International Carter lectures Park on rights, pledges support

Press, 2 July 1979, Page 9

International Carter lectures Park on rights, pledges support

NZPA-Reuter - - — Seoul President Jimmy Carter has told the South Korean President (Mr Park Chung Hee) that he should match his country's spectacular economic growth with progress in political and human rights.

Mr Carter made the appeal at a State banquet after holding extensive talks with President Park on political and military developments on the Korean Peninsula.

Although Mr Carter dealt with accusations of political repression in South Korea during his banquet speech, he pledged that the American military commitment to the country was unshakable, strong, and enduring.

He also took care to avoid any action which might weaken President Park in his confrontation with North Korea.

In their final communique President Carter and President Park proposed a meeting between United States and North and South Korean officials to discuss ways of reducing tensions on the Korean peninsula. The presidents proposed that both North and South Korea should be admitted to

the United Nations pending the opening of negotiations that could lead to unification of the divided peninsula.

President Carter’s reason for visiting South Korea is to demonstrate to the North Korean leader, Kim II Sung, that the United States remains a firm alh of the South despite differences over human rights

But the issue oi human rights also played a big role during President Carter’s visit.

Opposition sources said in Seoul at the week-end that the police had arrested several hundred dissident protesters, most of them students, in the few days before Mr Carter’s arrival on Friday night.

President Park, who h..s been the South Korean leader since 1963, keeps a firm grip on opposition forces in the republic and has come under criticism from American Congressmen

for refusing to allow sufficient political freedom.

In the talks that came before the banquet, President Carter stressed his humanrights campaign.

He followed this up in his speech on Saturday when he said there was abundant evidence of South Korea’s dramatic economic progress and added: “I believe that this achievement can s e matched by similar progress through the realisation of basic human aspirations in political and human rights.” He said, “The right to participate in the political process helps to unite a nation in pursuit of common goals.” President Park replied that South Korea had found “a democratic system which best suits our actual circumstances and which is the most effective in solving our own problems. This system upholds freedom based on law and order and assures

the full creativitiy of the individual.” Indications were that Mr Carter would not include two of South Korea’s leading dissidents in meetings arranged with opposition leaders. The two are a former Presidential candidate, Kim Dae Jung, and a former President, Yun Po Sun.

Mr Powell confirmed that President Carter would not make a decision on keeping or ending a freeze on the withdrawal of American ground troops from South Korea until after he returned to Washington on Sunday. Mr Carter pledged in 1976 that he would withdraw all 33,000 American troops by 1982. But he froze the plan in February after intelligence reports said the North Korean Army was bigger than previously believed.