Joint Efforts by Citizens to Deter Distortion of Koguryo Hiostory

Actions to deter China from distorting Koguryo history, such as the joint efforts of civic groups, are getting into stride.

About 10 organizations, such as Young Korean Academy and the Organization for Commemoration of the Samil (3·1) Independence Movement, gathered to have a press interview for the initiation of the Citizens’ Union for Protecting Koguryo History, a tentative name for the group, in Dongsung, Seoul on December 29 and announced their break into action to hinder the distortion of Koguryo history.

Fifteen people, including Shin Yong-ha, an emeritus professor of Seoul National University, and a novelist Lee Ho-cheol also participated as individuals.

In their statement, they pointed out that China is trying to include the history of Koguryo into Chinese history through a project called “Work process of Northeast (a study of northeastern China).”

They added that the government, the academic world and civic groups should reflect on their wrong in coping with it due to the lack of information and cooperate to protect the national history from now on.

They will have campaigns and a 10 million signature-collecting campaign in Korea and other countries for protecting Koguryo history and convey a formal statement to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Academy of Korean Studies, the Chinese Embassy in Korea and Unesco.

Meanwhile, a cyber-diplomatic mission, “VANK (Voluntary Agency Network of Korea),” composed of 13,000 people, revealed that they will begin their project against that of Chinese side, a project called “Work process of Northeast.”

VANK will spread e-mails and letters to foreign historians to make China’s distortion of Koguryo history known.

Sun-Woo Kim sublime@donga.com