[Editorial] Half century's heart-rending stories

The list of separated families the North Korean Red Cross Society sent us for the reunion on August 15 already brings forth everywhere many heart-rending stories. The reunion of family members who have lived in separation for half a century must surely be a moving occasion for excitements and exuberance that one can hardly find any matching case in the history of mankind. We hope that the reunion will bring them the greater joys and excitement than the pains they have accumulated for all these years due to the separation and "whereabouts unknown.``

From their excited looks and expressions for their impending reunion, we can readily confirm that families and blood ties far surpass in importance the difference of their political system and ideology. Undeniably, our society has up until now discriminated, implicitly or explicitly, those families whose members crossed the border to North Korea. Those in charge of personnel administration for public employees or for private companies have had the tendency to somewhat shun the people whose family members left the South for the North or engaged in activities to aid the North.

The people in Pyongyang`s reunion list are all those who left, voluntarily or otherwise, the South for the North except one former resident in Japan. Now that the government fully released their names, we must make this occasion as an opportunity to eradicate any residues, if still left at all, of our so-called "associational complicity system`` in the past that served to torment the families and their relatives by keeping them in the government`s watchful check list because of no other reason than their kin`s defection to the North. At the same time, the North must also accord same bold considerations to its families, whose separation of family members was due to their kin`s defection to the South. Thus, they can be free from any fetters that may shackle them due to their defected kin.

Included in the North`s list are Hawng Ue-Boon, a native of Kimchon, North Kyongsang province and the wife of Dr. Rhee Seung-Ki who is a native of Damyang, South Cholla province and Pyongyang`s world-renowned chemist who invented "Binalon,`` the North`s `Juche` (selfhood identity) synthetic fibre; Cho Ju-Kyong, a native of Youngyang, North Kyongsang province and Professor of Kim Il-Sung University who received the People`s Scientist Award in recognition of his authority on Analytical Mathmatics; Ryu Yol, a linguist with a towering authority on `Yiedoo` literature and a native of Sanchung, South Kyongsang province; Chung Chang-Mo, a native of Chonju,

North Chonlla province and an eminent painter in the traditional Korean (Chosun) paintings; and, Park Sup, a native of Seoul and Pyongyang`s topnotch People`s Actor in radio performance. They draw our particular attention because they are famous artists and leading scholars well-known in their home towns and provinces. There were many young intellectuals among those who defected to the North immediately after the nation`s liberation on August 15, 1945 or during the Korean War (1950-53). The people in their home towns will feel very proud of their towering achievements in their respective fields such as in arts, science and technology as well as in traditional Korean studies.

It would be a very heart-wrenching experience for the ten million separated family members, if we ever stop as a one-time event this precious occasion for family reunions to share and recover their love and family ties, and to feel the mutual affection and human warmth. For that reason, it is very reassuring that the South and the North agreed to resume the South-North Red Cross talks in order to discuss the establishment of permanent reunion centers for the separated family members immediately after Seoul`s handover of the North Korean long-time prisoners of war to Pyongyang. The reunion centers require a priority consideration to let the old aged members of separated families have the occasion to meet their separated kin before they pass away. If the separated kin were confirmed alive, the ways and means must be explored to let all of them have the reunion occasions even if the number exceeds the agreed ceiling of 100 cases for the first round.

Due suspicions are also raised about the North`s selection of reunion applicants because Pyongyang`s list does not include even a single person whose separation was due to his kin`s defection to the South. Be it the South or the North, its selection must be free from any political consideration.