By Lee Tae-hoon
Staff reporter
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) is embroiled in a lawsuit over its decision to ban the distribution of an English-language book that summarizes a dark chapter in the country's modern history.
Kim Sung-soo, former head of the TRC's International Cooperation Team, told The Korea Times Thursday that two translators, including himself, as well as Mike Hurt, the final copyeditor of the report, have filed the suit against TRC President Lee Young-jo.
The three plaintiffs demanded compensation of 50 million won ($44,000) for the mental stress and financial loss that they had to undergo as victims of apparent political censorship that Lee has tried to ``cover up'' by diverting the attention and accusing them of producing a substandard translation.
They claimed that the ban of the TRC's 215-page publication was on ideological grounds, rather than due to the poor quality of its English.
Kim said Lee told him to stop translation as the TRC's standing committee member in October 2008, adding that he disagreed with the view of then-commission head Ahn Byung-ook, who is perceived as a liberal.
``I replied that it was fair enough to have a different view, but that, as I was just a translator, he should make his objections to Ahn directly,'' Kim said.
As Lee, a Harvard-educated conservative scholar, objected to the release, the commission had to carry out another round of reviews of the book for three months in order to pinpoint the alleged English errors.
Lee gave no specific instructions regarding any corrections during the extensive editing period, and later approved the publication of the book.
However, upon his inauguration as the commission's president last December, Lee ordered the halt of production of the report, on the grounds of its poor English translation.
When asked why the commission concluded that the book should be withdrawn from circulation, the TRC answered, citing an evaluation done early this year by a native English speaker copyeditor.
However, Benjamin Applegate, deputy editor at the JoongAng Daily, who took the job, said that he made no such assessment to evaluate whether he believed the book was good enough to be published or not, though he made a summary of errors he found in the book.
Leigh Payne, a professor of sociology at Oxford University, said the translation errors in the report do not reach the threshold to withdraw publication, and Lee's decision to ban the book is against his role as president of the commission and his international promotion of the commission.
The Korea Times extensively dealt with the dispute over the issue in the article, ``Forbidden Book Haunts Truth Commission,'' published on April 6.
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