Human Rights campaigners have held a rally in Seoul to call for human rights to be upheld in North Korea.

The demonstration at Cheong-gye Plaza in Gwanghwamun saw many civil and human rights groups join with citizens and activists who walked 680 km in solidarity with North Korean prisoner Shin Suk-ja, known as the Daughter of Tongyeong.

Shin has been imprisoned with her two daughters, Oh Hye-won and Oh Gyu-won, in North Korea for more than 20 years.

They traveled with Shin’s husband, Oh Kil-nam, to the country in December 1985 from Germany, where they had been living in political asylum.

Oh later escaped while on an communist government mission to Europe in 1986, but his family was then taken to the country’s Yodok political prison camp, where he believes they may have been held ever since.

The marchers started their solidarity trek on Nov. 19 in Shin’s hometown of Tongyeong on the southern tip of the country, then headed east to Busan before walking to Seoul and ending up in Imjingak on Sunday.

They held events at 12 p.m. each day along the way to raise awareness of North Korea’s system of political prison camps, tying yellow ribbons of remembrance on trees as they marched.

Tongyeong Trek leader Choi Hong-jae said the campaign aimed to ensure that Oh’s family, among the estimated 517 abductees still suffering under the Kim Jong-il regime, was not forgotten. 

More than 3,800 people have been abducted by the North since it signed a cease-fire agreement in 1953. Though many were repatriated to the South following inter-governmental talks, 517 of them are still detained in the country, many of them fishermen taken while working along the two countries’ maritime border.

“I was involved in the student movement as a leftist Juche ideology supporter in 1987, the time when Shin Suk-ja and her daughters first went to a political prison camp. I sided with the people who were giving them that pain,” Choi said.

“So, because of that debt I owe to them I planned this trek. As a citizen just like Shin Suk-ja and her daughters, and also as a human being, I wanted to share in their pain.”

Oh also attended the Seoul rally on Saturday, where more than 400 people came together to watch performances by South Koreans and defectors from the North as well as walking a short way with the group as they marched on toward Imjingak.

The Seoul rally organized by The Network for North Korean Democracy and Human Rights (NKnet) and other organizations included traditional martial arts, B-boys and brass performances. Singer Lee Kwang-pil also sang a song for abductees, followed by North Korean song troupe Answer.

A North Korean human rights photo exhibition and a postcard petition campaign were also held during the afternoon marking the 63rd anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

An open letter has also been sent to the Korean National Assembly and party leaders asking them to act to end the human rights abuses suffered by people in North Korea.

The letter calling for the passage of the North Korea Human Rights Act, first submitted to the National Assembly in 2005, was signed by 105 non-governmental organizations representing 15 countries as well as by 278 individuals.

“We hear repeatedly that the National Assembly will not take action because of the ‘politics’ in South Korea,” the letter organized by the Defense Forum Foundation read.

“But this is not about politics. It is about the fate of 23 million people, many of whom are engaged in a daily struggle to survive.”

By Kirsty Taylor
(kirstyt@heraldcorp.com)