Korean-American groups protest South Korea's decision to feed livestock instead of North Korean people
the US is providing just half the amount of grain it provided in 2001, while Japan, which donated 600,000 tons of food in 2000, provided nothing at all last year and has given nothing again this year.
Source : Base21
by Terry Park/Staff Reporter
parkterry@hotmail.com
New York, NY--Young Koreans United of New York and the Korean Alliance for Peace and Justice of New York will hold a rally in front of the South Korean Consulate in New York City on Friday to protest the South Korean government's decision to use the nation's surplus rice to feed livestock instead of shipping it to famine-stricken North Korea.
Millions of people in North Korea, especially children, depend on outside food aid, as years of droughts and bad harvests have debilitated the North's food supply. As reported by James Conachy in his article on North Korea asylum bids in China for the World Socialist Web Site, the hardline Bush and Koizumi adminstrations have "disrupted" international relief efforts to feed the North Korean people; the US is providing just half the amount of grain it provided in 2001, while Japan, which donated 600,000 tons of food in 2000, provided nothing at all last year and has given nothing again this year. Meanwhile, the U.N. World Food Program raised only $25 million by last April despite desperate pleas for emergency food aid. This makes South Korea's surplus rice all the more important, but for the first time in its history, it has decided to use it on its livestock. This will certaintly worsen an already dire humanitarian situation in North Korea.
Some speculate that the naval clash in the Yellow Sea which resulted in the death of four South Korean sailors and an undetermined number of North Korean sailors may have been a factor in hardening opinions against Pyongyang and therefore the monumental decision to restrict food aid. This may also lead the U.S. to further decrease its food aid, as the naval clash has sparked cries in Washington to take a more belligerent stance against the North Korean government, which was labeled a member of an "axis of evil" by President George W. Bush.
YKU and the Korean Alliance for Peace and Justice have issued two demands to the South Korean government:
1. Humanitarian Food Aid to the People of North Korea MUST Continue
2. Do Not Use Food for Politics
Photos of the rally (courtesty of YKU-NY)
Rally in front of South Korean consulate office, Los Angeles
Rally in front of South Korea's Permanent Mission to the United Nations, New York City
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