Editor of Korea Times Newspaper: "Nodutdol Organizes Trips To North Korea Where Young People Are Indoctrinated"

"A Korean Lesson"
by Marcin Szczepanski
Excerpted from Nowy Dzeinnik/Polish Daily News, April 6, 2003

In Korean, “nodutdol” means “springboard”; a springboard that shoots toward a new life of wealth and freedom—including the freedom of speech. Nodutdol is also the name of an organization which in recent weeks has flared the tempers of many Korean immigrants. And in the foreground of the entire affair stood Korea Times New York—one of the most distinguished Korean newspapers in New York City.

The storm started with a front page article in the Korea Times: “The Anti-American Meeting at the Korean-American Association.” The article was re-printed in the New York Times and Newsday. On Mar. 13, 2003, Yong Il Chin, one of the main editors of the Korean newspaper, wrote that at the association’s headquarters, built and maintained by immigrants, a meeting of “anti-war protestors and enemies of America will take place.” The “enemy of America” label referred to the group Nodutdol (the springboard) for Korean Community Development. The group has about 50 members and its headquarters are in Woods, Queens. Nodutdol consists of young, Western educated leftist activists, whose sympathies lean toward communist North Korea. The group members were scheduled to meet at the association’s headquarters for a so-called anti-war teach in.

“These people are beginning to penetrate the very core of Korean culture and they might cause Americans to regard the entire Korean community as anti-war supporters,” warns Yong Il Chin in an interview with the New York Times.

On Apr. 2, in an interview with Nowy Dziennik (Polish Daily News), Chin added,“The group Nodutdol organizes trips to North Korea, where young people are indoctrinated, after which they return to the United States and spread their dangerous beliefs.”

To read the rest of the article, click here.