SEOUL– The main opposition Democratic Party (DP) on Wednesday referred North Korean defector-turned-lawmaker Tae Yong-ho of the ruling party to the parliamentary ethics committee for making distorting remarks about a civilian uprising on Jeju Island in the late 1940s.
Tae has come under criticism after he said earlier this week that the Jeju uprising was obviously triggered by the instruction of North Korea’s late founder Kim Il-sung during his visit to the southern resort island as part of his ongoing campaign to become a member of the People Power Party’s (PPP) Supreme Council.
The uprising, widely known as the Jeju April 3 incident, took place on April 3, 1948, when Jeju islanders began protesting against U.S. military-led rule following Korea’s liberation from Japan’s 1910-1945 colonial rule. The then government distorted the uprising as a communist riot and massacred up to an estimated 30,000 civilians in armed crackdowns over the subsequent years.
“I believe Rep. Tae has a huge problem with his perception of history,” Rep. Wi Seong-gon, DP’s vice floor leader, told reporters after submitting the complaint against Tae.
Wi, who represents a constituency in Jeju, called on Tae to give up his parliament seat and issue an apology, and urged the ruling People Power Party to expel him.
The PPP lawmaker, however, refused to apologize, saying it is the plain truth that Pyongyang had instructed a communist group in Jeju to start the movement.
“I still don’t understand how I hurt the victims’ hearts and what kind of senseless remarks I made when I only told the historical truth,” Tae said in a news conference.
Tae, North Korea’s former deputy ambassador to Britain, defected to South Korea in 2016 and was elected as a lawmaker here in 2020, becoming the first North Korean defector to do so.
Source: Yonhap News Agency