s business, disgraced the firm’s image and created a bad precedent that a person can act illegally to attain their purpose. We want the ruling to show those committing illegal acts should take responsibility,” a prosecutor said.
“The strike at Hanjin Heavy was protracted and became a nationwide issue. Outsiders on Hope Buses also intervened and their actions caused extended chaos in Busan,” he said.
Kim admitted to the accusations but claimed her acts were justifiable in a two-page final statement.
“A company should keep agreements with laborers but Hanjin Heavy failed to do so often. Those not keeping promises should be punished first, then justice can be realized,” said the 51-year-old in a working uniform.
“The suppression of Hope Bus rallies was too harsh. The movement was a social demonstration to prevent a massive layoff, to protect laborers who were abandoned by society,” she said.
Kim was indicted without physical detention on charges of interfering with the company’s business by staging a sit-in inside the operator’s cabin of a 35-meter-high giant crane from Jan. 6 to Nov. 10 last year to protest a massive layoff.
The verdict will be delivered on Feb. 16.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/01/117_103866.html
Two days ago(1.28) the spokeswoman of the Jaenueng Struggle Collective released the following statement:
I and my fellow fighters have waged a battle against the Jaeneung Education Institute for the last 1,500 days, and it still doesn’t end. Each and every one of us has been put through indescribable daily hell; we did not rest a single day for the past 100 days. Nonetheless we brace for another chapter of the ongoing struggle.
A while ago, I found a middle-aged man weeping before our camp at dawn. I was surprised to see the man because he was a stranger to the camp. It turned out that he was a member of the labor union at Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction, which recently won a victory in a seemingly impossible situation; the union members were promised to be rehired a year later. This miracle-like triumph planted a hope among people. In all those years, we could not even make a tent before the headquarters of Jaeneung at freezing nights. I and my fellow warriors spent countless nights in a cold vehicle. But we were not alone; some intoxicated people came by and, in a rising fury, knocked heavily on the door of Jaeneung Education Institute or knocked down flowerpots nearby.
You might wonder: "Why are you on the street everyday like a reminder of sadness and sorrow?"
The teachers who continue to work for Jaeneung and visit homes of their students could have forgotten us. Those who know us might want to forget us. About 3,800 teachers banded together when teachers at Jaeneung first established a labor union. But not all the original members sticked together in raising our voice over the past 12 years -- they stayed with us for less than a quarter of that time. For the remaining 8+ years, those who stayed fought alone on the streets with tooth and nail against the behemoth in the private education industry. Many of our fellow members were hounded, scathed, hurt and crushed and in the end left the struggle in a defeated spirit.
Yet, we remained and continue to fight on the street.
We demanded that the company rehires all the 12 laid-off workers, but they refused to rehire one member of us.
Ms. Lee Ji-hyeon was one of our former warriors. She was one of the workers who set up a labor union in 1999 and has been with us in this struggle for years and years. But she developed cancer during our collective struggle. We could hardly afford to visit her lying in a sick bed; we silently wept when we heard that her health is rapidlly declining and failing her. We wept again on the day she passed away.
We are a small group of people who number slightly over ten, yet we choose to confront the gigantic force who has constantly oppressed their workers. Amidst our bleeding, we sometimes direct our fury against each other, but nonetheless we keep planning our daily battle.
You might ask: "Why do you keep fighting?"
We demand two things:
1) Jaeneung acknowledges and permits our labor union, which Jaeneung deprived from us solely because we chose to fight
2) Jaeneung rehires all laid-off workers
Each warrior has his or her own reason to continuously participate in Sit-in Struggle.
One fighter wants to bring back the wonderful time of 33 days in and around December 1999. It was a time when "Labor Union of Educational Workers at Jaeneung: Our Shared Love and Dream" was founded, which kindled hope and brought smiles to faces of teachers as they worked at homes of their young learners.
Another member simply wishes to leave behind ten years of being unemployed and join the flow of people who go to work.
Another warrior aspires to rebuild the disbanded labor union. Another one of us seeks revenge against the corporation that wielded its vast capital to destroy his life.
And there's a warrior who wants to go back to co-workers who have trusted their darling students and him and stayed together through thick and thin.
We want to rejoin a Jaeneung that acknowledges labor union, a company where diligent educational workers are not forced to "pay for" the loss of client students out of their salary as punishment. We yearn to return Jaeneung as a proud teacher who specializes in private home-tutoring, instead of being relegated into a second-class teacher. We refuse to be sacrificed as a scapegoat just to bolster monstrous growth of the corporation. That is why we refuse to accept neither phase-in reinstatement nor selective reinstatement, which Jaeneung thinks are "generous" offers.
We have no idea how long our sit-in struggle will go on. We only ask for this: the right existence of our labor union! But the dinosaur of capital and power is freaked out and says it can't give us any.
We wish to record our story with a happy ending that imbues every heart with hope; "The last twelve fighters, who confronted the ugly force who never stopped exploiting laborers and taking away things that made them workers, finally made a breakthrough and lived happily ever after."
