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By Do Je-hae
Staff Reporter
Ten NGOs filed a petition with the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last week to seek global recognition of Gando, in the northeastern region of China, as part of the Korean territory. Lawmakers have issued a resolution to reclaim Gando but the South Korean government has remained cool to the diplomatically sensitive issue.
The civilian movement has been gathering momentum as this month marks the centenary of the Gando Convention signed between Japan and China.
On Sept. 4, 1909, Tokyo and Beijing signed the convention, which recognized China's territorial rights over the northeastern region of Gando, territory regarded as Korean from ancient times until Korea lost its sovereignty to Japan in 1910.
A century after what Koreans call a "null and void" agreement, activists and experts are staging arduous campaigns aimed at reclaiming Gando, currently occupied by China. As many as 100,000 Koreans made a living there in the late 1800s.
Maps produced in the 16th century and 1910 have supported Korea's case on Gando, clearly defining the area as part of the Korean territory.
"On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Convention, we are determined to seek global recognition of Gando as Korean territory and renew the world's attention to the territorial dispute between China and Korea," a spokesman for the movement said in a press conference last week in Seoul.
"In order for these efforts to bear fruit, the government, the National Assembly and the people must join forces."
Due to diplomatic sensitivity, the government has largely neglected the Gando issue, while lawmakers have been more active.
Last month, a group of 50 lawmakers submitted a resolution to reinforce Korea's case on Gando.
The nation's case on the invalidity of the 1909 China-Japan Gando Convention is closely associated with international circumstances that led imperialist Japan to expand its rule over Korea.
Many cite the invalidity of the 1905 Korea-Japan Eulsa Treaty, which stripped Korea of its diplomatic rights.
Some historians and legal experts have claimed that the treaty is null and void because the Korean sovereign at the time, King Gojong, never fully authorized it and was coerced into signing it.
"It is important to understand that the territorial issue of Gando is strictly and historically a dispute between Korea and China," Kim Hee-gon, a history professor at Andong University, North Gyeongsang Province, told The Korea Times.
"The border issue goes back to ancient times. In the 20th century, the Greater Korean Empire (18971910) and the Qing Dynasty (16441912) were contending for the territorial rights to Gando."
After taking over Korea's diplomatic rights through the Eulsa Treaty, however, Japan excluded Korea's position on the matter and dealt solely with China to settle the dispute.
Japan recognized Gando as Chinese territory in exchange for economic concessions from China, namely constructions rights in southern Manchuria.
After all these years, what can we expect to gain from a successful case on Gando?
"We have lingering territorial disputes with Japan and China. A successful argument on Gando would empower us with the historical justification to fight back on similar claims as well," Kim said, in reference to the Dokdo conflict with Japan and China's assertions of Goguryeo (37BC668AD) as part of its own history.
Goguryeo ruled most of northeastern China for more than 700 years.
Most of the region defined by Japan in the early 1900s as Gando, or Jiandao in Chinese, is part of Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, a part of Jilin Province in the northeast of China. The area is currently home to about 840,000 ethnic Koreans.
By the late 19th century, peasants in northern Korea settled in northeast China to flee poverty. Many arrived as refugees when Japan invaded Korea in 1894.
jhdo@koreatimes.co.kr
