hankyoreh

한국전 당시 남북에 모두 병역을 거부한 박종일씨. 이제야 비로소 그 시절을 얘기하는 그들의 눈가에는 이따금 물기가 비쳤다.(사진/ 한겨레21 윤운식 기자) 대부분의 증인이 구속된 것이다. 더구나 대부분의 증인이 구속된 것이다. 더구나

On June 29, 1939, the Japanese police arrested 33 Korean Jehovah’s Witnesses.

They were prosecuted for lese-majeste by refusing to pray at the Japanese shrines, and for the crime of propagating antiwar ideology under a security law. Jehovah’s Witness missionaries first came to the Korean Peninsula in 1914, and in 1932, 45 people participated in the Seoul conference of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Most of them were arrested. Judging that 33 of them were arrested on one day, it would seem that the police were keeping a close eye on them.

There were prior signs to indicate this. The Japanese police had confiscated 50,000 copies of the Book of Ecclesiastes in Seoul during June of 1933, and 30,000 in Pyongyang during September of the same year. There also had been warnings. Director of the Jehovah’s Witnesses Japanese branch Akashi Junso told his Korean compatriots that the day of their arrest was not far off. At the time, Akashi was under investigation by the Japanese police in relation to issues regarding his son’s military service. Yet the Korean Jehovah’s Witnesses did not go into hiding. Finally, after Akashi’s son and another Japanese citizen refused to serve, the Japanese police went on a veritable rampage of arrests that spanned across Japan, Taiwan and Korea.

There is still one among those persecuted Jehovah’s Witnesses who is still alive today. Her name is Jang Sun-ok (87) and this reporter met her on March 12 in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. Her breathing uneasy, she vividly described to me her memories. She was seized on March 29, 1939 from her house in Wangsimni. "I was eating my meal when the police came," she said. Her husband too was arrested that day, and spent the following two years in confinement. Born in Pyongyang and married at the age of 16, Jang was 19 and pregnant at the time of her arrest.

"I spent one year in the Dongdaemun Police Detention Center, one year under prosecution, one year during the pre-trial hearings, and one year under trial," she recalled. She miscarried on the freezing, excrement-covered floor of the Dongdaemun Detention Center.

"The torture at Seodaemun Prison was the most difficult thing to endure," she recalled. Her and the other Jehovah’s Witnesses were forced every morning to face the East toward Tokyo, and bow in the direction of the Japanese Emperor. If the prisoners refused, they were handcuffed behind their back, one arm twisted over, one twisted under, and painfully forced to hold a bow over an extended period. "After holding that position for an hour, the pain was so extreme I thought I would die," she recalled. She was also handcuffed to other prisoners or had her feet shackled as a means of torture. At times, two prisoners were confined in a room, handcuffed so that their elbows were linked. They were sometimes forced to sleep in that position. "They would say no one could come out of that room alive. At night while we slept, these longhaired ghosts would come in and tell us to stop believing in our religion. I shouted back that I was prepared to die, demanding they turn back. There were bloodstains on those walls, and I was terrified." She spoke of her time there as if recalling a nightmare. The torture lasted seven full months.

Finally, in her early twenties, she was released.

Of the 38 Jehovah’s Witnesses imprisoned during the Japanese occupation of Korea, five died behind bars. Detained alongside Jang, Han Sun-gi was one of those who met such a tragic end. At the time, Kim Jong-suk, a Korean, was the prison guard responsible for watching after them, before Kim himself became a Jehovah’s Witness. In his memoirs, Kim wrote, "Even while dying, [Han Sun-gi] would exhort her son, who was imprisoned with her, to maintain their faith."

From left

The memoirs of Park Ok-hui, whose husband Choe Seong-gyu was among the detained, also tell a mournful story. "I was told that as my husband would be released, I should prepare 500 won and bring it to them. It was a black, wintry night. I found my husband wrapped in a light blanket, lying on the floor. He was already half gone. Eight hours after his release from prison, he was dead at the age of 42." Mrs. Park, like her husband, refused to surrender her faith, and was thus arrested for the fourth time in September 1942, only to be released upon Korea’s liberation in August 1945.

