II- Chapter Two: Atomic Bomb Survivors in Korea


1. Threefold Suffering of A-Bomb Survivors in Korea

2. Significance of the Son Jin-doo Judgment

3. Realization of Treatment in Japan and Thereafter

4. Solidarity with Japanese Citizen Movements


[Index]

1. Threefold Suffering of A-Bomb Survivors in Korea

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The first point to reassert concerning the issue of atomic bomb survivors in South Korea is that these individuals have been treated differently from A-bomb survivors in Japan. The Japanese government has ignored the victims in South Korea, and this has not essentially changed even subsequent to the Japan-ROK Basic Treaty in 1965. Both governments have viewed this treaty as having resolved the postwar problems diplomatically with Japan's offer of a total of $500 million in economic aid to South Korea, including repayable loans. "The White Paper on the Claim Fund," published in 1976 by the South-Korean Economic Planning Agency, explained statistically how much of the $500 million had been paid in and then used for each industry in every fiscal year. According to the statistics, Japan provided the $500 million worth of aid not in one lump sum but over a ten-year period in installments, not to be used freely but as tied aid, which restricted the use of the funds quite specifically. For example, about 55% of the funds were designed to be spent on building the industrial foundation for steel production, including $60 million in spending on the construction of a steel factory in Pohang.

Thus, the majority of funds were spent to support industrial development in South Korea, and the Japanese government intervened in their usage and secured gains for Japanese industries as well. Funds were offered as economic aid, and not one cent was spent on compensation to the many South Koreans who had suffered from the war and colonial rule. Inside South Korea, the bereaved families of those who had died did receive compensation in the 1970s, but this was done by the South Korean government as a part of domestic policy and so was unrelated to the funds from Japan. It seems then what has already been settled is limited strictly to the economic and industrial sectors, and the issue of compensation has yet to settled with the South Korean people. Further evidence to support this view is that, during the process of negotiating the amount of interstate payment based on the Japan-ROK Basic Treaty, no consideration was given to the issue of Koreans in Sakhalin or of those Koreans suffering from atomic bomb-related illnesses.

It is said that A-bomb survivors in South Korea have endured threefold suffering. First was the suffering that resulted from Japanese colonial rule. Deprived of land and food, these Koreans were subjugated, taken to Japan, and forced to labor under appalling work conditions. In the process, untold numbers of people lost their lives. Second was the suffering that stemmed from the atomic bombings, as many of these Koreans had been relocated to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Ethnic differences here irrelevant, both Koreans and Japanese suffered in the aftermath of a disaster caused by the first atomic bombings in the history of humankind. The third cause of suffering has been the difficulty in making a living at home. After the collapse of Japanese imperialism, they managed to return to Korea, but were unable to find work due to atomic bomb-related disabilities. In South Korea, where the mainstream interpretation of history has been that the atomic bombings brought liberation and independence to the motherland, it has been especially difficult for the A-bomb survivors to gain sympathy from society.

Moreover, no specialized doctors or hospitals were available for A-bomb-related physical afflictions. Caught up in a vicious cycle of no cure, no jobs and no money, these Korean A-bomb survivors have been tormented and remain in profound misery.

In Japan, legal salvation for A-bomb survivors was provided, though belatedly, in 1957 with the A-bomb Victim Medical Care Law (Genbakuiryo-ho) and those who obtained special passes for A-bomb survivors became eligible for state-funded treatment. However, Koreans have been excluded from the application of the law.

2. Significance of the Son Jin-doo Judgment

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Son Gi-yon and then his brother Son Jin-doo illegally entered Japan in 1966 for medical treatment for radiation sickness. Their attempts to obtain medical care were blocked by the Japanese state. Having violated the immigration law, Son Gi-yon was immediately deported home and Son Jin-doo was put in a Japanese prison. After serving his prison term, Son Jin-doo filed suit against the Japanese government and after lengthy court battle, finally won the case in the Supreme Court in March 1978. Several points must be considered concerning the significance of this case.

The first is that the Son Jin-doo Judgment (March 30, 1978) was of profound significance. The ruling read in part, "To understand the cause for the enactment of the A-Bomb Victims Medical Care Law specifically for those A-bomb survivors, it is impossible to ignore that, along with the unprecedented uniqueness and seriousness of the damage to health caused by exposure to the atomic bombings, such damages were the result of a state act, which was war, and many of the A-bomb survivors are still living in conditions less secure than the general victims of the war. One aspect of the A-Bomb Victims Medical Care Law is to make the state, which executed the war, responsible for providing relief measures for such special war damages. In this sense, it cannot be denied that this system is in effect based on a consideration of state compensation." This was an acknowledgment that compensating war-related damages was the duty of the state. Especially significant was that it suggested atomic bomb damages, with "unprecedented uniqueness and seriousness," should be given priority during the disbursement of state compensation.

