Photo : YONHAP News
A Seoul court issued a warrant to detain the leader of a radical conservative civic group for allegedly staging protests to insult Korean victims of Japan’s wartime sexual enslavement.
The Seoul Central District Court issued the warrant on Friday for warrant for Kim Byung-heon, the head of Citizens’ Action for the Abolition of the Comfort Women, on charges of defamation and violations of the Child Welfare Act and the Assembly and Demonstration Act, citing that he is a flight risk.
Kim stands accused of holding up banners in front of a high school in Seoul’s Seocho District, and another in the Seongdong District, last December, that asked the schools if they were keeping statues of a girl honoring the victims to guide students to prostitution.
Since February 2024, the Kim held demonstrations around the country, placing black plastic bags or masks that read “demolition” to cover up such statues.
President Lee Jae Myung has strongly criticized Kim’s protests on social media for defaming the deceased victims.