Even this chain of death did not shake Jang Sun-ok’s faith. The urgings by the Japanese prosecutor to recant her beliefs were futile. In the end, Jang received a sentence of three years, two years less than that the prison term sought by the prosecution. But even when the term ended, she was not released. The Japanese government had classified Jang and four other female Jehovah’s Witness prisoners as "beyond rectification," and they were sent to a "preventive detention center." Though all of the Jehovah’s Witness men were released after their sentences expired, these women were held until Japan’s surrender in World War II.

In total, Jang spent six years and two months in detention, finally gaining her freedom on 16 August 1945, a day after Korea’s liberation from Japanese rule. Lee Jeong-sang and Kim Bong-nyeo spent four and six years in containment, respectively. But the Korean government has never reimbursed them for their suffering, nor so much as asked them of their suffering. But their suffering did not end with their release. Due to the lingering aftereffects of their experience, some had back pain and were unable to stand up if they lay down. It took some time before the women - who had endured life in a cold cell, dressed in ragged prison clothes - were able to bear children. "Even as I think if prison life now," said Jang "my emotions well up. It is painful to so much as speak of it," she said, her voice trailing off.

Korean Jehovah’s Witnesses died in a Tokyo prison, as well. The story of Ok Gye-seong’s family is one of these. Ok Gye-seong had three sons, Rye-jun, Gi-jun, and Ung-ryeon. Ok Rye-jun’s wife was Lee Jeong-sang, and Ok Gi-jun’s wife was Kim Bong-nyeo. The two elder Ok brothers spent four years in detention, and their wives and youngest brother perished while in prison, the youngest Ok brother in Tokyo. Ok Ung-ryeon had been serving as a translator for Iwanami, a Japanese publishing company. A record of him is contained in the book "Those Who Rejected Military Service," published by Iwanami. The following is an excerpt. "Age 24 at the time, Korean Jehovah’s Witness Ok Ung-ryeon was arrested by the local police, served time in prison and suffered mental harm due to prolonged severe torture, eventually dying for his faith in prison."

Another Korean, Choe Yong-won, also received a sentence of five years in prison. "Those Who Rejected Military Service" explains that "[the Korean Jehovah’s Witnesses] received much harsher persecution in Korea than in Japan." What is more, from 1939 Korean Jehovah’s Witnesses were cut off from communication with their compatriots in the U.S. They defended their faith despite their isolation.

The tradition of Jehovah’s Witnesses abiding by one’s conscience against military service continued through the Korean War. I met with draft resister Park Jong-il, 77, on March 12 in Anseong, Gyeonggi Province. With a full head of white hair, Park spoke of that time in a voice hale and hearty. Park’s paternal aunt, Park Ok-hui, was imprisoned during the occupation. His paternal uncle, Choe Seong-gyu, died in prison. When her husband died, Park Ok-hui went to live with her younger brother, Park Jong-il’s father. It was then, at age 15, that Park Jong-il became a Jehovah’s Witness.

"I was born 22 October 1930, and the 1949 military draft law applied to everyone born after September 1, 1930," he said. "It’s as if I were born to be drafted," he said. Park rejected the draft of both North and South. When the Korean War broke out in 1950, he was living in Seoul. Within days, the North Koreans occupied Seoul. On his way to Seodaemun in central Seoul one day, North Korean soldiers seized him. Alongside others captured, he was questioned and taken by truck somewhere. He was steadfast in his determination. "I knew that Jehovah’s Witnesses rejected military service during the Second World War," he said. Just as his turn came, someone called out that conscription was over for the day. He had survived his first crisis.

On September 28, 1950, about three months into the Korean War, South Korean and U.N. forces liberated Seoul from the North. Having hid in his hometown in Gwangju, Park returned to Seoul to proselytize. But on December 24, the government notified all men of appropriate age for military service to remain in Seoul and for all others to evacuate. News also broke that the Chinese were advancing southwards. Though he wanted to evacuate, the chances were high that the soldiers patrolling the streets would seize and conscript him. Thus, he sought refuge in a Seoul house owned by another Jehovah’s Witness and hid alongside with his compatriot, Jo Yeong-ha.

