South Korean Opposition Parties’ Bid to Form a United Front Collapses

Attempts to forge a united opposition before crucial parliamentary elections this spring collapsed last week with the largest opposition party refusing to negotiate with leading dissident Kim Dae Jung.

“Without the retirement of Kim Dae Jung, no opposition unity can be obtained. Unification of the opposition without the retirement of Kim is meaningless,” Kim Myung Yun, acting president of the Reunification Democratic Party, said Friday.

He said his party rejected Kim’s proposal to forge a united party under the leadership of Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam, former leader of the Reunification Democratic Party. He also rejected Kim Dae Jung’s plan to avoid running two opposition candidates in a district by dividing up the territory among the parties.

Kim Dae Jung, president of the Party for Peace and Democracy, and Kim Young Sam met Feb. 29 and agreed to talk about a unified opposition. The two Kims have been trying to rebuild their parties after they split the opposition vote and lost in the Dec. 16 presidential election to Roh Tae Woo.

Kim Young Sam resigned Feb. 8 as leader of the Reunification Democratic Party to apologize for his loss in the election and help clear the way for new party leaders.

Kim Dae Jung refused Wednesday to follow Kim Young Sam into retirement and allow a new group from the two opposition parties to attempt to forge an alliance.

A united front against the ruling Democratic Justice Party in the parliamentary election is seen by political analysts as the surest way to gain an opposition majority in the unicameral National Assembly, now dominated by the ruling party.

Meanwhile, the former head of South Korea’s national police was convicted Saturday of trying to conceal the death of a dissident student last year during police interrogation. He was given an eight-month suspended sentence.

The activist, Park Chong Chul, 21, a former student of Seoul National University, choked to death in January, 1987, when police pressed his neck against the rim of a bathtub in an attempt to get information from him.

Former police director Kang Min Chang, 55, was found guilty of malfeasance and dereliction of duty. Judge Sohn Jin Kon, who presided at a three-judge Seoul District Criminal Court, said Kang did not move speedily to investigate the student’s death and tried to pressure a police doctor into changing an autopsy report on it.

Kang was dismissed after the death, and was arrested last Jan. 16 when the police doctor published a diary disclosing the alleged pressure to change his autopsy report.