S. Korean court orders NIS to disclose details of civilian massacres Korean soldiers perpetrated during Vietnam War

Posted on : 2021-03-26 16:58 KST Modified on : 2021-03-26 17:13 KST
The South Korean government to date has remained silent on the issue
Members of MINBYUN—Lawyers for a Democratic Society call for South Korea to acknowledge civilian massacres perpetrated by Korean soldiers during the Vietnam War and to pay the victims compensation during a press conference in front of the Seoul Central District Court on Apr. 21, 2020. (Yonhap News)
Members of MINBYUN—Lawyers for a Democratic Society call for South Korea to acknowledge civilian massacres perpetrated by Korean soldiers during the Vietnam War and to pay the victims compensation during a press conference in front of the Seoul Central District Court on Apr. 21, 2020. (Yonhap News)

South Korea’s Supreme Court has ruled that the National Intelligence Service (NIS) must release all information in its possession about massacres of civilians perpetrated by South Korean troops during the Vietnam War. The NIS said that it would release the information in compliance with the ruling.

The third panel of the Supreme Court, under Lee Dong-won, announced Thursday that it would uphold the ruling of the lower court, which had countermanded the NIS’s refusal to provide the information. The lower court made the decision in a lawsuit filed against the NIS by an attorney named Lim Jae-sung.

In response to Lim’s request for disclosure, the court in the original trial said that the “disclosure value is recognized in light of [the information’s] significance as a historical resource allowing the verification of historical casts, such as whether the government of the Republic of Korea investigated associated individuals in connection with massacre incidents.”

The Supreme Court concurred on the ruling’s legitimacy, dismissing the NIS appeal through a discontinuance of trial. The discontinuance of trial system allows for the dismissal of appeals without a judgment on the merits in cases where no problems are deemed present in a court’s original ruling.

In between his original filing of the lawsuit in November 2017 and the Supreme Court ruling Thursday, Lim had to fight the NIS in court for over three years.

Lim’s information disclosure request for a list of documents containing information from an investigation by the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA, a predecessor of the current NIS) into the massacres of civilians in the Vietnamese villages of Phong Nhi and Phong Nhat, allegedly committed by South Korean troops in February 1968.

While the courts in the first and second trials ruled the disclosure to be legitimate, the NIS had continued to refuse to disclose the information, citing “concerns that if the information in question is disclosed, it could conspicuously compromise important national interests” and “violate the privacy of the individuals connected with the investigation.”

Following the Thursday decision, the NIS announced that it intends to disclose the information in question. An NIS official told the Hankyoreh, “We are proceeding with all of the procedures for information disclosure and will be handling the situation in accordance with the intent of the final ruling once [the process] is complete.”

This potentially paves the way for an investigation into massacres of civilians by South Korean troops during the Vietnam War, an issue that the South Korean government has remained silent on to date.

The Seoul Central District Court is currently hearing a lawsuit filed by Phong Nhi massacre survivor Nguyen Thi Thanh to demand compensation from the Republic of Korea. The South Korean government has not acknowledged such acts by South Korean troops, calling the allegations “difficult to believe.”

The Phong Nhi/Phong Nhat massacre is an incident in which around 70 residents of the two villages in the Quang Nam Province of central Vietnam were allegedly killed by members of the South Korea’s “Blue Dragons” 2nd Marine Brigade.

The KCIA was determined to have kept examination records and reports following an investigation of three soldiers affiliated with the brigade in November 1969.

Lim said he plans to “examine the list of [KCIA] investigation documents and have their actual content made public through an information disclosure request.”

By Joh, Yun-yeong, senior staff writer

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

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