KOREAN PEACE COMMITTEE

A New Zealand-based campaign to promote peace on the Korean peninsula and to advocate resolution of issues between the United States and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea on the basis of peaceful negotiation between states in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.

Organising Committee

Media Release For immediate release

Call for peace in Korea

Petition launched on Korean Liberation Day, August 15

A petition entitled ‘Call for Peace in Korea’ was launched today by the New Zealand Korean Peace Committee. It calls on the US government to engage in meaningful negotiations with North Korea to

• resolve the present crisis on the basis of non-aggression and removal of sanctions in exchange for the verifiable ending of the nuclear weapons programme and,

• to transform the armistice agreement into a peace treaty to bring sustained peace to the Korean people.

It further calls on the New Zealand government to endorse these moves to produce a peaceful resolution of the crisis and to support progress towards a secure, de-nuclearised, prosperous and eventually peacefully re-unified Korea on the basis of sovereignty and security from aggression, as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations.

Committee Co-ordinator Tim Beal said that in launching the petition on a day which has been celebrated in both North and South Korea since 1945 as a day of liberation, committee members hoped to provide an opportunity for New Zealanders to express their desire for Korea and the rest of our world to be liberated from the threat of war.

Individuals and organisations who have signed on to the petition can be viewed on line at http://www.vuw.ac.nz/~caplabtb/kpc/ The petition is open for signatures until November 15, after which it will be presented to the New Zealand government.

ENDS

Contact: Tim Beal (04) 463 5080 (work) or (04) 934 5132 (home), email: Tim Beal