Need Your Help for the Transnational Korean Peace Candlelight Vigil

Dear Eclipse Rising members, supporters and zainichi/Korean/Japanese/Bay Area communities,

July 27 marks the 56th anniversary of temporary armistice agreement to end the fighting between the United States and Korea. However, that was not a peace treaty and the war between the US and Korea has technically never ended.

With recent escalating tensions between North Korea and the US (nuclear testing, missiles, military training, the detention of the American journalists) highlighted by the media, the horrendous thought of the "forgotten war" starting up again is not such a far-off reality.

On Sunday, July 26, there will be an international candlelight vigil held to voice our concerns and convince Washington, President Obama, and the international community that we must end the Korean War, the ongoing militarization and occupation of the Korean peninsula, and move forward toward a peace treaty and a reunification of the Korean peninsula.

The candlelight vigil will be happening in the following US cities: Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Oakland, Washington DC, and possibly Chicago and Minneapolis. Also, some South Korean peace groups are going to join us along with the delegation of Korean Canadians and Korean Americans visiting North Korea this summer through the DPRK Exposure and Education Program.

The one planned in Oakland will be at the Oakland Asian Cultural Center (88 9th St # 290, Oakland, CA 94607-4295) from 6 - 8pm. The vigil will be co-sponsored by other local organizations and feature light snacks and refreshment and possibly a presentation of community folks sharing their thoughts about the Korean war and the need for a peace treaty through artistic means like poetry, song, and dance!

Eclipse Rising has committed to bring some zainichi foods, share a slideshow presentation of our families and our stories, and possibily sing "Imjim River" with the antendees.

We are looking for volunteers in our lovely community for the following:
1. help us cook or prepare zainichi foods (if you've never made a "zainichi" dish you can still help - we'll send you a recipe or we can cook together)
2. if you are zainichi - e-mail photos of your family that you are willing to share through a slide show. If you can also include a short blurb about your personal experience or family experience and maybe include how you or your family are affected by the division, even better! Please send those (2-3 photos only please) to eclipserising@gmail.com
3. We know there are some musically talented folks we're sending this to! We want to play Imjin River for our small and intimate audience that night and we'd love it if anyone could join and play a musical instrument or sing along!
4. Write up a short piece or create an artistic expression (essay, poem, song, photos, painting) on how the division and war of Korea has affected you or your family as zainichi in some way and be willing to share it
5. Lastly, we're looking for help in outreach and publicity for the event once fliers and PR stuff are created and the event does need volunteers day of - set up, clean up, maybe during stuff too

In closing, please let us know if you can jump in on any aspect of this important project, and please ASAP because July 26 is fast approaching! You can e-mail us at eclipserising@gmail.com

Please save the date (July 26 6-8pm)!

Check out this website:
http://www.endthekoreanwar.org/
Thanks,
Eclipse Rising

Okinawa Radio - Churadio.com

Please check out the following link to an Okinawan Radio station on line, with Okinawan music, links, and an online shop!*

http://churadio.com/index.php

*Website is in Japanese

Sending Another "Jimmy Carter" to North Korea

Reading this made me think of what might happen to the zainichi Koreans who reside in Japan if there was a war between North Korea and Japan.

You can read the article here or click on this link:

http://kpolicy.org/documents/interviews-opeds/090708seligharrisoncartertonk.html

Sending another "Jimmy Carter" to North Korea

Selig Harrison | July 8, 2009
(Originally published June 20, 2009 in The Hankyoreh)

North Korea is often accused of dishonoring the commitments it makes in negotiations. However, in North Korean eyes, it is the U.S. that has failed to live up to its promises. This is the main reason why military hard-liners have been able to take control of North Korean foreign policy in the past six months and justify an increasingly provocative series of nuclear and missile tests in internal policy debates.

Kim Jong-il's failing health and his reduced work schedule have made it easier for the hard-liners to consolidate control. Their strength is rooted in a cavalier U.S. disregard of its commitments that has vindicated their opposition to the 1994 Agreed Framework and the 2007 six-party denuclearization agreement.

