hankyoreh

2013. The sketching is being done to prepare for a large mural project organized by Sorokdo National Hospital. The final project is a wall 110m long and 3m high that will feature a mosaic of 400 peoples’ faces. The wall weighs 28 tons and was exhibited in a passage from the hospital to a central park. The patients’ own drawings of their faces were posted to the mural. (By Kim Myoung-jin

By Jung Dae-ha, Gwangju correspondent in Suncheon

A court recently made the first-ever ruling ordering the state to compensate former sufferers of Hansen’s disease (HD, also known as leprosy) who were forced to undergo sterilization and abortions as a result of social discrimination and prejudice.

The second civil division of the Suncheon branch of Gwangju District Court, under Judge Yu Yeong-geun, ruled on Apr. 29 to have the state pay 30 million to 40 million won (US$29,000-38,700) in damages to 19 HD patients who filed suit demanding compensation for pain and suffering from being subjected to forced sterilization and abortions.

Payments of 30 million won were ordered for nine males, including a 78-year-old man surnamed Kang, who were forced to undergo vasectomies, while payments of 40 million won were ordered for nine females, including a 71-year-old woman surnamed Yang, who were given abortions.

Kang and the other plaintiffs were demanding 100 million won (US$96,800) each as compensation for the operations, which were performed in the period from 1950 through the 1990s under the mistaken belief that HD - a bacterial infection - was genetically transmitted.

As the first-ever ruling to compensate HD patients for forced sterilization and abortions, the verdict is significant both in terms of restoring the dignity of people with the disease and for acknowledging the human rights violations perpetrated against them by the state.

In its ruling, the court argued that the state’s forced procedures restricted inherent rights granted by the South Korean Constitution.

The plaintiffs in the case, all of whom had recovered from their HD infections and presented no contagion risk, were nevertheless shunned by family members and society, and forced to endure discrimination and prejudice.

“It was as though sterilization or abortions were simply our fate,” said one of the plaintiffs.

“When I thought about making a family, I just resigned myself to the fact that I wasn’t supposed to have children,” said another.

Park Yeong-rim, a lawyer with Attorneys for Hansen’s Patient Human Rights, called the ruling “a first step in restoring the dignity of Hansen’s patients who suffered sterilization and abortions, since it is the first ruling to acknowledge the state’s compulsion in the sterilization and abortion process.”

Indeed, the ruling also appears likely to affect future cases filed by HD patients who suffered similar treatment. As of Apr. 29, there were two other cases filed against the state by patients in connection with sterilization and abortion, with a total of 651 plaintiffs, including 315 who underwent sterilization and 336 who underwent abortions.

One significant part of the ruling was the broad application of extinctive prescription for past actions.

“In the past, the state often got away with committing wrongs because the three-year statute of limitations for compensation had expired,” said Park. “What makes this ruling so significant is that it applied extinctive prescription from the time of the investigation.”

Sterilization of HD patients began during the Japanese occupation of Korea (1910-45). In 1927, the Physiological Society of Japan declared that “performing castrations and preventing genetic transmission” was a “shortcut to eradicating leprosy.” As of 1936, cohabitation between males and females in colonies like Sorok Island was made contingent on sterilization.

The procedures stopped with Korea’s liberation, but were resumed in 1948. From then on, men had to undergo vasectomies before they were granted cohabitation rights with family housing assignments on Sorok Island. Women who conceived were summoned to the hospital and forced to undergo abortions.

According to the court, this system of requiring sterilizations before allowing cohabitation on Sorok Island continued until as late as 1990. Similar policies requiring sterilization and abortions were also instituted in mainland national sanitariums and settlement communities, including Seonghye Center in Incheon, Sosaeng Center in Iksan, Aesaeng Center in Chilgok, Yongho Farm in Busan, and Seongjwa Center in Andong.

No legal basis existed for the procedures performed on the HD patients, many of whom had recovered completely from their infections.

“The abortion and vasectomy procedures were of an inhumane and anti-human rights nature, restricting inherent human urges and basic freedoms to pursue happiness and giving a sense of guilt and shame to the plaintiffs,” the court said in its ruling.

A source with Attorneys for Hansen’s Patient Human Rights noted that the sterilization and abortion procedures didn’t only happen during the occupation, but continued on after Korea regained independence.

“This was an example of trampling on the universal right to have and raise children,” the source said. “It was a nation perpetrating a massacre of human rights against HD patients for decades.”

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