Kim Dae-jung

Beginning of political career

It enters in policy in 1954 by being opposed to the maintenance Syngman Rhee. Although he was elected like representative at the Parliament in 1961, a military blow carried out by Park Chung-hee the évinça. He becomes the main leader of the opposition in the years 1960 and takes part in the presidential campaign of 1971. He then carries out a race with the very tight vote against Park Chung-hee in spite of the many handicaps imposed by the dictatorship in place. He had to undergo imprisonments, removals and death threats. Lastly, it was évincé and banished of the policy for more than one decade.

In 1980, Kim Dae-jung was condemned to died for sedition and conspiracy following an other blow of Chun Doo-hwan and popular rising with Gwangju, its political stronghold. Thanks to the intervention of the government of the the United States, the sentence was commuted to 20 years of prison, then, later, with the exile for the United States.

On the way towards the presidency

After its return in South Korea in 1985, it took again its role of chief of the opposition. When the first democratic presidential election was held in 1987 after the retirement of the ex-general Chun Doo-hwan, Kim Dae-jung and Kim Young-Sam, his comrade and rival political of long time, stood as a candidates; what divided the votes for the opposition and allowed the victory of the ex-general Roh Tae-woo, the designated successor of Chun Doo-hwan.

Kim Dae-jung fails presidential again of 1992, this time only against Kim Young-Sam who succeeds Roh Tae-woo. However, at the time of the elections of 1997, its fourth candidature, it gains finally to succeed Kim Young-Sam.

The preceding presidents Park Chung-hee, Chun Doo-hwan, Roh Tae-woo and Kim Young-Sam came all from a relatively hospital area, the province of Gyeongsang. Kim Dae-jung is the first pésident coming from the area of Jeolla in south-west, an area which had been traditionally neglected and developed, at least partly because of the political discrimination of the preceding presidents. It obtains the Prix Rafto in 2000 for the democratic pressures which it exerts in South Korea.

Presidency

Kim Dae-jung arrives at the capacity right in the middle of a economic crisis which touches South Korea as from the last year of the presidency of Kim Young-Sam. It carries out a vigorous economic reform and an important reorganization in order to revitalize the economy, thus obtaining some remarkable results for the South Korean economy.

Its policy of engagement with the North Korea is called the " Political of the sun ray " (sunshine policy), inspired by the Ostpolitik of Willy Brandt. Within this framework, Kim Dae-jung is the first Head of South Korean State to go to Pyongyang, where it signs the joint statement of June 15th, 2000 with his counterpart North-Korean Kim Jong-il. The declaration of June 15th, 2000 constitutes the angular stone of the relations intercoréennes, for the reunification of the peninsula.

The " sunshine policy" of Kim Dae-jung was worth to him to obtain the Nobel Prize of peace. This attribution is however discussed: the North Korea disputed that this reward is decreed only with the only South Korean president, while the political adversaries of Kim Dae-jung disputed the introduction of a not comprising dialog, according to them, of the sufficient counterparts of Pyongyang (see the detailed articles North Korea seen of Seoul and Réunification of Korea).

Simple: Kim Tae Jung

Random links: