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A service for the repose of the victims is held at the site of the Nogun-ri massacre on June 26. Yonhap News
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Memorial fund for Nogun-ri victims faces deadline
A special U.S. fund set up to build a monument commemorating South Korean refugees massacred by U.S.-led forces during the Korean War as well as to start a related scholarship will likely get nowhere, as the deadline for the fund’s use is nearing, officials said. In 2001, the U.S. donated US$4 million for such purposes, in order to make amends for the mass killing of South Korean refugees at Nogun-ri, a rural village in South Korea, during the 1950-53 conflict. The refugees were suspected of being North Korean sympathizers. The deadline for the use of the fund is set for September 30 this year. South Korea and the U.S. reportedly agreed upon extending the deadline by one more year for the US$2.8 million assigned for the scholarship fund, but the U.S. is opposing the extension on US$1.19 million set aside for building a monument, officials say. "We are doing our best in trying to push back the deadline," Vice Foreign Minister Lee Kyu-hyung said in a press briefing, adding that he will announce the outcome of negotiation with the U.S. when they are completed.The delay, sources say, is mainly attributable to discord between the two sides regarding who should benefit from the fund and how the money should be used. For the commemoration project, the U.S. is maintaining that any civilians injured or relatives of those killed during the Korean War should benefit from the fund, sources said. But South Korea is saying that the fund should be earmarked solely for Nogun-ri victims, they said. "If the coverage isn’t confined to victims from Nogun-ri, there will be little opportunity down the road to seek investigation into or compensation for other such massacres," said a civic group official.
