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On Apr. 17

Vietnamese and South Korean legal experts have come together to call on the South Korean government to investigate civilian massacres during the Vietnam War.

On Apr. 17, the Seoul Bar Association released a joint statement about the damage caused to civilians during the Vietnam War, along with members of the Vietnam Lawyers Association. Established in 1955, the Vietnam Lawyers Association is the country’s leading legal organization, whose more than 63,000 members include both attorneys and legal scholars. Six members of the association, including Vice President Duong Thanh Bac, paid a personal visit to South Korea for the release of the statement.

“Civilian groups in South Korea and Vietnam have organized various activities in connection with the harm done to civilians during the Vietnam War, but there has been minimal effort by the South Korean government to investigate those incidents or remedy the harm,” the lawyers said in their joint statement.

“Investigating the harm caused to civilians during the Vietnam War is both a cornerstone of realizing the universal human values of human rights and peace as well as an opportunity for strengthening the future-oriented relationship of the two countries, based on the truth of history. It’s also a way for arranging a full historical appraisal of the pain suffered by the veterans of that war.”

Seoul Bar Association Chairman Park Jung-woo and Vietnam Lawyers Association Vice President Duong Thanh Bac took turns reading the full text of the joint statement, in Korean and Vietnamese. The two figures signed the joint statement, calling on the South Korean government to investigate the damage suffered by civilians during the Vietnam War and to take steps to provide them with restitution.

On Mar. 4, 103 survivors of civilian massacres during the Korean War sent letters to the Blue House asking for an investigation into the massacres. This is the first time that survivors have personally made such a request to the South Korean government in writing. Two massacre survivors – both named Nguyen Thi Thanh, one from the village of Phong Nhi and the other from the village of Ha My – held a press conference in front of the Blue House fountain in Seoul with MINBYUN-Lawyers for a Democratic Society and the Korea-Vietnam Peace Foundation. “The Vietnam War ended in 1975, but our pain hasn’t ended. We haven’t received any kind of apology from the South Korean government, despite its clear responsibility. We hope that a response will be made to the impassioned requests of the Vietnamese petitioners,” the two Nguyens said.

Although civic groups have steadily pushed for an investigation into the civilian massacres during the Vietnam War, the government has remained silent thus far. In April 2018, a mock trial called a “citizens’ peace tribunal” was convened to further calls for an investigation. A freedom of information lawsuit also turned up evidence that records of interrogations of South Korean soldiers who participated in civilian massacres are stored by the National Intelligence Service (NIS). During a state visit to Vietnam in March 2018, South Korean President Moon Jae-in expressed his “regret for the unfortunate history between our two countries, which remains in our hearts,” but the South Korean government has never acknowledged that its army carried out civilian massacres in Vietnam or officially apologized for that. The NIS has refused to release the interrogation records it’s thought to have in its archives in defiance of a court order to do so.

Between Sept. 1964 and 1972, some 312,000 South Korean troops were deployed to Vietnam. During that time, the South Korean forces are estimated to have carried out over 80 massacres in which they killed more than 9,000 people.

By Ko Han-sol, staff reporter

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]