hankyoreh

By Lee Deok-woo, lawer

This year marks the 27th anniversary of the 18 May Gwangu Uprising, and the 20th anniversary of the 1987 Democratic Movement. Yet the annual formalities in Gwangju, at which the presidential candidates will be in attendance to commemorate the victims, promise to be little more than a fleeting hubbub. After all, the commemoration of the Gwangju Uprising has become little more than kitsch. While on the one hand many pay their respects to the departed spirits of May 18, 1980, others have established a park bearing the name of the slaughter's chief culprit, former President Chun Doo-hwan. I ask you, what has become of our country?

I have met many victims in my work as a human rights campaigner. Otherwise a normal citizen, Shin Gwi-yeong was one day seized by the police and tortured into giving a confession of having been a spy. Throughout the ensuing decades, he bore the stigma of the official judgment deeming him as such a traitor. The sailors of the fishing vessel Taeyeong kidnapped by the North are but another example. After treading a difficult path to liberation, they returned to the South, only to be labeled spies. To this day, they are still pained by the cold reception given to them. Not to mention the bereaved survivors of those civilians who were gunned down by South Korean policemen wearing the uniforms of the North Korean army in Naju. Words are of no use in halting their tears. I grow frustrated thinking of whether justice and human rights will ever truly take root in the soil of our country.

The term "state crimes against human rights," a subcategory of "crimes against humanity," is used to describe such atrocities as the mass slaughter that took place in Gwangju in addition to the use of state power for murder, torture and the systematic granting of total impunity to the perpetrators. By international law, the perpetrators of crimes this atrocious can and must be punished regardless of the time passed since their transgressions. In other words, there is no statute of limitations for such criminals. The formation of the International Criminal Court is the product of the effort to realize this ideal. America, of course, continues to disparage this process. While South Koreans have witnessed and inherited the legacy of crimes by the state, the perpetrators of such offenses still live illustriously in positions of power without showing the faintest hint of regret.

In order to institute the principles of international law and in order to set right a history of human rights abuses, activists have steadily worked to eliminate the statute of limitations shielding these perpetrators from trial. As a result, the Special Law Regarding the Statute of Limitations for State Crimes Against Human Rights was proposed in the National Assembly in 2005. Yet two years later, this proposed law has gathered only dust, without a single public hearing to discuss its contents. Some legislators speak ill of the proposal, mentioning the principle of legality and the impropriety of retroactive law. Yet our attempt is not to retroactively put the persecutors on trial, but merely to revoke the indulgences that were afforded to these monsters merely on the basis of time's passage. They denounce the law, unaware even of its contents. If perchance they are adhering to their positions in full knowledge of its contents, then their argument is no different from one that would granting pardons to everyone who commits heinous atrocities. Even now, it is not too late. The Assembly must hold open hearings this month and pass this bill.

On the 27th anniversary of the Gwangju Uprising, we must resolve no more to turn our backs on the cries of those who fell victim to the state's crimes against humanity. It is deceit to speak of reconciliation without inquiring into the past, and it is a further crime to turn the remembrance of the Gwangju Uprising into mere kitsch. Now is the time to feel the pain of the victims and strive to ensure that such a thing never happens again. Only on the day that the Special Law Regarding the Statute of Limitations for State Crimes Against Human Rights is passed will we be able to face the anniversary of Gwangju with a clearer conscience.