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195 Social celebrities petitioned with International Organization's Protest

It is booming to demand a judgement of acquittal to the human rights activist, Mr Suh Jun Sik, from both internal and external country. 195 social celebrities including leading figures of democratization movement and representatives of social activists groups submitted a collective petition urging Mr Suh Jun Sik's innocence to the court in charge (judge in charge, Mr Oh Seok Jun) on June 30th, a week before the sentence trial.

In the last trial held on June 15th, the prosecutor demanded a penalty of imprisonment for 5 years and disqualification for 5 years due to his violation the national security law. Against the demand, the social celebrities submitting the petition, "The prosecutor's heavy penalty for 5 years seems to aim at suppressing Mr Suh Jun Sik's activities, because a suspicion concerned "Red Hunt" for which Mr Suh Jun Sik had been arrested in November 1997 was taken off in other trials before". In the petition, they also said,
"The law of preservation and investigation has been evaluated 'undesirable' by Unitd Nation Human Rights Committee. Moreover UNHCR has requested to abrogate it, since it infringes the freedom of thought and expression. Therefore, it would be inconsistent with the demand for the rule of law to punish Mr Suh on the suspicion of breaking the law of preservation and investigation".

In addition to the petition, international human right groups keep on writing letters. For example, Amnesty International criticized through the public correspondence to president Kim Dae Jung and the court in charge, "The law of preservation and investigation, which also applied to Mr. Suh's case, has been interpreted arbitrarily to the past conscience prisoners and long term prisoners who never threaten any contemporary national security".

Also, the Martin Barrow Fund that had been set in the purpose of the struggling to the military dictatorship in El Salvador said, "We advise the Korean government to abrogate the national security law and the law of preservation and investigation immediately. We fix our eyes on South Korea until those laws will be abrogated". Moreover, the other international human rights groups such as Human Rights Watch, Human Rights Committee in Asia, and The Asian Hot Line, demanded a judgement of acquittal to Mr. Suh as well as abrogation or revision of the national security law and the law of preservation and investigation for matching the international human rights standard.

These deep concern at the sentence trial of Mr. Suh seems to be caused from following points: First, the trial is connected with a human rights activist who has claimed the principle of human rights and has struggled to the undesirable laws. Second, the 5 years penalty demanded by the prosecutor is too heavy. Third, there can be a serious situation like the court restraint on Mr. Suh. The sentence trial of Suh Jun Sik be held at room 407 of the west branch, Seoul District Court at 9:30 a.m. on July 6th.

SOURCE:KOREA HUMAN RIGHTS DAILY NEWS July 1th, 1999