The second point is that the judgment made clear that the purpose of the law is to provide overall relief to atomic bomb survivors, including those living in South Korea, because the law has no nationality clause, nor requires residency in Japan: considering the law has a humane purpose --providing relief for A-bomb survivors in light of their special health conditions -- and that the provision in Article 3-1 of the law anticipates victims who are not Japanese residents to be included as potential beneficiaries, providing relief to all A-bomb survivors in Japan, whatever the reason for their stay, must be consistent with the idea of state compensation, which is the aim of the law.

The final point is that the ruling concluded the law should be applied to Son Jin-doo, regardless of his status as an illegal immigrant: (providing relief to Son Jin-doo is) acceptable to state ethics, considering the plaintiff was a Japanese national at the time of the bombing and later was denaturalized due to the effectuation of a postwar peace treaty that disregarded his will.

A-bomb survivors in South Korea were, as were all Japanese, incorporated into the Japanese war system as "the Imperial subject." Nevertheless, they were denied Japanese nationality, regardless of their will, with the enactment of the San Francisco Peace Treaty. The deprivation of their Japanese nationality was done in an extraordinary manner in which the Chief of the Civil Affairs Bureau (minjikyoku) gave as its interpretation of the Peace Treaty that those of Korean heritage should all lose Japanese nationality. At the ruling on the Son Jin-doo case, the Supreme Court ultimately agreed with the memorandum but the hidden sense of guilt, I suppose, revealed itself in the above sentences. A sense of guilt because Japan denaturalized him in spite of his will and with no compensation in return. The Japanese Constitution provides that limiting an individual right, even if it is only an economic right, requires a guarantee for compensation of the limitation as a prerequisite. Therefore, I believe the state must provide adequate postwar compensation to A-bomb survivors in Korea and it is a matter of state ethics.

The term "state ethics" was not chosen randomly. A lawyer does not use the word "ethics" without deliberate preciseness. Some may say it would be better to use "humanity" instead because of its lighter tone. In a sense, "state ethics" implies a grave significance beyond legal responsibility; as one proverb says, "a state is its ethics." The Supreme Court usually makes its decision after a strict and meticulous examination of the meaning of words. Therefore, it should be emphasized that it used these particular words in this important ruling.

3. Realization of Treatment in Japan and Thereafter

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The success of the Son Jin-doo case forced the Japanese government, which had refused even the entry for treatment of South Korean A-bomb survivors, to immediately reverse its position to a serious consideration of the issue by the newly established Roundtable Committee on Basic Problems in A-bomb Victim Relief. Before the committee reached a conclusion, a group of LDP members prompted talks between the ruling parties of Japan (the LDP) and South Korea (the Democratic Republican Party) on this issue. A memorandum drawn up by them suggested a program facilitating medical treatment of Korean A-bomb survivors, including the dispatching of Japanese doctors to South Korea to promote the mutual association of doctors in both counties and extending invitations to Korean A-bomb survivors to come to Japan for treatment.

The way in which the program of treating Koreans in Japan emerged tells, in a sense, that the ruling party, which perceived the gravity of the state ethics pointed out in the Supreme Court ruling, tried to establish an alibi by demonstrating that it did make an effort to address the problem.

However, there was no aftercare given to those Korean A-bomb survivors who had visited Japan for treatment within the five-year time limit from 1981 and then returned home in improved health, if not with a full recovery. Without necessary aftercare, many who had recovered in Japan experienced relapses after returning. The program should have been extended in duration as well as revised in its entirety, including an increase in the number of patients and the elimination of time limits for treatment. The Japan Bar Association proposed in their first report in 1986 that the program be restarted with some modifications such as the extension of visiting periods, an increase in the number of patients, and funding by the Japanese government for travel expenses. Nonetheless, in November 1986, one month after the publication of the report, the program lapsed and so was terminated after having provided treatment for 349 South Koreans in Japan.

With the end of the project, the A-bomb survivors in South Korea turned the course of their struggles to appeals for monetary compensation in November 1987. They demanded the Japanese government pay a total of $2.3 billion, based on calculations using government spending on domestic A-bomb survivors at that time.

These moves by South Korean A-bomb survivors again came up on the inter-governmental agenda between Japan and South Korea, anticipating the 1988 Seoul Olympics. The Japanese government could not ignore these actions and negotiations continued quietly until 1990, when South-Korean President Roh Tae-woo visited Japan. Then-Japanese Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu, offering an apology, announced a plan whereby Japan would set up a relief fund of 4 billion yen for Korean A-bomb survivors as a humanitarian gesture. However, the extent of the scheme was limited to medical aid within Korea, not compensation for war damage, and according to two existing laws (The A-bomb Victims Medical Care Law and the Special Allowance for A-bomb Victims Law) covers only a part of total medical expenses, excluding living allowances, during the period of treatment. Nevertheless, this plan was a direct result of the successful struggles carried forth by those victims.

