| [Editorial] Continued denial of the right to conscientious objection |
| The Presidential Commission on Suspicious Deaths in the Military has recognized the deaths of five Jehovah's Witnesses who died for refusing to bear arms because of religious reasons at the hand of "violence that went against human rights and cruelty by the state." The results of the commission's inquiry are shocking even though the five men's deaths occurred 20 to 30 years ago, during the Park Chung-hee and Chun Doo-hwan regimes. Men who refused to bear arms were tortured "by repeatedly dunking their heads in concrete water tanks," and one witness even stated that at least one man was "hit with a pickaxe for an hour and a half." There was even an instance where one man was "put in a drum can and made to roll downhill for hours." The treatment was horrific enough for one/some of them to have taken their own lives, though military officials would write up their deaths with statements like "death during training" or "suicide resulting from mental stress." Even if it only starts doing so now, the military must apologize to the families of these men for its shameful past, one in which it enacted brutal violence against victims it labeled as communists. Naturally, there should also be an appropriate level of compensation from the state for these criminal acts. Jehovah's Witnesses refuse to take up arms because of religious reasons, but the families of these men were treated like criminals even long after they had lost their beloved sons to state violence. What resentment and how wronged they must have felt as Korean citizens! Progress in democratization has meant that direct violence against men who conscientiously object to taking up arms has all but disappeared. But these men are still sent to prison -- more than 400 every year. Most are Jehovah's Witnesses. It is going to be hard to fundamentally resolve the contradiction that is taking hundreds of young men full of dreams and turning them into criminals every year before the country recognizes conscientious objection and adopts an alternative service program. Way back in 1987 the U.N. Human Rights Committee started defining conscientious objection to military service as a legitimate part of the freedoms of thought, conscience and religion. Korea is currently a member state of the U.N. Human Rights Committee, and if it wants to be a rightful member of the international community it should respect universal human rights and carry through with the plan to offer alternative service. We hope that the Lee Myung-bak administration will respond to the commission's findings and return to the original plan for alternative service. How much longer will the Korean state remain an undeveloped country when it comes to human rights, for the way it tramples on individual conscience? West Germany offered alternative service even before reunification, and Taiwan has alternative service even though it is a divided nation like Korea. http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_editorial/333833.html |