Saturday, January 24, 2009

but who are the real criminals

JoongAng Daily calls Nam Gyeong-nam, a leader of the Seoul squatter resistance, a "hard-line anti-poverty activist." Police are searching for him and apparently want to charge him in connection with the military assault on squatters early this week that turned into an inferno that left six dead.

Question: if, as the paper reports, Nam has been wanted since 2003, when he allegedly threw Molotov cocktails at a police station, shouldn't authorities have been aware that such weapons could have been in the building that they attacked this week? And, given that knowledge, shouldn't cops have proceeded with caution, instead of mounting an all-out assault? It sounds like the cops are trying to transfer the blame onto the victims here. It was the police action that made a bad situation worse.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi Robert,

Great post. I work with the Clinton Global Initiative and I was hoping to reach you to discuss our panel on Urban Poverty. If you have a few minutes, I'd very much appreciate an email to heidi.moseson@clintonglobalinitiative.org

Many thanks,
Heidi