Chun Issue Called Pivotal for Seoul : Demands for Retribution May Affect S. Korean Stability

When Chun Doo Hwan left the presidency in February, the big question in South Korean politics was how much power he intended to wield behind the scenes.

Today the big question is how far Chun’s opponents will go in their demands for retribution. The outcome promises to affect not only the political stability of South Korea but also relations between South Korea and the United States.

The man Chun had counted on for protection, President Roh Tae Woo, has made it clear that he will not allow Chun to be put on trial. But even Roh--who was handpicked by Chun to succeed him, yet describes Chun’s term of office as “a long, dark and dreadful night”--is moving toward a break with his friend of more than 30 years.

There have been widespread charges of scandal and corrupt practices under Chun. Opinion polls show that more than 90% of the people want retribution. Opposition leaders insist on an apology and the return of ill-gotten wealth. Radicals, notably student groups, demand imprisonment or execution.

On Thursday, about 10,000 students demonstrated in Seoul, demanding Chun’s arrest and threatening to attack his home and seize him. They clashed with more than 20,000 policemen in the largest such incident since the Olympic Games here in September. Many injuries from rocks and firebombs were reported.

Park Jun Kyu, a ruling party member of the National Assembly, said that some form of final accounting for Chun has become inevitable.

“The 5th Republic (Chun’s government) is the issue,” Park said. “We have been postponing it.”

The usually pro-government Korea Herald said: “Dissociating the 6th Republic from the 5th Republic is now the nation’s foremost political task. . . . The nation’s future depends on it.”

31% Wanted Prosecution

After the Olympics, a poll by the newspaper Dong-A Ilbo found that 63% of the public wanted an apology from Chun and 31% wanted to see him prosecuted. Only 5% wanted to grant him immunity.

According to journalist Park Kwon Sang, “That 31% means that Chun can’t live anywhere safely in Korea.”

Even the nation’s top businessmen have started speaking out. Chung Ju Yung, founder of the Hyundai conglomerate, assailed Chun for pretending to loosen the government’s control of business while actually tightening it.

Kim Woo Choong, founder and chairman of the Daewoo Group, said: “He was a terrible president. He didn’t really do anything right.”

A Western diplomat, who asked not to be identified by name, said that retribution is the only way to resolve the complaints against the Chun government--and dissociate Roh from it.

“If they get Chun,” he said, “the (scandals and abuses) of the 5th Republic will basically be disposed of.”

One diplomat said that Chun, seeking legitimacy after seizing power in 1980, “wrapped himself in the American flag,” and now that his government has fallen into disgrace, the United States is trying to restore its tarnished image.

For the United States, the problem centers on a National Assembly investigation of Chun’s bloody suppression of protest in the southwestern city of Kwangju against his 1980 coup and the American role in the use of Korean troops there. U.S. officials have publicly welcomed the investigation and promised to cooperate.

“We’ve taken a terrible beating for seven years,” one diplomat said. “We sat on our thumbs . . . and let Chun’s people project their own story that the Americans were involved.”

He said he hopes the United States can show that its role was “an insignificant one” and that it mitigated the killing of civilians by Korean troops in Kwangju.

The diplomat was asked whether retired Gen. John A. Wickham, former commander of forces here who relinquished operational control of the Korean troops that suppressed the protests, might testify in the investigation. “We would like to avoid that,” he replied, “but we will not try to stonewall it.”

According to some analysts, Chun still commands a loyal following among the leaders of the politically sensitive armed forces, and these military men would not look with favor on his being prosecuted or otherwise humiliated. One said that if the overall political situation deteriorates, “you only need four or five strategically placed generals” to mount a coup.

Meanwhile, not a day passes without some new allegation of scandal or abuse.

Evidence has emerged that Chun lived in lavish style and conducted his office like a personal fiefdom, distributing privileges to his relatives, who passed out favors to their friends and relatives.

So far, charges have been brought only against Chun’s younger brother and a nephew. The brother has been convicted of embezzlement and influence-peddling and sentenced to seven years in prison. Accusations have been leveled against Chun’s wife, his elder brother, his father-in-law and his brother-in-law. In all, 14 of Chun’s relatives have been forbidden by the Justice Ministry to leave the country.

Chun set up a personal foundation; put his brother, Chun Kyung Hwan, in charge of the government-supported Saemaul (New Community) Movement; authorized his wife, Lee Soon Ja, to establish the Assn. for Fostering a New Generation, and named his wife’s father, Lee Kyu Dong, to the presidency of an association promoting welfare for the elderly.

Businessmen donated $85.4 million to Chun’s institute, $225.4 million to his brother’s Saemaul Movement and $36.1 million to his wife’s group. Nearly all the money was collected by the Blue House, the office of the president.

Audit of Blue House

An audit of Blue House operations in October disclosed that of the donations to the Saemaul Movement, $32.7 million was diverted to unknown uses.

Chun set up the Ilhae (now Sejong) Research Institute to provide, among other things, a palatial retirement home for the president and, through its endowment, a potential power base. But Chun never got to use it.

The disgrace of the arrest of his brother forced him to resign his only official position, as chairman of the Council of Elder Statesmen, and induced the institute to sever all ties with him.

His wife, under fire from the opposition, resigned last month as head of her association, but she insists that she did nothing wrong and that no one was forced to donate money.

No accusations have been made against the association run by Lee, Chun’s father-in-law, which collected its donations directly. But Lee, who owns a tree plantation, was found to have won lucrative contracts from the city of Seoul, whose mayor was appointed by Chun, for trees to decorate the capital for the Olympics.

Incidents that for years were obscured or kept secret are now coming to light. For example, the number of people killed in the Kwangju uprising, announced as 191 at the time, has now risen to a probable 304, including 103 still listed as missing.

Victims of the purges carried out by Chun in 1980 have been added up, for the record, as follows: 8,877 bureaucrats, 711 journalists and 825 politicians.

Former government officials have confessed that they liquidated 44 firms in bringing the nation’s news media under government control. Previously, officials had said these media organizations had disbanded voluntarily.

Fifty-four people were reportedly killed, nine of them beaten to death, in a massive “re-education” program carried out in army training camps for 10,000 so-called hoodlums in 1980.

Officials have disclosed that Chun liquidated 78 debt-ridden private corporations that the government had previously supported by guaranteeing bank loans, and then underwrote $7.1 billion in funds to banks to prevent the banks from collapsing under the weight of the non-collectible loans.

President Roh said the other day in an interview that he saw no need to get involved in Chun’s affairs. He said he was aware that Chun “has been accused of some wrongdoing,” and assumed that Chun “will decide for himself . . . whatever action he deems appropriate.”

Chun has been in seclusion since announcing in September that he would stay away from the Olympic Games in order to avoid any public incidents. According to South Korean newspapers, he has rejected requests that he apologize, return illicit wealth and go into retirement in his birthplace in the countryside, as did government officials who committed wrongs in medieval times.