Fingers of Fate

In Seoul last week, 15 men from the city of Chonan, all members of the "Anti-Japanese Anti-Communist Suicide Corps," knelt before the gates of the Japanese embassy. As hundreds of demonstrators watched in horrified fascination, the men one by one raised carving knives and hacked off the little fingers of their left hands as a grisly sign of their anger against Japan. Wrapped in a blood-soaked flag, the severed pinkies were intended for the Japanese ambassador for transmission to Premier Kakuei Tanaka in Tokyo. Before delivery could be made, however, police rounded up the bloodied men and shipped them off to a hospital.

That dramatic act of protest was beyond doubt the highlight of weeks of intense anti-Japanese activity in South Korea which included several mass demonstrations and a break-in at the Japanese Embassy in Seoul. The emotional outburst had been building up since last month's unsuccessful assassination attempt against Korea's dictatorial President Park Chung Hee, in which Park's wife was inadvertently killed (TIME, Aug. 26).

Special Emissary. The fact that the would-be assassin was a Korean who lived in Japan further exacerbated relations between the two countries, which have been distinctly cool since the Kim Dae Jung affair last year. The Koreans have demanded not only that Japan apologize for the assassination attempt, but that Tokyo ban Chosoren, the chief anti-Park organization active in Japan. Premier Tanaka refuses to do this. He did, however, agree to send an emissary to Seoul to offer a compromise whereby anti-Park activities would be curtailed within the limits of Japanese law.

Eventually, Park will probably have to accept a settlement that falls short of his maximum demands. If he does not, South Korea will pay a heavy price, since it is heavily dependent on Japanese foreign aid and investment and cannot afford a total break in relations. Meanwhile, the surge of Korean nationalist feeling offers a temporary domestic benefit to Park: he can use anti-Japanese emotions to divert attention from his repressive policies at home. That, at least, was the opinion of many Japanese, who felt certain that last week's demonstrations had in part been carefully stage-managed from above.

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