The 2-16 Declaration
Overthrow the Kim Jong-il regime and free North Korea!
The North Korean Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong-il regime has been a threat to the neighboring counties for the past 65 years, which has been violating the human rights of the country’s people and engaging in unjustifiable conducts, including repeated abductions of even foreigners.
A large number of people have been imprisoned as political prisoners, persecuted, and killed for the purpose of maintaining the regime. The way of arresting family members as political prisoners on account of the guilt-by-association system is truly a practice in or before the medieval period. The concentration camps must be liberated immediately and the lost time of the prisoners must be compensated. People in the general society must also be free from the fear of being sent to the camps.
Abduction, apparently, is also an unforgivable act of deceiving or forcing someone to go to North Korea against his or her will and using the person for the benefit of the North Korean government. Repatriation to North Korea, which has continued for more than half a century since the first time, is equivalent in nature. The victims must be retuned to their respective homes and families immediately, and their lost time must be compensated.
The nuclear development of North Korea poses a great threat to Japan and South Korea that are without their own nuclear deterrents. At the same time, North Korea constitutes a serious threat to its neighboring counties in terms of biological and chemical weapons and excessive military power. North Korea must immediately abandon the base policy representing the basis of armed liberation against South Korea, stop the scheme of the united front tactics symbolized by the slogan, “our fellow Koreans,” and make joint efforts with South Korea toward achieving true co-existence.
The accomplishment of these goals, guarantee of the human rights of people in North Korea, and reduction of the threat to neighboring countries will not be realized while the current Kim Jong-il administration is acknowledged. Whether the countries will be united as one or coexist as two nations will be decided by the people who live in these countries. We, as Japanese and Koreans living in Japan whose national sovereignty and human rights have been violated by the Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong-il regime, consider that overthrowing the Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong-il regime and removing their followers are our responsibilities and declare that we will use our positions and abilities to the maximum extent to fulfill them.
on the birthday of Kim Jong-il, February 16, 2010
This declaration has been organized by:
ARAKI, Kazuhiro
SUNAGAWA, Shojun
Song Yoon Bok