After U.S. military court acquits soldiers
South Korea is 'boiling' over crimes of occupation
By Deirdre Griswold
New York
"Boiling" was the word that kept coming up as a delegation
from South Korea described the mood in their country to an
overflow meeting at the International Action Center here on
Dec. 3.
The group had come halfway around the world to let the U.S.
government know that the Korean people will not tolerate the
extreme insult and injustice dealt to them on Nov. 22, when a
U.S. military court acquitted two U.S. soldiers of all charges
in the deaths of two Korean schoolgirls crushed by a tank on
June 13.
Shin Hyo-Soon and Shim Mi-Sun had been walking on the side
of a road on their way to a birthday party when the 50-ton tank
came barreling through. Witnesses in a videotape brought by the
delegation said the tank was far exceeding the speed limit. But
the U.S. court wouldn't find the driver or the soldier
accompanying him guilty even of negligent homicide.
This incident seems to have been the last straw for millions
of South Koreans, whose country has been occupied by the U.S.
military for over 50 years. Thousands have been joining
increasingly militant demonstrations at U.S. military bases,
and 1.3 million have signed petitions demanding that the U.S.
1) turn over jurisdiction in the case to a Korean court for the
retrial of the two soldiers; 2) revise the unfair Status of
Forces Agreement that governs U.S. military forces in south
Korea; 3) close down Camp Howze, the base where the incident
took place, and 4) withdraw all 37,000 U.S. troops from South
Korea.
The group plans to deliver the 1.3 million petitions
directly to the White House, as the U.S. Embassy in Seoul
arrogantly refused to accept them. It will also picket the
White House, carrying Korean flags on which hundreds of people
have written the above demands in their own blood.
Struggle for 'sovereignty and self-determination'
"At first most Koreans were silent, expecting the U.S. to
take the appropriate measures," the Rev. Hong Kun-Soo told the
IAC meeting. "But then came the acquittals." Another delegation
member, the Rev. Han Sang-Ryul, said that South Korea is now
"boiling over the struggle for sovereignty and
self-determination."
He and other Korean speakers linked the arrogance of the
U.S. military in their country to the Pentagon's war plans in
the Middle East. "U.S. military dominance and neo-liberalism
are used to subjugate and dominate around the world," said Rev.
Han.
A solidarity statement from the New York Committee for Shin
Hyo-Soon and Shim Mi-Sun referred to the present struggle--in
which for the first time demonstrators have broken through
chain-link fences and got onto U.S. bases, where they have
fought with sticks, stones and Molotov cocktails--as a "new
phase of the movement against U.S. occupation."
Kim Jong Il of the Pan-Korean Committee on the Two Girls
Killed by a U.S. Armored Vehicle brought a display of
photographs documenting other U.S. crimes. U.S. soldiers have
beaten many Korean women to death in the most sadistic and
brutal circumstances. A Korean legislator who came to the
defense of a number of young women students being harassed by
GIs because they were carrying signs protesting the killing of
Shin and Shim was himself beaten around the head and face.
This tremendous upsurge in the movement against the U.S.
military occupation comes South Korea comes when the U.S.
imperialists are intensifying their propaganda against North
Korea.
The latest James Bond movie, for example, is an unabashed
propaganda piece depicting Koreans as brutal torturers. It will
only further infuriate the aroused people in South Korea, who
know only too well who the real torturers are.
Reprinted from the Dec. 12, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
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