Pressure 'will save Kim’

Press, 22 September 1980, Page 7

Pressure 'will save Kim’

NZPA Seoul South Korean political circles are convinced the nation’s strongman, President Chun Doo Hwan, will eventually spare the life of the condemned politician, Kim Dae Jung, reports Don Kirk of the “Chicago SunTimes.”

“Nobody believes Kim will be executed,” said a ‘Christian leader amid a storm of international protest over the death sentence meted out against South Korea’s most popular Opposition politician. “There’s a rumour that President Carter has clearly notified Chun’that Kim cannot be hanged.” Although United States officials refused to comment publicly, the United States Ambassador (Mr William Gleysteen) is reported to have warned the Soviet Government of the “disastrous impact” that Mr Kim’s execution could have on public opinion in the United States and elsewhere. “His death would lead to such a strong public reaction as to overshadow ail our efforts here,” said one United States official. The United States has promised not to threaten to withdraw any of America’s 40,000 troops from South Korea or cut down on sales of military equipment, totalling nearly $5OO million a year, but officials have hinted that the United States could hold back on key South Korean requests, such as the Fl 6 aircraft South Korean officials for their part respond that the sentences against Mr Kim and 23 of his allies, given prison terms ranging from two to 20 years, are “an internal affair.” Almost ritualistically, South Korean Foreign Ministry sources cite South Korea’s “sovereignty” over its own “criminal cases” despite their desire for “friendly relations with the United States, Japan, and other traditional allies.”

Beneath the level of public posturing, though, both South Korean and American sources believe that General Chun would like to use the life of Mr Kim Dae Jung as a bargaining point while weighing Mr Kim’s fate. South Koreans point, out that General Chun can take as much time as he wants td sign the death sentence against Mr Kim — or mute it to life imprisonment ~ after first a military appeals court and then the nation’s Supreme Court have gone through the motions of a "review” in which they will almost certainly uphold the verdict. (Mr Kim and his co-defendants were reported yesterday to have filed the first of their appeals.

General Chun is also sensitive to the outraged response from Japanese leaders, who have said repeatedly that Mr Kim’s execution could do as much damage to South Korean-Japanese relations as to South KoreanAmerican relations. The immediate reason for Japan’s response is that Mr Kim was kidnapped from his hotel room in Tokyo in 1973

Japanese leaders have charged repeatedly that the kidnapping, perpetrated while Mr Kim was on a world-wide speaking tour, violated Japan’s "sovereignty” and cite what they regard ar a commitment by South Korean leaders after the kidnapping not to prosecute Mr Kiff for anything he did while in Japan.