Humanity’s Warrior Fights On

This rare, exclusive interview was made possible by Mr. Eugene Soh, Dr. Shin Gyonggu and their shared enthusiasm for reporting Gwangju’s history.

For Mr. Eugene Soh, the most precious value in life is human rights. However, if we do not strive to preserve this characteristic of our humanity, Soh’s following analogy is alarming: “If we don’t have [human rights], we are literally living in a jungle. In a jungle, there is one law: the strongest get everything. That is what I am concerned about.”

Soh’s activism, on behalf of all Asians, originated in Seoul. Originally from Jeonju, Soh attended university in Seoul, majoring in English Literature, with the initial desire to become a writer. Then, April 19, 1960 changed Korea, and Soh too.

Soh recalls how university students rebelled against a government led by a civilian dictator. On that day, 224 young people perished, but as a result, Korea experienced freedom it had never before claimed.

According to Soh, the student movement kept going, making an impact even today. “They just kept fighting for freedom, democracy and human rights. Because of the Student Movement, it was possible to make Korea.”

From what he personally witnessed, Soh “suddenly became a warrior” for “fighting against the system.” Soh finished his higher education after completing his mandatory national military service, shortly before the drafting for the Vietnam War began.

While living in Seoul, Soh befriended Americans employed through the U.S. Embassy. One close friend even paved the way for Soh to study in the United States. From his experiences he came to understand the American system.

Soh started studying International Relations at a community college, transferred and graduated from a private institution, then finalized his graduate work, all within the area of Washington D.C.

Upon graduating, Soh met members of the Senate and House of Representatives, focusing his effort to convince members of Congress that if America wanted to be more effective in Korea, they needed the support of the Korean people.

When the events of May 18, 1980 happened, Soh remembers what he did after work. “I watched the nightly news every night, and Walter Cronkite, for CBS, was reporting, and one night, he opened with Gwangju. The memory, it strikes me. The collapse of human dignity: that is what we saw.”

After his time in America concluded, Soh’s work with the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) started. Soh has had the privilege of visiting and serving in most Asian countries, providing aid in situations where European colonialism, civil war and poverty have left their damaging effects.

Sri Lanka suffered a “vicious, political conflict” after declaring independence from Portugal. According to Soh and the Ashoka Innovators for the Public, during the 1980s when a power struggle between two extremist groups occurred, more than 60,000 citizens vanished. “They never said ‘massacred.’ They always said ‘disappeared,’” Soh remarked.

Sadly, only a small number of victims – mostly innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire – have been identified, due to how the killers degraded and destroyed the corpses. “They killed the person, they put on a tire necklace and then they burned the bodies, so there was no way to recognize the bodies,” Soh said.

By way of the AHRC, Soh traveled to Sri Lanka to help an organization whose members were divided with how to handle honoring the lost. With the support of the AHRC and the May 18th Memorial Foundation, Soh bridged the gap by suggesting a monument be created for those killed. According to an AHRC’s press release, the monument’s official unveiling was on February 4, 2000, with the formal national observation annually on October 27.

With a visible monument for Sri Lankans to always remember, Soh mentioned that it is dedicated to those who sacrificed, so that “this kind of very brutal thing never happens again. This kind of injustice must end.”

More recently, Soh has helped in Cambodia. Initially, Soh was asked to investigate the medical services in a country that experienced civil war in the 1960s under the rule of the Khmer Rouge. From his findings, the AHRC requested Doctors Without Borders to set-up the Gwangju Medical Clinic, near Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Pehn. The facility’s official opening was in May 2013.

For Sri Lanka, Cambodia and the other opportunities, Soh has always referred back to the “May 18th texts.” Soh has explained Gwangju’s May 18 events in all Asian countries, because they have all been colonized at some point by a European nation. “They have been under oppression, and they are still living under the injustice.”

Soh has also shown what can happen after such tragedy occurs, with regards to “the monument inheritance of the Gwangju spirit.” “We showed and shared our experience here, so we encouraged them: ‘Don’t give up hope.’”

For those who are not familiar with national instability, Soh wanted to express additional thoughts. The first part was addressed to Gwangju citizens to have pride in their city. In fact, when foreigners have shown interest in traveling to Korea, he tells them to visit Gwangju. “If you don’t see Gwangju, you don’t see half of the country.”

For those in the foreign community, finding “live knowledge” is what Soh desired to emphasize. “If you go there, if you see for yourself, [then] you can experience it, you can do it, and once you do it, then it is yours.” According to Soh, merely reading books about places to visit is just “copied knowledge.”

Instead, Soh used a final analogy for actively acquiring “live knowledge.” “It is like the train without the track. Without the track, the train can’t go. The road did not exist in the beginning, so I always encourage young people to go and see it for themselves. Don’t ask me. You can go and see it for yourself. You can do it, because all this is possible.”