Dispute over rant by DUP’s Lim intensifies

Dispute over rant by DUP’s Lim: Pro-North Korea activist-turned lawmaker Lim Su-kyung of the main opposition Democratic United Party enters the party’s workshop for the 19th National Assembly lawmakers at the Seoul Education and Culture Hall in Yangjae, Seoul, Monday.

The dispute involving the rant by Rep. Lim Su-kyung of the Democratic United Party (DUP) on North Korean defectors is escalating despite the lawmaker’s apology.

Lim, a former pro-North Korean student activist, is drawing fire not only from the ruling Saenuri Party but also from conservative groups as a whole for her abusive remarks.

Rep. Ha Tae-kyung of the ruling party, also a target of profanity-laced tirade by Lim, lashed out at the main opposition party lawmaker calling for a sincere apology.

“Lim needs to explain clearly why North Korean defectors are traitors,” said Ha in a statement, Monday. “She has changed her tone. She originally criticized me for engaging in the human rights movement to help defectors. But in her apology she altered her position saying she attacked me for joining the Saenuri Party.”

Lim earlier denounced North Korean defectors as “traitors” and “being rootless,” according to Baek Yo-sep, a student who defected from the North, at an impromptu meeting in a bar.

She was also quoted as saying she would “kill Ha Tae-kyung with my own hands for being a traitor.” As criticism mounted, Lim apologized in a statement saying she meant “traitor” to point out at Ha’s conversion to the Saenuri Party not all defectors.

Lim became well-known after making an unauthorized trip to the North in 1989 as a collegian and meeting then leader Kim Il-sung. She entered parliament as a proportional representation candidate of the DUP following April’s elections.

Both Ha and Lim worked as pro-unification activists until the mid 1990s.

Against this backdrop, Park Jie-won, the interim chairman of the DUP, stepped in to contain the situation and said he was not considering taking any specific action.

“Our party believes in the sincerity of Lim’s apology, repentance and explanation,” said Park. “Lim holds respect for North Korean defectors and has the attitude of cooperating with them.”

The interim leader, however, added that he will instruct the DUP lawmakers to be careful of their words and actions.

It is estimated that there are nearly 20,000 North Korean defectors residing in the South.

Meanwhile, experts claim the issue, along with other cases involving pro-North Korean figures in the opposition parties, will have an impact on the upcoming presidential election slated for Dec. 19 negatively affecting the liberal side.

“The problem is that the incident makes it seems like the entire liberal side has a pro-Pyongyang stance,” said Shin Yul, a professor of political science at Myungji University in Seoul. “Lim’s case is one of them. Together with a series of other similar ones that involve pro-North Korean lawmakers, the DUP will suffer from the public impression that they also lean toward Pyongyang, ahead of the presidential race.”

The main opposition party is facing an uphill battle against the ruling party as they failed to maintain momentum of the sweeping upbeat mood in the April elections. Experts say the defeat was mainly due to the alliance with the minor opposition Unified Progressive Party (UPP) which called for far-left policies including the scrapping of the free trade agreement with the United States.

The North Korean factor has played into elections here as public fear of a North invasion still lingers among those aged over 60 who experienced the Korean War (1950-1953).

The alliance with the UPP is currently on the verge of collapse after it was found that pro-North UPP lawmakers masterminded vote-rigging in their party’s primary in March held to select proportional representation candidates. <Korea Times/Chung Min-uck>

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