Human Acts

Death and destruction in Korea are felt at the individual, family and national levels but at the international level, it has become only a statistical addition to the list of millions dying each year.

- Jitendra Uttam

ALMOST fading in our memories, a disastrous war that began in Korea on June 25, 1950, led to more than one million military deaths and an estimated two to three million civilian casualties.

Alleged war crimes include the mass killing of suspected communists by Seoul and the torture and starvation of prisoners of war by Pyongyang.

North Korea became one of the most heavily bombed countries in history, and virtually all of Korea's major cities were destroyed. Destruction on such a scale has a lasting imprint on the collective remembrance of Korean society. Though combat ended with the Korean Armistice Agreement on July 27, 1953, no peace treaty has been signed between the warring states, making the war a frozen conflict, which often erupts with brute force.

Amid simmering tensions and reckless antagonism, North and South escalated with a series of low-level armed clashes, known as the Korean DMZ Conflict, in the late 1960s. Adding fuel to the fire, North Korean leader Kim Il Sung declared “liberation of the south” to be a “national duty” in 1966. Inspired by the call of national duty, North Korean commandos launched the Blue House raid in 1968 to assassinate South Korean President Park Chung-hee. Though the attempt was not successful, it communicated the intent.