Nomfundo Walaza visits South Korea amid nuclear test crisis
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Nomfundo Walaza, CEO of the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre, recently returned from a visit to South Korea, where she represented Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu at the opening of the World Bell Peace Park in Hwacheon County.
The World Bell Peace Park overlooks a dam which covers the site of intense fighting during the Korean War that took place during 1950-53. The bodies of thousands of soldiers and civilians lie at the bottom of it. The ceremony culminated in the ringing of a massive bell, made from 37 tons of shell casings and bomb fragments gathering in battlegrounds in Korea and other areas of conflict around the world.
Ms Walaza says: “When I arrived the country was in shock over two events: the first was the suicide of former president Roh Moo-hyun, who was being investigated for corruption.
“Mr Roh apparently killed himself because he was under intense scrutiny for allegations of graft, a problem South Korea has grappled with in recent decades and which has bedevilled its astonishing progress as an economic power.”
She adds: “The second issue facing South Korea was, of course, the underground nuclear test conducted by its hawkish northern neighbour. It was followed up with missile tests. Of course this added to the tension in the region.”
Ms Walaza notes that both the death of Mr Roh and North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests touch on the mandate of the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre, which is due to begin development later this year. So too, do the ongoing tensions in many areas of the world, such the Middle East, including Iraq and Iran, the Indian sub-continent and Africa.
Ms Walaza, who shared the podium with Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Mikhael Gorbechev, said: “It was a poignant moment when the massive bell tolled over the demilitarised zone that has seen so much violence and suffering.
A statement issued by the Committee to Create the World Bell Peace Park says: “All our spears and shields, arrows and targets, cannon and rusty shells, all the mechanisms of oppression and violence, and all the historical weapons that have been used to destroy life, we now place in a smelting furnace to be transformed into a beautiful bell that will peal out a song of peace and love.”