4. Solidarity with Japanese Citizen Movementss

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Also worth noting with regard to the issue of South Korean A-bomb survivors is their alignment with citizen movements in Japan. It was long after the end of the Second World War that the issue of A-bomb survivors surfaced in South Korea, due it seems, to South Korean recognition of atomic bombing as explained earlier; the three-year Korean War from June 1950; and the Cold War. It was not until 1967, after the conclusion of the Japan-ROK Basic Treaty, that the Association of Aid for A-Bomb Victims in South Korea was formed. The association began its activities, including conducting surveys on the living conditions of those victims, as well as calling for the building of specialized hospitals and facilities to help them find jobs and to assist them with their lives. In November 1967, the association held a demonstration at the Japanese Embassy in Seoul demanding compensation..

It was in December of the same year that the National Board of Executives of the Association of Japanese A- and H-Bomb Victims Organizations decided to launch an investigation into the conditions of A-bomb survivors in South Korea. The following January of 1968, the first memorial service for South Korean victims was held in front of the A-bomb survivors' Memorial in Hiroshima Peace Park by the South Korean Buddhist Church in Japan along with other organizations. 150 people, including the bereaved families of the victims, attended the ceremony.

In the same year, the National Meeting of the Anti-Nuclear Conference held in Hiroshima decided to assist those A-bomb survivors in South Korea, but it was not until the aforementioned arrest of Son Gi-yon upon his arrival to Japan that the Japanese organizations began directly cooperating with the movements in South Korea. The arrest of Son Jin-doo prompted several A-bomb survivors organizations in Yamaguchi prefecture and other places to come forward and give assistance.

Later, a variety of citizens groups and organizations across Japan (described here from west to east) started movements to help A-bomb survivors in South Korea. The main organizational arms of these movements include Zenrinkai (Group of Good Neighbors), a Fukuoka-based religious organization, which, since about 1973, has organized activities for the financial and political support of South Korean A-bomb survivors to assist them with living and medical expenses. In Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the two cities upon which atomic bombs were dropped, there are committees to support activities for inviting A-bomb survivors from South Korea to receive treatment in specialized A-bomb hospitals. In Osaka, the Citizens Organization to Support A-bomb Victims in South Korea, led by Yoshiko Matsui, has been involved in various activities, including raising donations to support each branch of the Association of South Korean A-bomb Victims, conducting field surveys, and promoting personal exchanges. In Tokyo, the Citizens Council on the Issue of A-bomb Victims in South Korea was established to assist intergovernment negotiations and to exchange information.

In March 1988, these groups and organizations across the country held a symposium, "Consider the Problems of A-bomb Victims in South Korea," which was attended by all the organizations and main activists that have been dealing with the issue, including So Ito, deputy of the Association of Japanese A- and H-Bomb Victims Organization. The extensive attendance contributed to achieving substantial discussion. Of course, appeals from three victims from South Korea that included Sin-Young-ju, the president of the Korean A-bomb Victims Association, and Dr. Lee Myong-gun, who had been treating those victims in Youn-se University in South Korea, deeply moved the audience. A document of the symposium, "Consider the Problems of A-bomb Victims in South Korea," was published (edited by the Citizens Council of A-bomb Victims in South Korea, published by Gaifusha).

In May 1988, the Japanese government dispatched an investigative team to South Korea consisting of individuals from the Foreign Affairs and Health and Welfare Ministries (headed by Haruhiko Shibuya, Secretary of the Asian Affairs Bureau of the Foreign Ministry). The team then issued its report after visiting the South Korean A-bomb Victims Association, and emphasized that it should be borne in mind that the heart of the matter was "the emotions of the victims" in bringing about a solution to the problem. Nevertheless, the policy of the Japanese government, presumably based on this report, caused great problems.

During President Roh Tae-woo's visit in 1990, Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu offered 4 billion yen in funds for aid along with an apology. However the funds had attached guidelines limiting their use to building facilities and providing medial treatment. This caused some confusion as to the use of the funds as the associations and victims had been demanding an urgent payment of provisional money. If the Japanese government really wants to find a solution to the problem, the measures proposed by the Japanese government should, as pointed out by the investigative team, be ones which can provide emotional satisfaction to those victims. Besides the inadequacy of the amount of payments, the bureaucratic attitudes fostered by the ODA system of dealing with aid will not solve the problem of providing this emotional satisfaction. The money the government offered only caused confusion and engendered resentment among the victims. I believe the guidelines should be abolished and the use of the funds should be left completely in the hands of the victims. The policy Japan and its people should look to find is one that can make those aging A-bomb survivors feel "It's good to be alive."


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