S. Korea Student’s Suicide Called Result of Police Mistreatment

SEOUL, South Korea — A university student jumped to his death from a hospital window after claiming that he had been committed as a mental patient because of his political activities, an opposition party said Monday.

The Party for Peace and Democracy disclosed the incident, which occured Friday, as student demonstrations erupted over another suicide by a student who leaped from a rooftop Sunday after demanding the release of all political prisoners.

The suicides occurred only days before opposition forces are to mark the anniversary of the May, 1980, Kwangju incident, in which government troops killed at least 193 protesters. The suicides could put new fire into anti-government demonstrations, which lately have lacked the focus and rage of the widespread protests that forced democratic reforms last year.

Political Science Major

Officials at St. Mary’s Hospital in the Kangnam section of Seoul confirmed Monday night that Koh Jung Hee, a 27-year-old political science major at Yonsei University, jumped to his death Friday from the window of his ninth-floor room. They refused to discuss the incident in detail.

Officials of the Party for Peace and Democracy said the police committed Koh in February, against his will, after arresting him and diagnosing him as mentally ill. Koh had written foreign embassies and made phone calls to the presidential palace protesting fraud in the December presidential election, the party said.

Koh was a volunteer in the presidential campaign of Kim Dae Jung, the Party for Peace and Democracy’s candidate, who came in third behind President Roh Tae Woo and another opposition candidate.

Three days before his death, Koh reportedly told his mother and sister that he would commit suicide unless he were released. The family is now calling for an investigation, the party said.

Meanwhile, students skirmished with police at two Seoul campuses Monday, and opposition parties renewed their call for the release of political prisoners in response to the suicide Sunday of Cho Sung Man, a 25-year-old chemistry student at Seoul National University.

Cho stabbed himself in the abdomen and leaped from the roof of a four-story building in the Myongdong Cathedral compound in central Seoul. According to fellow protesters, he shouted “Immediately release all prisoners of conscience!” before jumping and left behind a suicide note demanding that North Korea be co-host for the Olympic Games in September.

In the past, some South Korean dissidents have resorted to suicide in the hope of shaming the government into action, and there were indications that Cho’s death might have an effect on the Roh administration.

Yoon Giel Joon, chairman of the ruling Democratic Justice Party, reportedly urged the government to grant the opposition demands.

Human rights advocates estimate that 300 to 400 prisoners of conscience remain behind bars, even after an amnesty in February. The government has said the number is much smaller and that only those convicted of serious crimes are still in prison.