(Translation by Kim Sun-ah)
Here you can read the original text in Korean!
Here you can read the editorial in today's Kyunghyang Shinmun, related to the 3rd anniversary of the Yongsan Massacre (2009.01.19/20):
Yongsan Disaster Three Years on: What Has Changed?
In the early hours of January 20, 2009, fire broke out in the lookout tower on the roof of the Namildang Building at "Yongsan Zone 4" redevelopment site in Seoul. Five evictees conducting a sit-in protest to resist forcible demolition and one policeman lost their lives. This was the "Yongsan Disaster."
Today marks the third anniversary of the disaster. Almost nothing, however, has changed.
The eight evictees detained at the time of the incident remain behind bars, while the livelihoods of the surviving family members of those that died remain in jeopardy.
The pain caused to tenants by indiscriminate redevelopment projects, unrealistic relocation compensation and violent forcible demolition continues.
Following the Yongsan Disaster, the government amended the "Built Environment Renewal Development Act" to increase the compensation for lost business provided to evicted tenants from three to four months' worth. It also introduced a "sunset system" whereby the designation of renewal zones is repealed if redevelopment does not take place within a certain period of time.
The government, however, has failed to produce a fundamental policy to prevent forcible eviction and demolition. Because of this, incidents of clashes between tenants and hired thugs continue to occur in areas such as Seoul's Sangdo 4-dong, Bugahyeon-dong and Myeong-dong.
If a second Yongsan Disaster is to be prevented, relevant laws must be passed as a matter of urgency. United Democratic Party lawmaker Chung Dong-young and others yesterday tabled a proposed bill for a "law on banning forcible eviction."
The bill is one that would ban violent activity by hired thugs at redevelopment sites and stipulate criminal penalties for those that violated the law, as well as banning eviction at times such as winter, bad weather, before sunrise and after sunset.
The bill also introduces a concept it calls 'resettlement of local residents,' and clearly stipulates specific policies for the resettlement of residents when redevelopment takes place.
Not much of the 18th National Assembly's term remains, but the ruling and opposition parties will have to find the will to pass the bill during the assembly's provisional session this February.
Another issue that requires a resolution on the third anniversary of the Yongsan Disaster is getting to the truth regarding what went on and releasing the evictees currently in prison.
At the time of the incident, prosecutors said that fire had broken out when the occupying protesters sprayed paint thinner and threw Molotov cocktails, but the evictees' surviving family members claim there is no evidence to conclusively attribute the fire to the Molotov cocktails, and are demanding an investigation to discover the truth.
Another problem is the fact that leading police officers have received no reprimand or punishment whatsoever, despite the fact that excessively hardline suppression constituted one of the causes of the disaster.
Then-chief of Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, Kim Seok-ki, who resigned following the incident, rose to a position as consul general in Osaka, Japan, and has returned to Korea saying that he will run as a candidate in the April general election.
While nobody claimed responsibility, the eight evictees were sentenced to four to five years' imprisonment and remain in jail.
Ahead of the Seollal public holidays the government has issued special pardons, commutations and reinstatements to 955 criminals convicted of livelihood-related crimes, while lifting more than 3,000 administrative restrictions placed on construction companies as a special favor. The jailed evictees, however, were kept off the list.
We believe the way to provide at least a minimum amount of solace to those that lost their lives through the Yongsan Tragedy is to release the comrades that were locked up after protesting alongside them.
We also believe that tragic situations such as replays of the Yongsan Tragedy can only be prevented by providing relocation compensation for tenants with a sufficient amount of money in the short term, and turning the paradigm of redevelopment projects toward housing welfare and boosting local communities in the mid to long term.
http://english.khan.co.kr/khan_art_view.html?artid=201201201605247&code=790101
Related articles:
☞ 끝나지 않은 용산의 외침, “여기 사람이 있다” (NewsCham, 1.20)
☞ ‘용산참사 지휘’ 김석기 총선 출마에 “끔찍하다” (Hankyoreh, 1.20)
☞ 용산참사 총지휘 김석기 '총선 출마' 끔찍합니다 (OMN, 1.19)
Last Wednesday(1.11) we'd to learn that (according to a facebook source) "Our friend, photographer Park Jeong-geun who has been inspected by the 'National Security Law', became under arrest by 'infringing the National Security Law' today, as accepting an arrest warrent. Jung-geun has been RETWEETING the twitter account @uriminzok (account from North Korea) and made some black humor of 'Viva la Kim...!"(*)
* Related articles:
☞ In South Korea, Old Law Leads To New Crackdown (npr, 2011.12.01)
☞ South Korean Law Casts Wide Net, Snaring Satirists in a Hunt for Spies (NYT, 2012.01.07)
☞ 박정근 “에리카 김 만나 사랑도, 내곡동에 살고 싶기도” (Hankyoreh, 2012.01.17)
☞ 정봉주와 박정근, 표현의 자유 ‘그 사이’ (NewsCham, 2012.01.12)
And finally here you can read Jeong-geun's 'open letter' to "His Excellency Mr. President Lee Myung-bak", written three days ago in Suwon Police Detention Center!
