Monday 25 August 2008

August 15 National Reunification Rallies Held


August 15 National Reunification Rallies Held

The August 15 national reunification rally was held in Seoul on August 15.

Present at the rally were more than 5000 workers, youth and students, members of civic organizations and the Democratic Labor Party of south Korea.

The participants waved the reunification flags and shouted the slogan “Long live independence!” expressing their ardent desire for reunification.

Speeches were followed by a resolution at the rally.

The resolution declared that despite their desperate attempts the Lee Myong-bak regime and the pro-US conservative forces cannot arrest the stream of the times toward the reunification, and stressed that the Lee regime which swims against the trend of the times and incessantly incites confrontation and division cannot but pay dearly for it.

It also indicated that the south Korean people from different social standings would actively struggle for the implementation of the June 15 joint declaration and the October 4 declaration, withdrawal of the US occupation troops from south Korea, the repeal of the US hostile policy toward the north and against the total import of American beef and the conclusion of the south Korea-US Free Trade Agreement.

In the meantime, the August 15 national reunification rally was also sponsored on the same day by the South Side Committee of the Solidarity for Realizing the June 15 South-North Joint Declaration at the Baekbeom Memorial Hall in Seoul.

At the rally a joint statement of the National Joint Committee for Realizing the June 15 Joint Declaration was read out to denounce the Japanese authorities which has not yet admitted the nefarious crimes committed against the Korean nation, distorts its history of aggression and runs amuck in the moves to grab Dok Islet and the political suppression of the Korean residents in Japan.

A special statement of the South Side Committee of the Solidarity for Realizing the June 15 South-North Joint Declaration was read out at the rally.

The statement disclosed and condemned traitor Lee Myong-bak who made a mess of the inter-Korean relations, arrested the participants in the candlelight actions demanding the overall renegotiation on the American beef import, and tries tooth and nail to control the broadcasting services.

It called on all the fellow countrymen in the south, north and overseas to actively stage the struggle to realize peace and reunification in conformity with the spirit of the June 15 joint declaration.

100th Candlelight Struggle Staged

The 100th candlelight struggle against the import of American beef was staged in Seoul on August 15.

Some 12,000 members of different civic organizations and political parties, workers, youth and students and citizens took part there.

A people's declaration was read out at the rally.

The declaration asserted that the 100 times of candlelit struggle are the people's great victory and called to raise higher the candlelight against the Lee Myong-bak regime’s moves to privatize the public sectors and control the media organs.

It stressed if the Lee regime does not stop the attempts to go back to the dictatorial era the people's candlelit struggle will continue.

After the rally the participants staged a demo waving placards reading “Lee Myong-bak, who totally disregards the people and tramples on democracy, step down!” and “Let us hold the candlelight of independence!”.

The police authorities mobilized 13,000 police troops of 165 companies to quell the demo under the pretext of so-called “illegal night rally” and forcibly walked off 160 citizens.

In defiance of the madcap crackdown of the police the citizens undauntedly staged candlelit demo in various parts of the city including Myungdong Cathedral and went on till the next dawn, shouting such slogans as “Lee Myong-bak, step down!” and “Lee Myong-bak is criminal”.

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