A LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS

Here is the evidence Capt. Kim. The mayor of Gangjeong village with other Jeju Islanders and their supporters yesterday protesting against the plan to blast Gureombi rock. You can't keep denying the growing international opposition to this Navy base! (See below for details about Capt. Kim)

• I just finished an hour long radio interview with a station in Vermont. Longtime peace activist Joseph Gainza hosts the show and several folks called in. We talked a good while about Jeju Island and the Aegis destroyers (made here in Maine) that will be ported at this base. I asked listeners to call the South Korean embassy in Washington DC (202-939-5600). I just called myself and spoke to a very combative Capt. Kim who tried to tell me that the people of Gangjeong village support the Navy base and that U.S. warships will never port there. I told him I had just returned from a conference on Jeju Island where I heard the elected mayor of Gangjeong, the former governor of Jeju, and the head Catholic Bishop of Jeju all speak out in opposition to the base. Capt. Kim is full of lies and he is trying to blunt the opposition to the base. I concluded my conversation with him Korean-style (forceful with each other) and told him that their right-wing government's cover was blown - that people all over the world know that they have become military partners with their former imperial occupier (Japan) and the U.S. in a tragic and dangerous new strategy to surround China.
  
• Evidence that people all over the world are becoming aware of this is the work of many dedicated activists who are pushing hard to share information about Jeju Island. Just a couple examples are the emails I saw this morning from Australia, Japan, the UK and Guam where they are also organizing on behalf of the villagers. Below is a remarkable email I received this morning from GN board member Agneta Norberg who lives in Stockholm, Sweden. She was one of those arrested with us last week when she nimbly moved her 75-year old body under the razor wire on Gureombi rock.
  

It is amazing what kind of reaction it has been since I returned to Sweden from Jeju. First, the newspaper in the county were I was born, up in the North, a rather prestigious liberal paper gave me a whole page today. With photo and correct text. Now the national radio called and a very popular journalist will visit me and make a portrait of who I am and what brought me to Jeju and he asked me specifically to give a frame why people are resisting there. So it is worth getting arrested. But the result must be a large protest storm all over the world. I just wanted to give a small positive glimpse in the darkness.
- Agneta