Korea Frees Top Dissident After Reform Talk Failure : Opposition to Continue Its Protests

Authorities freed Kim Dae Jung, the nation’s most prominent dissident, from house arrest today, hours after talks between a key opposition leader and President Chun Doo Hwan broke down.

Kim’s release had been a major demand of the opposition Reunification Democratic Party, which earlier rejected the outcome of the meeting between its leader, Kim Young Sam, and Chun. The party vowed to continue the anti-government protests that have turned the nation into a battlefield for two weeks.

Hundreds of uniformed and plainclothes police, who since April 8 had blocked all entrances to the narrow lane where Kim Dae Jung lives, withdrew from the area at midnight.

Envoy From U.S.

Hours earlier, U.S. envoy Gaston Sigur, a State Department official sent to assess the political situation in Korea after 15 days of violent protests, had been driven to see Kim through a cordon of about 50 angry protesters, who screamed slogans and pounded on his car.

Kim, who returned to Korea in 1985 after two years of self-imposed exile in the United States, has long been one of the most vocal opponents of Chun’s authoritarian rule.

Surrounded by several hundred supporters and reporters who joined him outside the house, he described his 76 days of house restriction, under which even his children could not visit him.

“People get married twice in their lifetime,” he said. “Once when they are young, and again when their children leave. This time I had a very long and happy honeymoon.”

Productive Meeting

Kim said his meeting with Sigur was productive and he praised the United States for backing democracy in South Korea.

“I told him (Sigur) that the reason U.S. policy is heading in the right direction is because the United States made it clear it supports Korea’s democratization,” Kim said.

The Reunification Democratic Party earlier rejected the results of the Kim Young Sam-Chun meeting in which the president offered a renewed national debate on constitutional reform. A visibly angry Kim said he made proposals but nothing was achieved. (Story on Page 6.)

The National Coalition for a Democratic Constitution, organizers of a June 10 rally that marked the beginning of two weeks of violent protests, said it has no plans to cancel a major protest Friday despite the turn of events today in Seoul.

March on Blue House

According to published reports, Friday’s demonstrators will attempt to march on the Blue House presidential mansion, which is heavily guarded by armed troops.

Police reported generally peaceful demonstrations today involving more than 7,000 students on and around 40 university campuses, 27 of them in the capital. It was the smallest turnout since the daily protests began June 10.

On June 10, the ruling Democratic Justice Party nominated Roh Tae Woo, a longtime Chun ally and the president’s hand-picked choice, to run for the presidency in elections late this year under the Chun constitution.

That same day, students and other anti-government forces began a series of demonstrations against Chun’s rule. Violent protests have swept the country for two weeks, resulting in thousands of injuries on both sides.

In the last few days, Chun has come under heavy pressure from members of his party--as well as U.S. officials--to rescind his April decision to postpone talks on constitutional revision until after Seoul’s 1988 Olympics, by which time Roh would be expected to occupy the Blue House under constitutional provisions and election laws that favor the ruling party.