Survey Methodologies to Investigate the Massacred Civilian Victims
This project is to survey on the scale of civilian victims of the mass killings taken place during the Korean War and has been proceeded collaborating with outsourced research teams. In 2007, Seokdang Research Institute of Dong-ah University carried out the survey project of the massacred civilian victims in regions such as Gimhae-si, Cheongdo-gun, Gurye-gun, Youngam-gun, Gochang-gun, Gongju-si, Cheongwon-gun, Ganghwa-gun, etc. The selected regions were chosen after carefully speculating the scale and the representative-ness of each mass killing. Particularly, Ganghwa-gun was included because it was a military borderline of the two conflicting powers then, and Gimhae was significant because a large number of mass killings against civilians were occurred even though the region was never taken by the North.
In 2008, Jeonnam University supervised a research project over regions such as Hamyang-gun, Youngcheon-si, Younggwang-gun, Imsil-gun, Youngdong-gun, Inje-gun, etc. One of the commonly used research methodologies was a group interview throughout field researches, and recording and documentation of testimonies from the victims. Individual cases are investigated particularly focused on an outline, a type of damage, a category of perpetrators, and surrounding circumstances of each incident. Then investigated results were then categorized by each geographical denomination, and this statistics became a source of viewing the data in accordance with each region of the country. These collected data, then had to go through an extensive screening test to determine the truthfulness. And the final stage was to reconstruct the categorized groups into other forms depending on necessities.
In 2007, the above-mentioned investigative process was conducted on a total of 3,820 individuals including bereaved family members, witnesses, and witnesses of the incidents. As a result, some 8,600 victims were uncovered.
Categorized by each region, there found 1) 356 victims in Ganghwa-gun, 2) 385 victims in Cheongwon-gun, 3) 365 victims in Gongju-si, 4) 373 victims in Yeocheon-gun, 5) 517 victims in Cheongdo-gun, 6) 283 victims in Gimhae, 7) 1,880 victims in Gochang-gun, 8) 2,818 victims in Youngam-gun, and 9) 1,318 victims in Gurey.
Divided by a type of damage, there found 1) 1,457 leftist guerilla victims by the army or police forces of the South Korea, 2) 1,348 Bodo League member victims, 3) 1,318 local leftist victims, 4) 1,092 victims from Yeosun Incident, and 5) 892 victims accused of being collaborators of the North Korea, etc.
External Affairs
1) Collaboration with Truth-finding Organizations and Regional Autonomous Entities
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of the Republic of Korea (hereinafter, referred to as “TRCK”) is an organization independent from any governmental/non-governmental political entities, and has sought to bring out veiled incidents that have never been brought up or wrongfully known, thereby pursuing reconciliation between victims and perpetrators. Particularly, it has been significant to maintain close cooperative relationship with regional autonomous political entities, since the investigations had to cover lengthy time period, almost up to a century, deal with areas across the Korean peninsula, and look thoroughly on substantially immense investigative scale to cover.
(1) Collaboration with Truth Commissions Overseas
The TRCK is an organization established to deal with truth-finding issues from the past, and thus it has been very critical to pull out close assistance from the governmental authorities such as the nation’s police forces, the Ministry of Defense, and the National Intelligence Service (formerly known as “KCIA”), etc. The TRCK has held a monthly gathering of heads of truth-finding commissions and had meetings and seminars with the national police, the Ministry of Defense, and the National Intelligence Service, etc. Through building cooperative relationship among the mentioned organizations, the TRCK sought to increase efficiency in carrying out its works by exchanging concerned documentations, sharing thoughts on the selection of research subjects, and adjusting duplicated investigations, etc.
Furthermore, the TRCK co-hosted a conference on ‘Evaluation of Truth-finding Works and the Prospect Thereof’ with the Presidential Commission on Suspicious Death in the Military, the Truth Commission on Forced Mobilization under the Japanese Imperialism, the Presidential Committee for the Inspection of Collaborations for Japanese Imperialism, etc. The concerned commissions shared various field experiences with respect to truth-finding work and exchanged ideas through various seminars and conferences.
(2) Collaboration with Regional Autonomous Bodies
The TRCK is authorized to allocate parts of its missions to local autonomous entities or to carry out the missions in cooperation with them. Currently, receiving petitions, promoting application procedures, and implementing ground researches, etc. have been conducted in cooperation with local autonomous entities.
The TRCK, together with other 246 local autonomous entities, promoted its entitled missions and encouraged to file concerned petitions for a year starting on Dec. 1, 2005. During the period, Song Ki-in, the first president of the TRCK visited 16 different cities and numerous civic groups, and actively engaged in media liaison activities to raise awareness on the significance of truth-finding works assigned to the TRCK.
As a result, a total of 10,860 petitions were filed. The number is considerable, since most of filed incidents were taken place decades ago and there still isn’t concrete trust built between the victimized and the authorities.
2) Collaboration with Bereaved Family Members and Relevant Organizations
The TRCK is entitled to ask experts to join researches concerned with the mandates of the commission, hold conferences to hear advises from experienced professionals regarding truth-finding works. Especially, in the case of investigations on Korea’s independent movement and Korean communities abroad, the commission could carry out relevant investigation in collaboration with relevant research institutes or other agencies specialized in concerned investigative areas.
There was such diversity in scopes of characteristics of investigative institutes and there also were a lot of them that the commission had to deal with. Particularly, the bereaved family union of the civilian victims sacrificed during the Korean War takes up a large portion of petitions filed at the commission, and thus close cooperation and keen assistance from the union was essential.
The TRCK has been making utmost efforts to resolve misunderstandings from more than 50 bereaved family unions, if any, and raise awareness on the commission’s mandates through continuous seminars and meetings. Additionally, the TRCK paid special attention on civic groups to collect diverse opinions and to promote the mandates and missions the TRCK was assigned onto through seminars and forums, thereby attempting to build an alliance there between.
