Students, Police Clash at S. Korean Memorial

About 1,500 students chanting “Bring down the military dictatorship!” and “Drive out the Americans!” clashed with riot police Sunday outside a memorial for students killed in a 1960 uprising that toppled the government.

The protest took place outside the April 19 Cemetery in northern Seoul, where 200 students killed in the 1960 uprising are buried. Students, opposition leaders and government officials annually pay tribute at the memorial.

Witnesses said that about 200 protesters were arrested Sunday and several students were beaten by baton-wielding police in the rally that climaxed a week of demonstrations commemorating “Student Uprising Week,” when the government of Syngman Rhee was toppled in 1960.

No official estimates on the size of Sunday’s crowd, arrests or injuries were immediately available.

Offerings at Graves

Earlier in the day, families of the fallen students took offerings of wine, food and fruit to the graves and held picnics next to the funeral mounds on the balmy spring day.

Opposition and government lawmakers went separately to pay their respects at the memorial, each side using the occasion to plead its political agenda.

Opposition leader Kim Young Sam called for the continuation of the struggle to promote democracy in South Korea and spoke against the government of President Chun Doo Hwan.

But Deputy Prime Minister Kim Mahn Je said “the only way of rewarding” the “noble spirits” of the fallen students is to turn South Korea into an “advanced nation.”

Denounce ‘Dictatorship’

Before the clash, students joined with about 2,500 other opponents of the Chun government in a rally denouncing his “military dictatorship.”

The United Minjung (People’s) Movement for Democracy and Unification called on the crowd to “stage a total war to overthrow the military dictatorship and establish a democratic government with the force of the people.”

After the rally, about 1,500 students marched around the memorial grounds shouting anti-government slogans. They dug up red bricks from the memorial grounds and broke them into hand-sized rocks to throw at police.

Seconds after the first rock was thrown, riot police fired barrages of tear gas canisters and moved through the acrid smoke, beating and collaring stunned students.

Rep. Solarz ‘Disappointed’

Rep. Stephen J. Solarz (D-N.Y.), ending a four-day visit, said Sunday that “considerable progress” needs to be made in South Korean politics before the people’s “overwhelming desire” for democracy is achieved.

Solarz, chairman of the House subcommittee on Asian and Pacific affairs, said he was “deeply disappointed” by President Chun’s decision to end negotiations with the opposition on what system to use to elect his successor.

Last Monday, Chun, who said he will step down next February at the end of his seven-year term, announced that debate on constitutional change was being suspended until after the 1988 Summer Olympics here in September next year, and that his successor will be chosen by the current indirect electoral college system, which the opposition charges favors the ruling party.