For nearly eight years, from June 1994, to December 2002, the moderates in North Korea led by First Deputy Foreign Minister Kang Sok-ju prevailed, and North Korea suspended its nuclear weapons program over the bitter protests of the hard-liners. In return, North Korea was promised two light water reactors as a token of U.S. readiness for normal relations. The reactors were never built, however, despite large South Korean and Japanese financial outlays. The Bush Administration not only abrogated the Agreed Framework, but dissolved the Korean Energy Development Organization (KEDO) and bludgeoned South Korea into approval in order to leave no doubt that the U.S. had repudiated its commitment.

Despite this, the moderates were able to get Kim Jong-il to support the six-party process with help from China and to disable the Yongbyon reactor. In return, the six parties pledge of 600,000 tons of oil. Although Japan, angered by the U.S. decision to remove North Korea from its List of Terrorist States, refused to provide its share, 200,000 tons, and the moderates were once again discredited.

This is a very dangerous moment in our relations with North Korea, the most dangerous since June 1994, when Jimmy Carter went to Pyongyang with the grudging consent of the Clinton Administration. Carter negotiated an agreement with Kim Il-sung that headed off a war and paved the way for the Agreed Framework. Now, we are in urgent need of another high-level emissary, but the Obama Administration is not even prepared to give its grudging consent to Al Gore. Gore has expressed interest in negotiating the release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee, the two imprisoned U.S. journalists and employees of Current TV, which he founded, and in the process pave the way for a reduction of tensions.

Gore met Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on May 11 and asked for the cooperation of the Obama administration in facilitating a mission to Pyongyang and in empowering him to succeed in such a mission by exploring with him ways in which the present stalemate in relations between North Korea and the U.S. can be broken. She said she would "consider" his request, but the Administration has subsequently delayed action. The Administration's position is that the case of the two imprisoned journalists is a "humanitarian" matter and must be kept separate from the political and security issues between the two countries. In a News Hour interview with U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice on June 10, Margaret Warner asked Rice how the latest U.N. sanctions resolution would "complicate efforts to win the release of the two American journalists." Rice turned the question around, declaring that the issue of the two journalists "cannot be allowed to complicate our efforts to hold North Korea accountable" for its nuclear and missile tests.

This is an unrealistic position. It shows a callous disregard for the welfare of Laura Ling and Euna Lee. It ignores the danger of a war resulting from the Administration's naive attempts to pressure North Korea into abandonment of its nuclear and missile programs. Past experience with North Korea has repeatedly shown that pressure invariably provokes a retaliatory response that makes matters worse. The Administration should instead actively pursue the release of the two women through intervention in their behalf by a high-level unofficial emissary empowered to signal U.S. readiness for tradeoffs leading to the reduction of tensions, such as the provision of the 200,000 tons of oil that had been promised and not delivered to North Korea since the six-party talks broke off last fall.

Looking ahead, the goal of the U.S. should be to cap the North Korean nuclear arsenal at its existing level and to move toward normalized relations as the necessary precondition for progress toward eventual denuclearization. The prospects for capping the arsenal at its present level have improved as result of Pyongyang's June 13 announcement admitting that it has an R&D program for uranium enrichment. Since this program is in its early stages, and Pyongyang is not yet actually enriching uranium, there is time for the U.S. to negotiate inspection safeguards limiting enrichment to the levels necessary for civilian uses. Until now, North Korea's denial of an R&D program has kept the uranium issue off the negotiating table and kept alive unfounded suspicions that it is capable of making weapons-grade uranium.

Progress towards denuclearization would require U.S. steps to assure North Korea that it will not be the victim of a nuclear attack. In Article Three, Section One of the Agreed Framework, the U.S. pledged that it "will provide formal assurances against the threat or use of nuclear weapons by the U.S." simultaneous with complete denuclearization. Pyongyang is likely to insist on a reaffirmation of this pledge. Realistically, if the U.S. is unwilling to give up the option of using nuclear weapons against North Korea, it will be necessary to live with a nuclear-armed North Korea while maintaining adequate U.S. deterrent forces in the Pacific.

In my view, in the event of another war with North Korea resulting from efforts to enforce the U.N. sanctions, it is Japan that North Korea would attack, not South Korea. Some of the hard-line generals in the National Defense Commission, I learned on my January visit to Pyongyang, were outraged at Kim Jong-il's apology to Prime Minister Koizumi in 2002 and have alarmed moderates in the regime with their swaggering confidence that North Korea could win a war with Japan.

*Selig S. Harrison is director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy and a senior scholar of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is the former director of the Century Foundation¹s Project on the United States and the Future of Korea. Specializing in South Asia and East Asia for fifty years as a journalist and scholar, he has visited North Korea over ten times and on two occasions, met with the late Kim Il Sung. He is the author of six books on Asian affairs and U.S. relations with Asia, including Korean Endgame: A Strategy For Reunification and U.S. Disengagement, published by Princeton University Press in May 2002. Dr. Harrison serves as an advisory board member of the Korea Policy Institute (KPI).

9th Annual Malcolm X Jazz Festival

Seize the Time! The 9th Annual Malcolm X Jazz Arts Festival!

Saturday, May 30th, 11-7pm,

San Antonio Park (18th Ave + Foothill Blvd)

EastSide's 9th annual Malcolm X Jazz Arts Festival is one of the last free festivals in Oakland, so come and enjoy! One of the most important pieces of our festival are the community of local artists and food vendors.

www.eastsideartsalliance.com

They still need volunteers, so if you're interested, please e-mail FuryoMusume@gmail.com

Japan: Robot Nation

http://current.com/items/89610631_japan-robot-nation.htm

or click on title of post below

Japan: Robot Nation

Japan, the world's second largest economy, is facing a demographic crisis that will shrink the population dramatically. The Japanese aren't having babies, and the country won't accept immigrants to help bolster the population. But Japan may have a unique solution --- Robots!

Vanguard is Current TV's award-winning documentary series. Whether it's half a world away or in our own backyard, Vanguard goes there to bring you stories about the most important issues of our time. Led by reporters Laura Ling, Christof Putzel, Mariana van Zeller, Adam Yamaguchi and Kaj Larsen, Vanguard airs on Wednesday at 10 pm Eastern and Pacific and can be found online at current.com/vanguard.

There is a brief mention of zainichi Koreans in Japan and how foreigners are treated there.

Richard Aoki Remember

http://www.hyphenmagazine.com/blog/2009/03/-richard-aoki-speaking-at.html

Richard Aoki Remembered
richard-aoki.jpg

Richard Aoki speaking at an Asian American Political Alliance reunion in 2008. Photo courtesy of Andre Nguyen.

Here is an obituary on activist and former Black Panther Richard Aoki, who passed away last Sunday at his home in Berkeley, CA. I learned a lot about Richard Aoki from writing this obituary though honestly it was very difficult, especially talking to his friends and colleagues who were grieving and still in shock.


There is little out there in the public sphere about Aoki, and perhaps that is why he is mostly known in activist circles. There are several articles, some excerpts from books, a radio interview, and video footage. The most popular image we have of him is of the stern Richard wearing a beret and shades. He was that -- the staunch revolutionary -- but so much more.

I was astonished to learn the many facets of Aoki. I knew he was fiercely loyal to his friends and to social justice causes. You could tell he loved his friends. For example, he spoke so highly of -- and defended -- Black Panther Party co-founder Huey Newton. He was also wary of the media for the same reason, because of the way his friend was described in his later years before and after his death. Even though Aoki played a major role in many events, his most proud, according to close friends, was his role in the Black Panther Party.

Aoki was already sick when he checked himself out of the hospital to take care of his mom who had had a heart attack. And even though his own health wasn't good, he organized a funeral service for his mom and spoke at it upon her death. Just about a month after his mom's service, he passed.

Aoki remained politically active despite his ailments in recent years, including supporting Lt. Ehren Watada, who refused to deploy to Iraq, and attending rallies with friends like activist Yuri Kochiyama. He also supported political prisoners. He made sure to attend Black Panther Party reunions and commemorative events, as well as events for the Asian American Political Alliance and other groups he had been involved in over the years.

He would speak with revolutionary fervor at some of these events. In the last several years, these speeches would wipe him out for several days afterwards but publicly, he never showed that his body was wearing down, according to friends.

His friends have put together a blog where people can share photos and memories. I was particularly struck by this entry by Kei Fischer. Here, she talks about how when Richard was in the hospital two weeks ago, he was worried about getting a letter of recommendation that he had written for her, even though he was so sick. "That small act alone truly characterized the giving, nurturing and self-less human being Richard was," she writes.

The Zainichi Korean Quarterly Film Series Featuring “Woori Hakkyo” - Our School

Eclipse Rising and Eastside Arts Alliance present…

The Zainichi Korean Quarterly Film Series

Featuring “Woori Hakkyo” - Our School

by Kim Myeong-Joon

Sunday, May 17

1:00 PM

Eastside Cultural Center

2277 International Blvd. at 23^rd Ave., Oakland

(510) 533-6629

About the Film: Woori Hakkyo is a documentary film that gives audiences a glimpse into the daily lives of 3^rd and 4^th generation Korean residents of Japan who attend a K-12 Korean school in the northern most prefecture of Japan: Hokkaido. As a critical response to the prevailing negative connotation the broader Japanese society has associated the Korean schools with because of their relation with the DPRK, Woori Hakkyo reveals an honest look at what life is like, particularly for the youth, in this unique community of Japan.

Historical Background of the Korean Schools in Japan: After liberation from Japanese colonization in 1945, 1st generation Zainichi Koreans built Korean schools in order for their descendants to learn the “mother tongue” – a right that had been deprived of the Korean community in Japan as a result of colonial assimilation policies. Hundreds of these Korean schools that are operated all over Japan are not recognized as “formal educational institutions” by the Japanese Ministry of Education and Science to this day.

Eclipse Rising is a US-based Zainichi Korean group founded in the winter of 2008, by Zainichi Koreans who came together in the Bay Area to recognize and celebrate the rich and unique history of Koreans in Japan, promote Zainichicommunity development, peace and reunification, and work for social justice for all minorities in Japan and around the world.

e-mail: elipserising@gmail.com blog: www.eclipserising.blogspot.com Find us on Facebook!

Eastside Arts Alliance is dedicated to nurturing ans supporting the work of the Lower San Antonio District’s African American, Latino/Chicano, Asian/Pacific Islander, and Indigenous artists and cultural workers, many of whom have not found a home within Oakland’s mainstream arts community.

ESAA Websites: www.eastsideartsalliance.com

Suggested Donation of $7 - 15

Film is in Korean and Japanese with English Subtitles

DIRECTIONS:

http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?formtype=address&address=2277+International+Blvd.&city=Oakland&state=CA&zipcode=94606

From BART, get off on Fruitvale BART and walk several blocks west on International Boulevard or walk 1 block north to International Boulevard and take 1R bus west to East Side Arts Alliance. For travel planner link,http://tripplanner.transit.511.org/mtc/XSLT_TRIP_REQUEST2?#tab1Selected

Eclipse Rising March Meeting!

Photos by Richard Plunk (except the first one)

A Journey Home: Visiting North Korea by Kei Fischer

This past summer, two Eclipse Rising members ventured into the unfamiliar territory of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, or North Korea as it is more popularly referred to. One member, Kei Fischer, wrote a reflection on the trip and it has been posted on the Nodutol website. Nodutol is a group that organizes the annual visit to North and South Korea. For more information about Nodutol, please visit:
www.nodutol.org

For the website of the article, visit:
http://nodutdol.org/index.php/eNews/archives_sl/151/


A Journey Home - Visiting North Korea by Kei Fischer

My mother’s ethnic heritage is relatively unheard of in the United States. She is ethnically Korea, but was born in and grew up in Japan. Her mother came to Japan when she was 10 years old with her mother from Wonson, a port city in the northern region of Korea, so that they could find a new life. Her father came from Cheju island, off the southern coast of Korea, also in search of a job, when he was only 17. When they came to Japan, they came as Japanese nationals, because Japan had occupied Korea. Many Koreans were also forced to come as laborers in Japan. In 1945 when the occupation ended, the over 600,000 Koreans that stayed in Japan became zainichi: permanent resident aliens without a country. Upon Korea’s division, most took on South Korean nationality, but some, like my grandmother, refused to declare sides.

My mother grew up in post-war Japan, not speaking any Korean, because her father was afraid she would be discriminated against. Therefore, my mother has always carried an alienated sense of identity, both literally and metaphorically, not feeling Korean or Japanese enough most of her life. That sense was passed down to my sister and me: both of us being biracial zainichis with US citizenship. With our mother’s family residing over 5,000 miles away and our own mother not knowing much about our Korean heritage, I was left to learning about Korean culture and language through library books and college courses. However, you can only learn so much through books. My desire to visit North Korea, or the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, was personal: I wanted to find a connection to the land and the heritage that I stood to lose if I did not take the initiative to visit. I wanted to see the home of my grandmother, meet the people who might share a similar laugh, and eat the food my ancestors grew up on.

