The following article is an opinion piece by human rights attorney Su-mi Jeon. Views expressed in opinion articles are exclusively the author’s own and do not represent those of NK News.

South Korea and the United States are strong allies but lack trust in each other. At least, this is my impression after attending and speaking at a congressional Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission hearing on April 15.

I was invited to share my thoughts about South Korea’s new anti-leaflet law that went into effect in March 2021. To my knowledge — and what I shared with the commission — was that there is nothing remarkable or even original about this legislation. But members of the U.S. House of Representatives, at least those present at the hearing, had a very different opinion.

The very fact that the Commission held a hearing on this issue at all speaks to a larger issue of a lack of trust in the Moon Jae-in government. Elected members of Congress asked questions like “Does the South Korean government impose penalties on freedom of expression?” and “Has support for North Korean defectors been cut?” and even questioned whether South Korea was still safe for North Korean escapees.

All of these questions are based on the premise that the Moon administration is censoring human rights in South Korea and violating the constitutional rights of its citizens. They are informed by a minority view held by a small fraction of North Korean escapees that are staunch opponents of the current administration for whatever reason. They are leading the charge that President Moon is an untrustworthy ally, and Washington appears willing to accept their claims at face value.

But as an attorney representing North Korean defectors in the South, I can say that the vast majority of escapees do not share such opinions. Further, these politicized questions completely ostracize Seoul’s legitimate rationale behind the “anti-leaflet” law and ignore completely the preferences of the South Korean public, especially those that live near the inter-Korean border. 

Residents living near the demilitarized zone (DMZ) have long complained about activists’ anti-DPRK activities. If the Commission members had ever lived under a constant threat of war that was so acute they had to regularly lock themselves up in underground bunkers in case violence broke out, would this hearing have still taken place? Would these Commission members have still asked the same questions? 

Propaganda leaflets are originally a tool of war used to fracture and disrupt an enemy country. This is why handling leaflets historically fell under the purview of the military in both Koreas. The U.S. Department of Defense must be more than aware of the dangers of escalation caused by anti-DPRK leaflets launched at North Korea. 

Nevertheless, the congressional human rights commission appears to disregard this national security concern because it is either not communicating with the U.S. military about it or it is more sanguine about a second Korean War as it would no doubt be good business for the American military industrial complex. There are no other convincing explanations for why the Committee can remain so cloistered in the personal liberty dimension of the leaflet issue and overlook the safety of South Korean residents under threat.

The reality is that propaganda leaflets sent across the DMZ are doing nothing to improve the human rights situation in North Korea. This is particularly true since most information and material from the outside world comes into the North through its border with China. Further, advanced scientific techniques for determining wind direction and other logistics are required to accurately navigate these leaflets into the North. Most private organizations and individuals lack such expertise and their leaflets fail to reach North Korean territory. Finally, due to North Korean paranoia about COVID-19, leaflets that do reach their intended targets are unlikely to be touched out of fear they are carrying the coronavirus. 

As a lawyer, I fully support freedom of expression. But people on both sides of the DMZ live in a constant state of fear that the Korean War will resume after a seven-decade-long armistice. This is not far-fetched: Vincent Brooks, former commander of the U.S. Forces in Korea, said he believed war was close to breaking out as recently as 2017. 

I hope that the Biden administration and the U.S. Congress will play an active role in replacing the current armistice with permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula so that security concerns will no longer infringe on the right of individuals to freedom of expression. Further, if the United States truly aspires to improve the human rights of North Koreans, it should weigh the provision of humanitarian aid instead of emphasizing propaganda leaflets that put the lives of South Koreans at risk. 

Washington should understand that their views are being warped by a handful of politicized North Korean defectors and not the vast majority of escapees living in South Korea. The Moon government is simply acting to protect the safety of ordinary South Koreans. In this regard, the “anti-leaflet” law is neither surprising nor extraordinary.