Open Letter to President George W. Bush

December 10, 2008


President George W. Bush
The White House
Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. President:

I supported you, President Bush, since you said publicly that North Korea was one of the Axis of Evil because Kim Jong-il developed weapons of mass destruction while starving millions of his own people.

I supported you, President Bush, since you invited and met with the North Korean defectors, Kang Cheol-hwan, Kim Seong-min, Kim Han-mee family, and Park Sang-hak. I supported you because I believed you really cared about these people.

I supported you, President Bush, since you freed Iraqi people from Saddam Hussein. I thought you cared about the oppressed people most, not the world opinion. I thought you would take care of the North Korean people who were much worse off than Iraqi people.

I supported you all along because I thought you were a leader with a heart we could trust. However, your diplomacy of 6-party talk with North Korea in the past five years showed that you did not really mean what you said. You were only concerned about the nuclear issue and/or your legacy, not the oppressed people in North Korea. I know you have been undercut by the South Korean leftist governments of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun, and by the liberal Democrats here at home. They all wanted bilateral talks with NK and appeasement of the dictator. Sad to see you and your State Department caved in.

There have been other things your Administration did which I found unforgivable: 1) Amb. Chris Hill going out of his way to return the illicit money of $25 millions at Banco Delta Asia Bank to Kim Jong-il, 2) Ignoring completely the 2004 North Korean Human Rights Act, which could have been lethal to the NK dictator, and 3) Taking North Korea out of the list of the terror sponsoring nations. No matter how much you were pressured by the leftist governments in SK and/or by the liberal Democrats in the U.S., you did not have to do the above for Kim Jong-il, whom you said you loathed.

I read today in the Korean newspapers that the 6-party talk fell apart in Beijing, again today! It fell apart, as far as I am concerned, from the beginning in 2003, and fell apart at least a dozen times in the past five years. Kim Jong-il won! He is sick now, but he still has his nuclear weapons.

It is not too late, Mr. President. You can do something before you leave the White House. Please enact the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act of 2008 right away. Accept the North Korean refugees as many as you can now! Allocate funds to the North Korean defectors in South Korea! You met with those defectors, Kang Cheol-hwan, Kim Seong-min, and Park Sang-hak. You encouraged them yourself to fight on! I was responsible in part bringing Kim Seong-min and Park Sang-hak to the White House and the Governor’s Island, respectively, in 2006 and 2008. I arranged the visits myself for the freedom fighters. You should help them, Mr. President. They are working very hard but are desperate financially. Free North Korea Radio broadcasting and the balloons with leaflets.

I beseech you to do something because many people are dying in North Korea even now. They are dying of starvation and dying in the infamous concentration camps. The refugees are being forcefully repatriated by the Chinese authorities, to face torture and imprisonment, even executions, back at home. Kim Jong-il will never give up his nuclear weapons unless forced by the Chinese government, which is for now very unlikely. Supporting NK human rights issue and helping the NK defectors in South Korea will do a world of good, practically and morally. They can and will topple the evil regime eventually. The regime has to go, we all know. Kim Jong-il murdered more than 3 million of his own people, and will murder more if he can. China will just stand by and watch. South Koreans are so scared of nuclear attacks that they do not want to confront Kim Jong-il. Should we all sit tight and let Kim Jong-il continue his genocide holocaust? Never! Never again!

I love Abraham Lincoln. I translated two of his books into Korean. Lincoln did not sit tight and let the slave owners expand slavery into the West. He saved the Union and also freed the slaves. Unfortunately, we do not have a Lincoln in South Korea. President Bush, you can be the Lincoln of South Korea. It does not matter whether he is an American president or a Korean president, as long as he frees the slaves in North Korea and unify the Korean peninsula eventually. You can start! This is not a matter for Koreans only! It is and will be a universal issue, if we do not do anything. Mr. President, please save North Koreans! That will be your real legacy to go down hundreds of generations, not the nuclear talk, not the 6-party talk.

Sincerely,

Sin-U Nam, AIA
Korean-American Architect in NJ
North Korean Human Rights Activist
Lifetime Member of Lincoln Forum