I visited North Korea in July of 2008 as part of a delegation called DEEP (DPRK Exposure and Education Program). To prepare for our trip, we met biweekly to read up on Korean history and be exposed to an alternative perspective of North Korea. I began to view North Korea in a different light. I read about guerillas in the north fighting for independence from Japan—fighters who, after World War II, prevented North Korea from being dominated by U.S. capitalism. Instead, North Korean revolutionary socialist ideals called for equality, self-reliance, and justice for the poor and oppressed.
I went to the north with a delegation of seven Korean Americans, two Korean Canadians and one other person who was also of zainichi Korean heritage. Our delegation was a diverse mixture of backgrounds, but we all held a desire to learn more about our northern half of the homeland. As our small plane began to descend onto Pyongyang Airport, my zainichi sister and I gazed upon the green land we were approaching. Our eyes welled up with tears. I am seeing a piece of land, I thought, that my mother has never seen – land that my grandmother lived on as a child –land closed because of a war. It was an overwhelming experience, but one I did not take for granted. I was here, I began to realize, to foster a relationship between Koreans in the north and the rest of the world and in doing so, to participate in a decades-old movement to end the Korean War and to reunify the peninsula.

The next two weeks changed my life. Not only were we greeted with the warmest embrace, much like that between long lost relatives, but we were asked time and again to recall what we saw in the north and to share that with the world. There was an amazing air of pride in the north’s revolutionary history, which was evident in the beautiful monuments dedicated to guerilla fighters, the intricate mosaic murals created with messages of resistance to US imperialism, and the historic sites delicately preserving what was left after the destruction of war. One delegate noted how amazing it was to see such monuments with faces that resembled hers. It made me sad to realize that my grandfather could not be openly proud of his Korean background in Japan. But, it gave me hope because as a third generation zainichi, I was restoring that connection to Korea.

As delegates, we were privileged to visit the demilitarized zone, the 38th parallel, and actually pay witness to how unnatural and cold the area was. We also visited the Sinchon memorial site where tens of thousands of Korean civilians, including women and children, were brutally murdered during the Korean War. We also experienced a more modern side to North Korea. We spent time at a flourishing cooperative farm where some youth farmers gave us a tour and showed us their small but clean living quarters. We visited babies and female patients at the maternity hospital in Pyongyang, where care varied from prenatal services to breast cancer treatment, all of which were free services. We took a short trip on their subway system, which was thoughtfully decorated with mosaic murals and floral-like chandeliers and with trains, we were told, that always ran on time.

Although the technology, buildings, transit systems, and hospital tools may not be cutting-edge, North Korea is not a place of despair and hopelessness. The famine in the mid-1990s was undeniably horrible but the North Koreans did their best to press on. If we in the U.S. truly want to help, we must focus on officially ending the Korean War and supporting the reunification of the country. North Korea feels the same. Everywhere we went, there were signs for tongil or reunification. We were repeatedly asked to send the message of tongil to people in our countries. North Korea wants peace on the Korean peninsula and has made concrete steps with South Korea towards that end.

As a part of our agreement to participate in the DEEP delegation, we were asked to conduct a report back of our experience. I also plan on continuing to talk to as many people as I can to simply get that negative image of North Korea out of people’s minds. The push for reunification cannot happen until we feel we can work with the people of North Korea. The people we met and the stories that were told were of a dignified, thoughtful, and genuine people.

Our bus ride back to the airport was a solemn one. We had all formed bonds with our guides, driver, and English translators, and we were not ready to go home. Inspired to share with our North Korean hosts what was in my heart, I read from my journal: “Coming to North Korea, I feel 100% accepted for the first time in my life, regardless of my ignorance of Korean language, history, and culture. I have learned to be proud to be Korean and that is a gift I will always cherish. You have inspired me to learn more about my heritage and to teach my family about what I learn. I finally have a homeland and I look forward to the day when my mother can return ‘home’ to one united Korea, her heart swelling with pride.”