[Opinion] I Feel Like I Am in Pyongyang

45-year-old German doctor Norbert Vollertsen has been raising an issue of human rights violation in North Korea. He caught the media spotlight in March 2002 by organizing the mass defection of 25 North Koreans in Beijing, China. He was injured during a scuffle with the police during a protest in Cheolwon, Gangwon Province on Aug. 22, in which he tried to send balloons containing radios and money. Four days later, he was attacked by North Korean reporters while attending a rally held by conservative groups near the Universiade press center in Daegu. Seeing him enthusiastically campaigning against the North Korean regime, some praise his spirit, but others are less friendly, saying `why he makes such fuss with things he is hardly related to`.

Vollertsen had his say in the National Assembly`s inspection session yesterday. “I feel like I am in Pyongyang, although I am in Seoul. I think there is brainwashing here in the South, too. There are controlling, manipulating and violation of human rights.” He must have allured to confrontation and conflict surrounding North Korean issues. The media pays little attention to human rights issues in North Korea, and some even say it will jeopardize the reconciliatory mood in the peninsula, the German doctor might have wanted to say. It is sorry to hear him saying he feels like being in Pyongyang. The remarks are like testament to dividedness of the country over North Korean issues.

Lawmakers from the ruling and opposition parties waged an intense war of words apparently to hear what they wanted to hear from the German doctor. Some lawmakers and members of rightist groups, who attended the inspection session as witnesses, lashed out at each other exchanging violent words. They must feel shamed of creating such an ugly scene before the foreign activist. A bird strikes balance using its two spread wings. This country is, however, like a nose-diving bird with two wings called the liberal and conservative.

“40 million live in the South and 20 million in the North. If we make the 4 million our allies, we will build communist Korea in entirety,” late North Korean leader Kim Il-sung reportedly said while he was in rein. Conflict in the South will only do good to the North.

“They see me as a leftist in Germany and North Korea, but as a rightist in South Korea over the same remarks,” said Vollertsen in an interview with October edition of New Dong-a magazine. It seems that he wants to be seen as a human right activist, neither leftist nor rightist. What we need the most is a practical approach toward North Korean issues - two spread wings that make a bird fly high.

Song Mun-hong, Editorial Writer, songmh@donga.com