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The Truth and Reconciliation Committee on Wednesday published the names of 492 judges whose judgments invoked president Park Chung-hee¡¯s draconian emergency decrees in the 1970s. Park proclaimed the emergency decrees to stifle any criticism of his prolonged hold on power.
The committee released the list of the judges after submitting to President Roh Moo-hyun and the National Assembly a report on the result of its investigation in the second half of 2006.
The Supreme Court commented in a press release that it would consider the revelation a chance to reflect on the judiciary¡¯s past. The committee published in the 483-page report the names of all judges involved in 1,412 rulings on violations of the emergency decrees, plus the names of some defendants, reasons for the rulings and sentences. The list contains a dozen sitting senior judges, including four in the Supreme Court, three in the Constitutional Court and several High Court judges.
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People huddle around a bulletin board to read the Chosun Ilbo news about president Park Chung-hee¡¯s emergency decrees on Jan. 7, 1974. The decrees banned discussion about revision of the Yushin Constitution, which gave enormous power to Park.
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Former main opposition Grand National Party chairwoman Park Geun-hye, the daughter of president Park, said in a press conference, ¡°I see the publication as a political attack. Why did they reveal it now? This is the political reality of Korea. History will judge what the current government has done in the future.¡± She said she felt sorry for those who had been summarily executed on trumped-up charges of trying to reconstitute the banned People's Revolutionary Party under the emergency decrees. But she added, ¡°The execution was in accordance with the law. And they say the publication is also legal. In that case, surely one of them has to be wrong.¡±
Uri Party spokesman Woo Sang-ho said although it is necessary to try to correct wrongdoings by the past authoritarian governments, it was excessive to reveal the names of judges and brand all of them as flunkeys of authoritarian rule without taking the varying extent of their role in the rulings into account. Uri Party Rep. Noh Woong-rae also said it was unhelpful to publicly condemn the judges, although the truth of past wrongdoings should be revealed.
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A judge whose name is on the list is seen among others at the Supreme Court in Seocho-dong, Seoul on Wednesday.
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GNP Floor Leader Kim Hyung-oh in a party leadership meeting said raking up the past and plotting to divide society was the wrong way to find truth and seek reconciliation. GNP spokeswoman Na Kyung-won claimed the presidential committee had been set up under the current government¡¯s political slogan of ¡°overthrowing the mainstream.¡± But two minor opposition parties endorsed the publication. Millennium Democratic Party spokesman Lee Sang-yul said the Park Chung-hee administration curtailed the basic rights of the people under the emergency decrees. He added that the judiciary should keenly examine itself and try to prevent such wrongdoings from recurring. Democratic Labor Party spokesman Park Yong-jin said the judges on the list were evidently responsible for the rulings they made under the emergency decrees, ¡°since rulings are the means whereby judges speak.¡±
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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