But at the time, Seoul was on the verge of falling into North Korean hands. Two weeks into his hiding, someone came to the house. "Men wearing hunting caps and trenchcoats came to the door and startled me.

The men ordered Park and his companion to put their hands up. "They checked our hands to see if there were traces of gun use on them." Appearing to be North Korean officers, Park surmised the men had taken him and his friend to be straggling members of the South Korean army, which had already fled. After searching their flat and finding nothing but Bibles and English-language documents, the men dropped their suspicions and left. "I thought they were going to take me to the North or force me to spread communism in the South, and I was fully prepared to reject their demands," he recalled. Though they returned twice to his house, they did not drag him or his companion away. Thus they remained safe during the three-month occupation of Seoul by the Northern forces.

Seoul then returned once more to South Korean hands. In March of 1951, he went to Daegu to proselytize. As soon as he disembarked from a freight train there, the military seized him. They were forming a unit to head the front lines, charged with the conveyance of artillery shells. "The officer in charge, the one they called Captain Gwon, questioned me. I told him I could not fight for them." He was summarily taken to a vault and lashed. Though the unit headed North after three days, Park stayed put thanks to Gwon’s kindness. Three weeks passed. All military units were preparing a joint counterattack. "When the units were rearranging, I was allowed to slip out unnoticed by the good grace of Captain Gwon," he recalled. And thus, Park escaped being drafted by both the Northern and Southern militaries.

Yet in the end, he could not escape conscription. Living in Busan at the age of 22, Park received a written order in June 1953. He was sent to the Pohang Reserves. Though he protested vigorously upon arrival, no one would listen. The only response he received was a threat to send him to military prison. In turn, the military commanders began to suspect his ideology, thus sending him to the the South Korean Counter-Intelligence Corps (CIC). Though they threatened to shoot him, he could not shoulder a weapon. At the CIC, he was cudgeled on his buttocks 20 times. He suffered severe injury there, which caused him excruciating pain for some time. As the CIC had little use for him, they sent him back to the reserves. He repeatedly refused military service there.

"I was forced to get a service number," he said. He was sent to a training camp on Jeju Island. "On the island, there were a lot of training exercises for the new recruits," he said, "I kept telling the officers, ’I can’t do it,’ but I was whipped in response." In the end, he was assigned to a company. "Realizing that I would become a soldier, I took the last option available to me and began a hunger strike." The captain that had at first ignored him recognized the seriousness of the situation after three days. Finally, they took him to a military prison.

"I was classified as an objector," he said, "and so I felt at ease regardless of the beatings in store for me." Military officers tried to convince him by placation through a warm bath and a comfortable bed, but he would not budge. In the end, he had to stand trial. "People took great interest in the trial, including military chaplains and various officers." The prosecutors sought three years of imprisonment, the court decreed a sentence of three years, and the commanding officer signed off on it. Yet all told, his sentence was not very long. "I was sentenced after the [July 27, 1953] ceasefire agreement was reached, so my punishment was light," he explained. He spent three years in military prison. Park is probably the first person to spend time in prison for objecting to conscription after the South Korean military was set up.

No Byeong-il, now 87, was another Jehovah’s Witness who faced the crisis of being conscripted into the North Korean army. When the North Koreans occupied Seoul in August 1950, he hid at Gwanak Mountain to escape being drafted. But the smoke that rose up while he cooked a meal gave away his position, and he was caught and interrogated at an local elementary school that had come under military use. "I only serve the Kingdom of God," he said, "and do not want to join either side." He was classified as having not responded to conscription attempts. To punish him, they placed him in front of a firing squad, which fired at him - but using blanks. After his release, he left Korea and moved to the U.S.

Park Jong-il’s friend Choi Yong-won disappeared during the Korean War. Choi was one of two Koreans to be imprisoned in Japan. "I wonder what happened to Choi Yong-won’s siblings," said Park, tears welling up, as he knows full well the fate of many others who were unwilling to give up their faith.

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