[문화]Baek Ki-wan, a young man who fought against the wall of his lifetime

[앵커]

Paik Ki-wan, who died at the age of 89, was committed to the unification and democratization movement with everything in his life.

He said of himself as a wall-fighter.

Reporter Seung-eun Lee tells the life of a young man, Paik Ki-wan.

[기자]

Born in Hwanghae-do in 1932, Paik Ki-wan came to South Korea in search of his father when he was 13 years old.

A word from a porter who didn’t know his name caught him while he was wandering.

[故 백기완 / 2007년 인터뷰 : 나쁜 놈, 있는 놈하고 싸워야지 없는 놈끼리는 암만 싸워봐야 이긴 놈이 없고 진 놈도 없고 승부가 안 나는 법이야 그러더라고.]

In the 1950s, when he was in his twenties, Paik started planting trees and the farmers and poor people.

His campaign against the Korea-Japan Agreement in the 1960s, against the Restoration in the 1970s, and the struggles with the new military in the 7th and 80s, he shouted for anti-dictatorship, democratization, and unification in the streets of his life.

The people’s movement camp elected him twice as presidential candidate.

In the 1987 presidential election, Kim Young-sam, Kim Dae-jung, and Yang Kim resigned after appealing for unification, but in 1992 they finished.

[오세철 / 연세대 명예교수(2007년 인터뷰) : 단순한 후보 운동이 아니라 (노동자) 정치세력화의 기반을 처음 만드는 시발점이 되지 않았느냐.]

Neither torture nor poverty nor the temptation of power to kneel.

The Institute for Unification Studies, which was established by selling pianos for daughters who had not paid all installments, was an outpost of thought.

His writings that awaken the direction of life and the Korean language were a must-read for the movement in the 80s.

Until recently, when he was sick, he was always at the scene of workers’ struggles.

[故 백기완 / 지난 2019년 인터뷰 : 한 노동자가 죽었는데 그 노동자를 죽인 잘못된 질서, 제도를 나무랄 생각 아니하고…. 죽는 그 순간까지 썩어 문드러진 놈들의 뿌리를 뽑기 위해서 싸워야 한다고 생각합니다.]

The unification and democratization that the eternal young man Baek Ki-wan dreamed of was a world where everyone lives well together.

This is YTN Seung-eun Lee.

[저작권자(c) YTN & YTN plus 무단전재 및 재배포 금지]