[Statement] Condemning the police who responded to peaceful actions of nonviolent civil disobedience with arrest! Jeju is not a U.S. colony! Close the Jeju Naval Base that is turning Jeju into an outpost of the U.S. against China!
At 1:30 p.m. on February 26, police arrested Fr. Sung Hwan Kim, a peacekeeper in Gangjeong and director of the St. Francis Peace Center, on charges of obstruction of business and obstruction of official business. During the arrest, police followed Fr. Kim for over two hours. As usual, Fr. Kim celebrated the 11:00 a.m. Catholic Mass, had lunch with other visiting priests at an outside restaurant, and then moved to an outside café. The police monitored the entire process, which is a clear violation of human rights.
The police detained Fr. Kim based on his actions in October of last year, when the U.S. nuclear submarine support ship Frank Cable arrived at Jeju Naval Base. A tour bus carrying U.S. troops was leaving Jeju Naval Base, and Fr. Kim blocked the bus and picketed it. Father Kim’s action was an act of nonviolent civil disobedience against the injustice of U.S. warships entering and leaving Jeju Naval Base as if they were coming and going from their homes without apologizing for the 4.3 genocide, and out of a sense of urgency to raise the alarm about the increasing threat of war in Northeast Asia and the reality that Jeju is becoming a U.S. outpost. At the same time, it was an expression of the will to raise the issue of the bizarre situation of seeing five or six vehicles carrying filth and garbage of unknown origin and content from the Frank Cable that supports the nuclear submarines enter and leave the base every day, with no idea where they go or how they are disposed of. Fr. Kim’s actions were an exercise of his constitutional right to freedom of expression and conscience.
In 2019, the National Police Agency’s Human Rights Violation Investigation Team’s findings on the “Jeju Gangjeong Naval Base Construction Case” confirmed that the navy and pro-naval base residents had conspired to hijack ballot boxes in advance to defeat the vote for and against the naval base, and that the police had actively looked the other way. It was confirmed that the Ministry of Defense, the National Intelligence Service, the Jeju Island government, and the police assaulted, verbally abused, disrupted, and indiscriminately arrested people who participated in the opposition movement. The right to movement was restricted by diverting buses and blockading certain areas of Gangjeong Village so that no one could enter and no one could leave. The report found human rights violations including prolonged vehicle seizures, dispersal of protesters without regard for their safety, disruption of religious events, illegal internet manipulation of comments, assault of protesters at sea, support for conservative group rallies, and hospitality provided to pro-naval base residents, and finally called for an accountable apology and a national investigation.
However, instead of issuing a sincere apology and taking measures to prevent recurrence, the police interfered with the picketing of Father Sung Hwan Kim, who was exercising his freedom of conscience and expression in October of last year. Moreover, when U.S. soldiers on a bus on that day sexually harassed female activists at the rally with sexual hand gestures, the police dragged away the activists who raised the issue and helped the U.S. soldiers to leave Jeju Island in peace. Male police officers even grabbed and injured female activists, and female police officers also terrorized women by grabbing them hard. From that day until today, they have been threatening people and interfering with the cultural festival, claiming that the Human Chain Festival, which has been held in Gangjeong at 12 noon every day for 13 years, is a fake and undeclared rally.
It has been 18 years since the issue of the Jeju Naval Base in Gangjeong Village began. What’s more, February 26 marks the anniversary of the base’s completion nine years ago in 2016. We know from history that not thinking critically about what you do mechanically can lead to evil. We clearly remember what has been done in the name of public power at 4.3, 5.18, the Four Rivers, Milyang, Yongsan, Soseong-ri, at the labor sites where human beings are treated as machine parts, at the Sewol Ferry, and at Gangjeong. If you are human, shame on you.
We are still continuing our struggle every day with the 7 a.m. prayer vigil in front of the base, the 11 a.m. street mass, and the 12 p.m. Human Chain. The completion of the base does not mean the end of the movement for life and peace in Gangjeong. We are seeing this in concrete and tangible ways through the continued arrival of U.S. warships and the establishment of the Mobile Fleet Command this year. So Gangjeong is an ongoing process. As long as the Jeju Naval Base continues to expand its function and role as an outpost of the U.S. against China, turning Jeju into a powder keg and a U.S. colony in Northeast Asia, as long as the Jeju Naval Base is not closed and as long as U.S. ships continue to arrive, we have no choice but to become the second and third Kim Sung-hwan and continue our nonviolent, peaceful actions of civil disobedience.
At 6 p.m. today, Father Kim was released. Father Kim Sung-hwan, who has been working for a peaceful world without war, is not a person to be arrested, but a fellow citizen who deserves support and encouragement. He is innocent because he followed his conscience and took nonviolent peaceful action to prevent Jeju from becoming an island of war and an island of aggression. The UN Declaration of the Human Right to Peace emphasizes the right and obligation of human beings to exercise their right to peace. Police should apologize for illegally following and detaining Fr. Kim Sung-hwan! The police should stop the 12-year long suppression of the Gangjeong Human Chain Cultural Festival! Jeju is not a U.S. colony. Close the Jeju Naval Base that makes Jeju the powder keg of Northeast Asia!
February 26, 2025
Association of Gangjeong Villagers Against the Jeju Navy Base, Gangjeong Friends, Gangjeong Peace Network, St. Francis Peace Center