Looking at the Han River Estuary as Keyhole to Eurasia

- An Interview with a Peace-Activist and Photographer, Lee Shi-woo

Mr. Lee Shi-woo (44), a Korean peace-activist, writer and photographer, is throwing in downtown Seoul a small exhibition of his 10-year long work on the Han River Estuary. For him who's been working all his life on the problems derived from the division of Korea and the US military control, what's happening around the Korean Peninsula send strong signals particularly to South Korea. What he suggests as results is an easement of military confrontation through changing the 1953 Armistice Agreement into a Peace Agreement, and a new, bottom-up geopolitics of Eurasianism the very start point of which shall be the Han River Estuary. Because the Han River Estuary, covering from Odusan Reunification Watchtower where the Yimjin River and the Han River meet to the Mal Island at the end of Ganghwa, is 'open' to civil shipping according to the Armistice Agreement, many activists and citizens in Korea have regularly used the area for shaping up their movement for peaceful reunification by striking sail on its water since 2000.

He's speaking more about his life-time work including the 2008 masterpiece <The Han River Estuary: A Hole in the Armistice Agreement, A Window to Eurasia>, the increased military tension over the Peninsula at present, the 'Four River Project' under the current Korean government, etc.

Q: Tell us how you've reached this subject of 'Han River Estuary' from your past work on the DMZ. How this particular area is related to the UNC and Eurasia?

A: I've run across so many problems since I began working on the DMZ(Demilitarized Zone): AP(anti-personnel) mine, the herbicide, life and people in the CCL(Civilian Control Line), etc. And at some point, I've got two questions. First one was what the fundamental frame governing all these problems is, and second one was what the range of influence of the DMZ exactly is. The answer to the first question was given by the UNC(United Nations Command). The UNC has militarily controlled the southern portion below the MDL(Military Demarcation Line) since the enforcement of the Armistice Agreement in 1953, which has created all the problems. It was the UNC that has had the OPCON(Operation Control) on laying AP mines or spraying the Agent Orange, and it was the UNC that has conflicted with the issue of Korean sovereignty by maintaining entry control over the DMZ. My answer to the second question was Eurasia. The range of influence of the DMZ was including Asia and Eurasia beyond South and North in the Korean Peninsula. World could be thought as a boundary but we couldn't consider the world has yet completed a 'system'. To the contrary, Eurasia has never stopped developing itself as a 'system' since its first agenda which was Wilson's National Self-determination in 1919, second agenda which was Lenin's Theses on National and Colonial Questions in 1920, third agenda which was Roosevelt's UN in 1945, and fourth agenda which was Tito's Non-Aligned Movement in the 60's. I came to a conclusion that through this process of Eurasian agenda formation, the leadership that led that formation also comes out as a leader in the formation of the system of Eurasia. As the initiative of Eurasian agendas makes a transition from a Great Powers-led model to a Lesser Powers-led one, the Lesser Powers have demonstrated a Titoian strategy, the core of which lies in solving their domestic problems by simultaneously solving a Eurasian agenda. In South Korea Rhee Syng-man proposed the 'anti-communism' agenda, and in the North Kim Jong-il tried to solve the North's internal problems by proposing the 'nuclear' agenda on a Eurasian scale. The Titoian strategy to solve the agenda of 'North Korea' with the Eurasian agenda of 'North Korea Nuclear' has currently been working quite well with the NK-US Peace Agreement being in discussion. The problem is South Korea. As no capability to propose a Eurasian agenda in sight, South Korea is at a risk of being sidelined from history. For the NK-US Peace Agreement to become a tripartite peace agreement among South Korea, North Korea and the US at the least, South Korea should also start dealing with agendas on a Eurasian scale. As far as I'm concerned, the best agenda at this point is the 'dissolution of the UNC'. The UNC from its birth has been a baby of the political dynamics at a Eurasian level, and has been voted into dissolution at the 1975 UN General Assembly. While I was into this issue of the UNC, I found out so many stumbling blocks have prevented ordinary people from having proper understanding the problem. First of all, we're required to have recognition of the UNC with our own eyes and ears, and then to have a 'detonator' subject which, like a seed of a plant, could develop us to the core of the UNC problem. What was found in the process was the Han River Estuary. The fact that according to the Armistice Agreement, civil shipping at the Han River Estuary is not under the UNC administration makes it an Achilles' tendon within the UNC control. I joined the 'Peace Boat in the Han River Estuary' event right after the historic South-North Summit in 2000, it was the first-ever event of South Korean civilians (mostly artists then) getting across the government-alleged MDL on the water in the area. This experience proved the Han River Estuary is the best short-cut to make people understand the problem of the UNC.

Q: The last chapter of <The Han River Estuary: A Hole in the Armistice Agreement, A Window to Eurasia> deals with the Han River Estuary administration, and you decode one by one all the related articles in the 1953 Armistice Agreement. What do you think is the main problem with the Agreement?

A: The Estuary of the Han River is like a liberated area within the Division since it's open to civil shipping according to the Armistice Agreement. The Armistice Agreement, because it was a provisional one, had difficulty implementing strong control over civilians. At the time of its conclusion, the unrestricted civil shipping in the waters of the Han River Estuary was passed at first go unanimously. South Koreans, accustomed for the past 60 years to the Armistice Agreement often and apparently 'governing over' the Constitution, can't even imagine that the Agreement is just a provisional one. So the very article containing free civil shipping in the Han River Estuary strikes them like thunder.

