S. Korea Pledges Not to Jail Opposition Leader

SEOUL, South Korea —  The South Korean government announced Monday that it will not send opposition leader Kim Dae Jung back to jail Friday when he returns home from two years of exile in the United States.

Diplomatic sources said that an announcement two days ago that President Chun Doo Hwan will visit the United States in April was held up until the United States got assurances that the Seoul government will not jail the dissident leader again.

Unlike the West, where the coming return is a major event, the tightly controlled South Korean news media have been silent on Kim’s trip.

“A total news blackout is in effect,” a Korean journalist said. “Most people don’t even know he is coming.”

Kim’s supporters have spread the news of his return through clandestine flyers and by word of mouth.

Dozens of Western reporters will cover Kim’s arrival. And concerned that he might face a fate similar to that of Philippine opposition leader Benigno S. Aquino Jr.--who was assassinated at the airport as he returned from U.S. exile--a protective group of 26 prominent Americans, including three congressmen, is accompanying Kim on the flight.

Still banned from political activity, Kim faces a 17-year prison term--what remains of a commuted 20-year sentence imposed in 1980 for sedition. At one point, he was under death sentence and was saved by U.S. appeals.

Last month, before U.S. pressure caused the government to back off, a senior South Korean official warned that Kim would be arrested as a revolutionary and sent back to prison.

Many diplomats and opposition leaders now expect Kim to be whisked from the airport to his home in western Seoul and perhaps kept under strict house arrest.

Four days after his homecoming, elections are to be held for the National Assembly. For the first time since Chun seized power five years ago, they are being contested by a genuine opposition party, the New Korea Democratic Party, affiliated with Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam.