PERSPECTIVE ON SOUTH KOREA : Put the Toasts to Democracy on Hold : Despite some advances in human rights, the repressive laws that propped up military rule are still intact.

This week, President Kim Young Sam of South Korea arrives in Washington. No doubt he will be toasted as an exemplar of a theory at the center of President’s Clinton’s foreign policy: In an authoritarian state, economic growth will propel the country to democracy and increased respect for human rights. This theory is at the forefront of the Administration’s dealings with China, Indonesia, Brazil and other trading partners with repressive records.

Unfortunately, a recent mission to President Kim’s “New Korea” and intensive discussions with human rights groups, labor activists, civil liberties lawyers, and academics cast serious doubt on Washington’s premise.

As a result of the strenuous and protracted efforts of the Korean people, the country has finally emerged from decades of military dictatorship. Despite improvements in the human rights climate, including the release of 200 political prisoners in 1993 and 1994, Korea’s transition is dangerously incomplete. The repressive laws that propped up military rule are actively used by Kim to inhibit political opponents and labor activists.

On May 8, the Supreme Public Prosecutor’s office in Seoul issued a “special order of arrest” for two leaders of the country’s independent--and illegal--labor confederation. The order, the opening salvo in the government’s campaign against the autonomous labor movement, claimed that the labor federation intended to link demands for wage increases to the local elections in June. On May 18, as wage negotiations heated up, the prosecutor’s office issued warrants for the arrest of 64 leaders of the union at Korea Telecom (the state-run telephone monopoly) for their participation in two protests in 1994. The warrants effectively, and probably not coincidentally, derailed negotiations.

Korea Telecom management, led by a retired four-star general newly appointed by Kim, (the previous chief was deemed to be too soft on the workers) refused to negotiate with those on the wanted list. Kim proclaimed in a widely broadcast comment that a strike at the strategically important Korea Telecom was tantamount to a move “to overthrow the state.” This heated rhetoric, ignoring the basic human rights of free expression and association and internationally recognized labor rights, needlessly overcharged an already intense situation.

On June 5, President Kim ordered hundreds of riot police to storm Seoul’s Myongdong Cathedral and Chogye Temple, two revered centers of worship, to arrest 13 Telecom union leaders seeking refuge there. In three decades of military rule, the police never invaded these religious sanctuaries.

Kim’s program to boost “Korean competitiveness” through heightened productivity is creating widening labor discontent, including the May wildcat strike at Hyundai that shut down the company’s automotive operations. Independent labor activists are planning to launch a national democratic trade union confederation in the fall, but it is likely that the government will try to short-circuit it.

Such actions are all too consistent with labor law in Kim’s vaunted New Korea. The trade union law, enacted in 1953 and subsequently amended under military rule, effectively prohibits workers from forming union federations of their own choosing if these would compete with the one officially recognized and government-supported labor federation.

The leadership of the International Labor Organization has strongly recommended that Seoul reform its laws to conform to international standards. President Kim, however, has taken no meaningful action in that direction.

Korea’s Orwellian national security law prohibits the “formation of and association with an ‘anti-state’ organization” or with an organization that “benefits the enemy.” During Kim’s presidential campaign, he urged the abolition of the law, but suddenly revised his position before the election. In fact, there has been an increase in the number of cases brought under the law over the last year. The law has been broadly interpreted so that those who have merely espoused socialist or communist ideas have faced imprisonment.

There is now a real opportunity to press President Kim to respect labor rights and reform his country’s repressive legislation. As a first-generation newly industrialized country, Korea has applied for membership in the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, the organization of industrialized democracies. The entry process provides valuable leverage to press Korea to reform its labor law to meet international standards.

So when President Kim is toasted this week, he needs to hear that, while Washington welcomes the progress Korea has made, its transition is incomplete. To become a reality, the New Korea that Kim promised in 1993 must institutionalize respect for human rights. Repeal of repressive legislation is the place to start.