Still, when we look at how the Agreement defines not on the relation with the North but on the South, we can't help but notice that it interprets the South as an 'occupied' territory. In the Agreement, there's often a phrase such as: "territory under the military control of the Commander-in-Chief, United Nations Command". Here the 'military control' means 'occupation', which was confirmed by the UNC through its official documents to the South Korean government in 1954 and 1962. The Armistice Agreement which is a legal instrument and the Armistice regime as a political regime have been developed while increasing gaps, although rooted in the same soil. So, what matters is not an 'abstract' colonization by the US Forces here but a specific, legal occupation by the UNC.

The dissolution of the UNC that Solidarity for Peace and Reunification of Korea(SPRK, 'Pyongtongsa') demand for example is a matter of course in the process of concluding the Peace Agreement. SPRK's demand goes even further, since their Agreement includes the withdrawal of US Forces stationed in South Korea. This is extremely important in terms of taking initiative of agenda. Once the discussion of the Peace Agreement conclusion, there will arise quite a few points of contention over the proposed draft, and the biggest battle will be waged around the matter of the UNC dissolution. At present I think we should focus more on what our demands share than differ.

Q: What is your say on the increased military tension over the Peninsula at present, the restructuration of the ROK-US military alliance, etc.?

A: Many have considered the Japanese participation in the ROK-US Joint Naval Exercises this year as resurgence of the ROK-US-Japan Tripartite Military Alliance. Although such a thing doesn't exist in legal document, it forms itself by a level of reality of the regime. But what we should remember is that through the Armistice Agreement and the SOFA(Status of Forces Agreement) between the UNC and the Japanese government, the military tripartism of ROK-US-Japan is not an alliance but a single command system. Look how the 'Chonanham Incident' on the water of Baekryeong Island (West Sea of Korea) in late March is being dealt combined with the relocation of Futenma Air Base in Okinawa. This is possible only because the legal administration of Five Islands in the West Sea of Korea is under the UNC by the Armistice Agreement, and that the Futenman Air Base is a rear base of the UNC in Korea. In terms of the nature of power, what matters is the US, but the UNC is what legally guarantees that power. Whether you have a legal instrument or not creates tremendous difference in terms of diplomacy in international society. One of the ways of doubling our empowerment is to connect the Henoko Anti-Base Struggle in Okinawa and the Han River Estuary in a single agenda.

The Operational Control Transfer is being drifted as many have worried. It was decided by the US strategy. If it had ever been seen as politically determined within Korea, it's an optical illusion. It also confirms that the command transfer can be completed not by the dissolution of the ROK-US Combined Forces Command(CFC) but by that of the UNC. Anyway, they rolled back the matter of command transfer with the excuse of Chonanhan Incident, which they say a crisis during armistice. Administration of crises during armistice is not the responsibility of the CFC but of the UNC. Whereas the CFC legally enters operation only during wartime, the UNC manages crises during armistice, when crises presently are the ones possibly to develop into a war. This indicates we should recover not only the operational control during wartime but also the one during armistice which is under the UNC. This is the lesson we should take from the series of incidents from Chonanham to the delay of the command recovery.

Q: There have been so many outcries against the 'Four Rivers Project' currently bulldozed under the Lee Myung-bak government despite expert panels' call for repeal (http://www.albummania.co.kr/gallery/view.asp?seq=126022) and overall popular objection. The problems mostly are about illegality and unfeasibility of the project itself, water pollution and flooding, threat to biodiversity, etc. Some construction sites in the Nakdong River have been flooded in July, for example, although Korean mainstream media didn't say a thing about it. What is your say about the Project, particularly if you place it under the current Armistice regime?

A: There's a sandhill called Chongjucho in the Han River Estuary, and it was schemed as a 'Nadeul' (meaning 'where people come and go') island in Lee Myung-bak camp during his presidential race. It was planned as last terminal of the Great Canal of the Korean Peninsula. Although at present the 'Great Canal' project was reduced to the 'Four Rivers Project', once the latter speeds up, there will come up again the talk of the Great Canal. In this Great Canal Project, the Han River Estuary makes a climax. Whereas the inland rivers are focused on developmental agenda, the Han River Estuary comprises South-North reconciliation and cooperation, reunification, and internationalization agendas.

But this Nadeul island project in the Lee Myung-bak camp was simply a preposterous idea. If anybody there had ever looked up in the International Law of the Sea, they'd have found what sheer inconsistency the project was. Within the International Law of the Sea, there's a clause on 'low tide elevation', it's a piece of land which submerges during flow tide and emerges during ebb tide. Problem is this low tide elevation, unlike an uninhibited island, makes a baseline of a territory. The Lee camp's idea basically is to make the low tide elevation of Chongjucho an inhabited island. It's already a pretty good excuse for territory dispute, and if it's made into an inhabited island, it's as good as creating hair-trigger circumstances around territory conflict. Environmental issues put aside, the sand dredging operation during the previous Participatory Government is much more ahead in getting rid of any arguable territory conflict. As we have no idea how long it'd take from the Peace Agreement to a Reunification Agreement, and since we're currently under the Armistice regime, what this kind of project shows is that its mastermind is totally blind. The Han River Estuary is a river border and international river, which is not a character we can find from the Han River or other inland rivers. It comes to my mind that North Korea and China have long co-administered the Aprok River and Duman River as river borders. Anyway, our understanding about the Han River Estuary in terms of the Modern Law is as piteous as in the Feudal Age of Chosun Dynasty. This is why I say the Han River Estuary to us is an agenda of overcoming feudalism and of going beyond the modern.

By Rebecca Kim (Researcher, Democracy and Social Movement Institute, Korea) rebeccakim.asia@gmail.com