Today's (2nd) article in Hankyoreh, related to the 3rd Yongsan Massacre anniversary:
Couple torn apart by Yongsan tragedy still hanging on
Husband and wife find strength in current social movements and in each other
It was 3 pm Saturday in the No. 6 reception room at Anyang Prison. Separated by a transparent acrylic barrier and iron bars, the husband and wife were speaking through gestures before the microphone came on. The wife, forty-year-old Jeong Yeong-sin, mimed eating to ask, "Have you eaten?" and mimed running to ask, "Have you exercised?" Dressed in prison blue marked with number "2944," her husband Lee Chung-yeon, 41, had a shy look on his face, but a broad smile spread over it. He nodded his head vigorously at his wife's questions.
The couple married in 2008 after dating for six years. But their simple wish for a happy home was crushed just six months later when redevelopment plans went into effect for the Zone 4 area of Seoul's Yongsan district, where the couple was living.
The area was the site of the couple's pub, called Rea, which they opened in 2006, as well as their home and Lee's parents' home. Lee was threatened with eviction without fair compensation from contracted "security employees", which led him to become the head of a residents' committee organized to resist the zone's demolition.
On Jan. 19, 2009, Lee and his father headed up to the lookout tower of the Namildang Building where the pub was located and began a protest "to survive." Within a day, a police commando unit descended on it. During the suppression effort, a fire broke out, claiming the lives of Lee's father and four other protesters, as well as one police officer. Lee and six other protesters fortunately escaped with their lives, but are now facing their fourth winter behind bars, accused of killing a policeman.
Jeong went into seclusion after her father-in-law's funeral, which came 355 days after his death. The reason was her anger over having to conclude negotiations without receiving any adequate apology or compensation.
"In the beginning, I didn't come out on the weekends for visits," she explained. "There were too many people looking happy on the weekends."
Her only friend was the wall-mounted television, which was the only thing she managed to keep from the pub after it descended into chaos. But even now, she shakes in terror at the memory of the tragic day whenever it shows a scene of fire.
It was the Hope Buses that helped Jeong finally shake off a bit of her sorrow and anger and step out into the world again. After reading a copy of Kim Jin-suk's book Salt Flower Tree, she said, she took part in all five campaigns to visit the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions Busan office direction committee member during her protest at Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction, gaining courage in the process.
"The tens of thousands of people who rode on the Hope Bus joined in even though it was not their own problem," Jeong said. "But Yongsan is my problem. I made up my mind that I couldn't just stay at home anymore."
Since July 2011, Jeong has been working as a full-time activist with the Yongsan emergency measures committee. She meets with demolition protesters across the country to help buoy their spirits, and she is passionately committed to the campaign to enact a law prohibiting forcible evictions in order to make sure no tragedies like Yongan happen in the future.
The microphone came on in the reception room. From behind bars, Lee asked for the latest news about the third anniversary event for the tragedy that was set to take place the next day. "It's a good thing the weather isn't cold for the memorial," he said.
"Yeah," said Jeong. "We're going to go around the development zone and then head to Duriban [a noodle restaurant near Hongik University] in the evening. The chairperson said he'd buy us noodle soup."
Even after going from being an ordinary small business owner to living behind bars, Lee expressed a wish to visit Gangjeong Village on Jeju Island and the Hope Tents at Ssangyong Motors.
Relating news he heard during a recent visit by Park Jong-bu, elder brother of torture victim Park Jong-chul, Lee told his wife, "I found myself thinking that the world has changed so much thanks to their sacrifice and efforts, yet we've gotten a free ride in this world."
He also said, "This is a still a world where common sense doesn't prevail, but that's all the more reason we have to live with a sense of duty."
Jeong told him, "Just rest easy. I'll do it all for you."
Perhaps because they were being watched, the couple never exchanged the expected "I love you"s. When encouraged by the reporter, Lee said, "I know it just seeing her eyes."
Without making eye contact with her, he said, "I love you." A bright smile spread over her lips.
As Lee headed back to his cell after the short 12-minutes together, Jeong smiled and waved at him.
In the car on the way to Seoul, Lucid Fall's song about the Yongsan tragedy, "Ordinary People," was playing on the stereo.
"It's a world where things are tough for the 99% who are ordinary people," Jeong said.
"I want to do my best for the people who have been locked up, and for the demolition protesters in other redevelopment regions, before people forget about Yongsan," she explained.
As soon as she arrived in Seoul, Jeong hurried to Seoul Station to buy chrysanthemums for the memorial event the next day. The flowers were placed at the site of the Namildang Building in Yongsan, where redevelopment has been halted for the third straight year, just like the couple's newlywed life.
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/515083.html
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