Welcome to BASE21

By PICIS, picis@jinbo.net

On 20th October, around 2,000 people from various social movement groups and trade unions gathered in front of Seoul Central Railway Station. They demanded 'stop the war of retaliation, realization of peace, and opposition to neo-liberal globalization'.

At the rally, Moon Jeong-Hyun, one of famous peace activists in Korea and co-heads of People's Action for Revision of Unequal SOFA, gave a keynote address. He denounced the U.S military action against Afghanistan, saying that "the September 11 terror attack on World Trade Center which brought about death of many innocent victims, is a result of U.S. unilateralism and obstinate dominant strategy over the world... therefore the on-going attack against Afghanistan under the name of 'war against terrorism' doesn't have any justification. What the U.S. is doing.... that is terrorism."

One of the organizers of the demonstration, Kim Pan-Tai, secretary of People's Action for Revision of Unequal SOFA said, "this rally is aimed at not only opposing the government's support to the U.S. war, but also to oppose neo-liberal globalization as an economic unilateralism."

Heo Young-Goo, vice-president of KCTU said, "U.S. invades countries all over the world, militarily as well as economically, under the name of globalization. In Korea, Samsung Insurance Co. which is one of the largest corporations in Korea, has already lost its ownership to a TNC. U.S.-led globalization undermines basic rights including livelihood rights and labour rights all over the world."

The statement from the participants read, "we, the Korean people, will join international movements of 'anti-war and anti-globalization'. We denounce barbarism and violence of the U.S. against the world poeples", and demanded following additional points. Opposition to Korean government's support of U.S. invasion, opposition to the MD(Missile Defense) system, opposition to all forms of free trade agreements including BITs between Korea and U.S./Japan, closure of U.S. military base in Korea, fundamental revision of SOFA etc.

After the rally, participants marched to MyungDong Cathedral, central area of Seoul.

The Korean peninsula is strategically very significant for the U.S. in its domination of East Aisa. So the U.S. has continuously intervened very deeply in this peninsula during the past years, on every level- political, economical and military. During the Korea War, the U.S. military even committed mass murder on innocent Korean civilians under the name of defense of the anti-Soviet Bloc. Korean student and social movement forces have focused on anti-America campaigns, as movement against imperialism, based on a nationalist stance, demanding the closure of U.S. military base in Korea and the retreat of U.S. army.

Anti-America campaigns in Korea were meaningful in addressing the issues of imperialism, colonialism and subordination. However, they have limitations, not only that they address political-military-centered issues but also that they are very much nationalists.
However, circumstances have been changed since the financial crisis in 1997. People and social movement forces have come to recognize the importance of internationalism, facing destructive effects of neoliberal globalization. Globalization affected Korean workers and people in a very direct way. This unexperienced situation of economic crisis made people recognize the imperative need to challenge world capitalism and build solidarity link with people all over the world. In this context, this rally on October 20th, was a stepping stone in combining the 'historical' anti-America campaign and 'recent' anti-neoliberal globalization movement. However, for Korean people, many problems remain to be solved in making connections between the two streams, despite the title of the rally, "opposition to the war of retaliation, realization of peace and opposition to neoliberal globalization".

In spite of many unsolved problems, Korean people now have a chance to deepen the stance of internationalism against neoliberal globalization. It has to go beyond the 'historical' anti-America campaigns and the 'on-going' anti-war pro-peace campaigns around the world. Imperialists and dominant-elites in every country are exploiting the 9.11 tragedy to propel corporate agendas. It is very urgent for people over the world to maintain fundamental principles such as internationalism, anti-neoliberal globalization, and defense of peoples' every basic rights. [PICIS]