South Korea Cracks Down on Dissent

Christine Ahn | February 21, 2012
[Originally published in Foreign Policy In Focus, February 16, 2012]

On February 8, the South Korean National Intelligence Service (NIS) raided the Seoul and Incheon offices of the South Korean NGO, Solidarity for Peace and Reunification in Korea (SPARK) for violating the National Security Law (NSL). The NIS also searched the homes of two of SPARK's leadership, confiscated their notebooks and cell phones, and shut down the server of its website, Jinbo.net.

The NIS, famously known as the Korean CIA, alleges that SPARK members violated the NSL because the organization sent a condolence letter to North Korea following Kim Jong Il's death and that a member was part of a North Korean spy ring. SPARK members counter that they went through the legal and proper channels in sending the letter and that charges of its affiliation with a spy ring is a fabrication. "SPARK always conducts its activities legally and openly," says Regina Pyon, chairwoman of the Seoul branch. "All the day's activities are reported on our website, including the most trivial information."

The South Korean government's targeting of SPARK, however, is clearly politically motivated given the organization's vital role in supporting the Gangjeong villagers' resistance to the naval base on Jeju Island. While the raid on SPARK is just one in a long string of arrests by South Korean President Lee Myung Bak using the NSL, it has particular historic significance given that the Cold War law was created to suppress the uprising on Jeju Island in 1948. more >

South Korean Women's Statement on the 2012 Seoul Nuclear Security Summit

South Korean Women's Organizations | January 13, 2012

We South Korean women believe nuclear weapons and power reactors are a matter of life or death. They threaten our lives, the lives of our families and all living creatures.

We Korean women remember the tragic atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945 when some 700,000 people, including 70,000 Koreans, were exposed to atomic radiation. The horror of mushroom clouds, which melted people and buildings and contaminated soil, still lingers today because more than 20,000 nuclear weapons exist on our planet.

We Korean women feel an enormous sense of crisis as we witness the aftermath of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in March 2011. We are shocked once again at the destructive power of radiation seen in the loss of human lives, environmental pollution and contamination of food. We are even more shocked at the foolishness of those who continued to build nuclear reactors even after the danger of nuclear power generation was demonstrated at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. more >

Support KPI Today

Most Americans, the media and U.S. policymakers lack even the most basic knowledge about Korea and the role that the United States has played on the peninsula for over 60 years. That's why the Korea Policy Institute was created, and that's the vitally important role we play in educating policymakers and the media. We need your help in setting the record straight. more >