Rep. Ha Tae-keung (People’s Power Party): An Apology for a Politician’s Cowardice
Personal Apology to comfort women scholar Park Yu-ha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ha_Tae-keung; https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/nation/2025/03/113_357826.html
https://n.news.naver.com/article/newspaper/023/0003889359?date=20250221
Rep. Ha Tae-keung (People’s Power Party): An Apology for a Politician’s Cowardice
Though much too late, I would like to offer my sincere apology and congratulations to Professor Park Yu-ha, author of Comfort Women of the Empire.
The reason I am offering this apology is because of a politician’s cowardice—my own. Eleven years ago, when Professor Park came under fierce attack from the public and media, and even ended up in court, simply for holding a different perspective on the comfort women issue, I believed that her views belonged in the academic realm. I thought they should be evaluated and debated within the scholarly community—not ruled upon by a judge in a courtroom. Of course, I admit that my own academic knowledge of the comfort women issue is limited. Nonetheless, I firmly believe that academic freedom must be protected in any issue, no matter how sensitive.
However, I could not publicly express that belief at the time. The comfort women issue was highly sensitive, and a wave of intense anti-Japanese sentiment was sweeping the country. I was afraid of being crushed or suffocated in the atmosphere that left no room for dissent. Though I considered myself a politician who prided himself on having convictions and standing by them, I simply could not muster the courage to speak up on an issue tied to anti-Japanese nationalism.
Looking back on how I remained a bystander as a fellow academic was subjected to a witch-hunt, I feel ashamed. That’s why in 2021, when a similar controversy erupted around the legislation criminalizing distortion of the May 18 Gwangju Uprising, I took a firm stance in opposition—learning from the case of Professor Park.
To Professor Park Yu-ha, who has endured and overcome so many hardships over the past 11 years, I offer my heartfelt congratulations. And as a politician and a fellow intellectual of this era, I offer my sincere apology for failing to stand up for academic freedom when it mattered most.