Posted on Jun 2, 2020
The children of South Korea's last concentration camp
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Han Jong-sun still clearly remembers the moment he was abducted with his sister.
It was a beautiful autumn day in 1984, and Han, then eight years old, was enjoying a long-hoped-for trip to the city with his busy father.
But Han's father still had a few errands to run, and he decided the quickest - and safest - thing to do would be to leave the children with an officer at a police substation for a few minutes.
That police officer would tear the family apart.
"A bus stopped in front of the police substation and we were forced into the bus," Han recalls more than 30 years later. "A police officer exchanged unknown signs with the people who got off the bus.
"We had no idea where we were taken to. 'Daddy told us to wait here! Daddy is coming!' We cried and bawled.
"They started beating us, saying that we were too loud."
The bus was taking them to Hyungje Bokjiwon, a private facility that was officially a welfare centre.
But in reality, allege those who survived, it was a brutal detention centre which held thousands of people against their will - some for years on end.
It was a beautiful autumn day in 1984, and Han, then eight years old, was enjoying a long-hoped-for trip to the city with his busy father.
But Han's father still had a few errands to run, and he decided the quickest - and safest - thing to do would be to leave the children with an officer at a police substation for a few minutes.
That police officer would tear the family apart.
"A bus stopped in front of the police substation and we were forced into the bus," Han recalls more than 30 years later. "A police officer exchanged unknown signs with the people who got off the bus.
"We had no idea where we were taken to. 'Daddy told us to wait here! Daddy is coming!' We cried and bawled.
"They started beating us, saying that we were too loud."
The bus was taking them to Hyungje Bokjiwon, a private facility that was officially a welfare centre.
But in reality, allege those who survived, it was a brutal detention centre which held thousands of people against their will - some for years on end.
The children of South Korea's last concentration camp
Posted from bbc.comPosted in these groups: 
South Korea
South Korea
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 3
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Korea before the Olympics was a contradiction. I remember blocks of the city outside of Osan being torn down and then rebuilt into American type buildings over night. If you scratched the surface just a bit there was filth underneath. Crime, corruption, police that you would think we have here (we don’t) with all the protests. And a general lack of rights that we all take for granted. Korea was not as bad in the early 80s as it had been, but it made you appreciate the states. This article does not surprise me at all.
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Thanks for the share, Chip. Korea's recent past has definitely been difficult.
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ROK and ROC were anti-Communist, but also autocratic until late 1980s. Although North Korea and China did suffer from starvation and mass imprisonment, South Korea and Taiwan also persecuted ordinary civilians for criticizing the government.
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
LTC Eugene Chu I've Dealt with the South Korean Marines. I Have No Fondness for Them.
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