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Bae Eun-sim, mother of martyr of Korea’s democratization movement Lee Han-yeol, speaks at Yonsei University in Seoul on June 9, 2020. (Hankyoreh archive photo)

Bae Eun-sim, the mother of martyred student protester Lee Han-yeol and a fierce proponent of democracy, has died. She was 82.

On July 9, 1987, the funeral for 22-year-old Lee Han-yeol took place amid the sweltering heat of early summer. At the ceremony, Lee's mother, Bae Eun-sim, vowed to keep fighting on behalf of her martyred son.

“Let it all go now. Your mother will take care of everything. Han-yeol! Let’s go now to Gwangju!”

Some 1.1 million people flocked to the funeral procession for her son that stretched from Yonsei University to Seoul City Hall; all of South Korea rang out with cries of “Save Han-yeol.”

Bae would go on to become known as the “mother of June” and a warrior for democracy.

A month earlier on the afternoon of June 9, Lee had been taking part in a Yonsei University gathering in front of the school gates to call for volunteers for a June 10 rally, when he was struck by a tear gas canister fired by riot police. He was taken to a hospital, but died 26 days later on July 5.

Lee’s image spread across the nation as a symbol of the June Democratic Struggle of 1987.

His death also transformed his mother’s life. An ordinary family woman, upon the death of her son, Bae took to the streets to realize the dream of democracy for which her son had sacrificed his life.

Together with Lee So-sun (1929–2011), the mother of workers’ rights activist Jeon Tae-il, and Park Jeong-gi (1928–2018), father of murdered university student Park Jong-cheol, Bae rushed to wherever people were battling for democracy and human rights, joining forces and sometimes facing arrest in the process.

After a life of battling for democracy in the wake of her son’s death, Bae passed away on Sunday. She was 82.

Bae suffered a heart attack on Jan. 3 and underwent treatment in the hospital before being discharged Saturday. Her condition seemed to have improved after her discharge, as she was able to take part in conversations. But the following day, she suffered another attack.

Her family found her and rushed her to the hospital, but she did not recover. Thirty-five years after her son’s death, Bae had gone to join him.

As chairperson of the Korea Association of Bereaved Families for Democracy, Bae launched a 422-day tent sit-in in front of the National Assembly in 1998. Her efforts helped lead to the enactment of the Act on the Honor Restoration of and Compensation to Persons Related to Democratization Movements and the Special Act to Find the Truth on Suspicious Deaths.

After learning about the 2009 Yongsan tragedy, in which police brutally suppressed protests by tenants, Bae became co-representative for the pan-national countermeasures committee on the tragedy in 2019. She also offered comfort and strength to others in the wake of farmer Baek Nam-gi’s death in 2016 from injuries suffered during a demonstration and during the enactment process for the Sewol Special Act in 2017.

Last year, she met with people from Myanmar, where citizens have been massacred in the wake of a military coup.

“It didn’t all end with the deaths of family members or friends. They keep on fighting even after they’re gone,” she said at the time. More recently, she had been working for the enactment of a law for persons of merit related to the democratization movement.

In recognition of her contributions to the campaigns for democracy and human rights, Bae was honored by President Moon Jae-in in June 2020 with the Order of Civil Merit known as the Moranjang Medal at a ceremony commemorating the 33rd anniversary of the June Struggle.

Upon receiving the medal, Bae read out a letter she had written marking the anniversary, sharing her fervent wish for South Korea to become “a country where no more lives are lost or families are left suffering for democracy.”

In June 2018, a memorial event on the 31st anniversary of Lee Han-yeol’s death was held by his alma mater Yonsei University and the Lee Han Yeol Memorial Museum. There, Bae declared, “Democracy does not simply happen. It arrives one step at a time, stained with people’s blood and tears and sweat.”

“I believe that the deaths [of martyrs] will not be in vain, and that they will live on forever in history.”

By Heo Ho-Joon, staff reporter

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