The Song Du-yul travesty may finally be coming to an end. Prosecutors demanded a 15 year prison term for the dissident Korean-born German scholar, and the courts will hand down a final sentence on March 30. As I’ve said in previous blog posts, I think both the trial and the National Security Law are crap; a democracy like South Korea shouldn’t be locking people up for their ideological beliefs. Now, Song won’t serve 15 years — if he serves any time at all, it will be short before he’s let out on amnesty. But that’s not the point — the man shouldn’t have been forced to stand trial in the first place.
It would be a lot easier to support Song, however, if he would stop making statements like this:
In a written statement submitted to the court, Song pleaded for leniency and said “the National Security Law is an obstacle to Korean unification and the law even falls behind the standards of laws made in the mid-17th century.”
Song — laws were pretty ugly back in the mid-17th century, and let’s drop the Korean unification bullshit. You are, after all, an apologist for one of the most odious regimes on the planet. Personally, I’d love to sentence you to 15 years in the North’s Yondok Political Prison Camp, but my commitment to democratic governance and freedom of speech is too firm.
And while we’re talking about the moral bankruptcy of the Korean left, take a look at this:
On March 2, 2004, around one hundred South Korean NGOs, human rights activists, and lawyers came together to discuss the North Korean Freedom Act of 2003 that is in the legislative process in the United States Congress, in Seoul, Korea. They express a deep concern over the potential risk the North Korean Freedom Act may pose to the human rights situation in North Korea, and peace in the Korean Peninsula.
This part, found on the Oranckay’s link, really bugs me:
When discussing the human rights in the Korean Peninsula, it should also be reminded that maintaining a peaceful coexistence of South and North Korea must be assumed. We believe that assisting the economic reconstruction of North Korea will pave the way for improving human rights conditions in North Korea.
The Oranckay points out how rightists and rightist organizations — my current place of employment included — tend to be quite hypocritical in their support of democracy; these people, after all, supported military dictator after military dictator during South Korea’s less pleasant years. Fair enough. But the same can clearly be said of many Korean leftists — see above. Economic development will improve the human rights conditions in North Korea? This, from people who no doubt opposed the “development dictatorship” of Park Chung-hee? And at least with Park, he could (and did) deliver the goods (while torturing/killing dissidents), which is more than you can say for a North Korean regime that has spent the better part of 20 years running the economy into the ground (while torturing/killing dissidents). And while they admit, sort of, that human rights abuses take place in the North, they are very hesitant to say what those abuses are, and to what extent they are taking place. Sure, they mention the North Korean people’s “right to food,” but fail to mention why North Koreans have been denied food, i.e. criminal mismanagement of the North Korean economy by the nation’s political leadership. Frankly, for people with their pedigree in pro-democracy activism, their take on North Korea simply boggles the mind, and I’m at a loss for words as to what to say.
4 Comments
I think I’ve said this earlier, but I kind of like the irony that the logic used in the statements you and Oranckay quote make Park Chung-hee kind of a human rights president.
(I’ve taken this from a guy called Jin Jung-gwon, who is a known leftist and an old anti-Chosunist, but who also wrote in a newspaper column after the 2002 naval clash that why isn’t anyone remembering the ROK soldiers who died. If there only were more leftists like him, the attitude of Korean “progressives” towards democracy in the whole peninsula would look much better. Those with time and Korean ability to read his rants against opposition and government, go to the discussion board at news.jinbonuri.com.
Mark my words:
Song will be released at the earliest possible oppurtunity. Usually this is 8/15.
He will then enter South Korean “academia” and spread the message that he was sent to South Korea for in the first place. This will start a flood of agents returning for “reconcilliation.”
I don?쨈t know what the German Foreing Ministry (i.e. German Embassy in Seoul)would do to “influence” the ROK leadership to show leniency. Prof. Song has earned his Phd/Dr. laureals from the famous Prof. Habermas and he is a very authorative figure in the academic class in Germany. Also the Literature Nobel prize winner G?쩌nther Grass has signed the open letter for the ROK government.
The German press in general use to observe the “Song Du-Yul”-case only occasionally, but there have been critical articles about the idelogically pitched up atmospehre of domestic Korean politics towards the judicial prosecution and the biased, unconfirmed leaking of informations/interrogation protocols by the KCIA (oops, NIS I should say, sorry boys, hope one of your English-proficient analysts are reading with us)to the mainly conservative mass press.
Furthermore, there was criticism due to the traditionally lawful Korean practice of hours-long absence of Prof. Song?쨈s personal defence lawyer during the first interrogation. And last but not least the National Security Law was condemned as a “pre-historic” remnant of the bitter-bloody-brutal Korean Cold War-policy. In balance to the objective pro-Song-paraphrase, the articles also critized Prof Song for his concealed membership in the North Korean Worker?쨈s Party, the hand-stroking images with the “Dear Leader” at the funeral of the “Great Leader” and the dubious (but not crystal-clearly proofed) controversy about his politbuero-membership etc.
Finally the speaker and son of the family Song got his lines reserved for a quote from a telephone interview, just like the qoutes of the Seoul prosecuter. Yeeha, in these moments I love my adopted German dudes and the serious, reason-minded/orientated German press media more than ever, with all their perfectly fine chased dialectic balance and fair objectivity. The Korean press bunch, either left or right, could learn a constructive lesson from the German folks.
In the end, 15 years in a Korean prison sounds pretty much in comparison to a life-long sentence by a German court for e.g. murder of 1st degree. In Germany the life-long convicted prisoner has the law on his/ her side to appellate for a release after 15 years of correct behavious behind bars, which is usually granted, if the prisoner is not a potential (abnormal, exceptional) danger for the society.
As long as Prof Song keeps his German citizenship, the Germans will do their outmost to protect their citizens (another usefull lecture for the ROK).
You can set your bets - 15 years or not. The dude who knows the correct answer could become a rich man and buy the whole real-estate of Kangnam. My 2 Euros.
Wow,
Poiboy, are you still pretending to be in Germany?