Based on our “Apology & Reparation: The Jeju 4 3 Retrials and the Japanese American coram nobis Cases webinar in April 2025. Please note: discussion of disturbing state violence and mass killings.

On April 3, 1948, U.S.-backed ROK security forces began a brutal anti-communist “suppression operation” on Jeju Island, massacring, torturing, inflicting sexual violence upon, and imprisoning thousands of villagers. ROK military, paramilitary, and police forces, with the backing of the U.S., killed an estimated 30,000 of the 200,000 Jeju residents between 1948-50. These forces also destroyed 40,000 homes and burned entire villages to the ground.

Part of the devastation brought on by South Korean security forces was the forced detention, torture, and sham convictions of thousands of Jeju villagers who were falsely convicted and criminalized as “traitors” by kangaroo military courts at the time. Survivors testified that some falsely convicted villagers were immediately executed, while others were imprisoned for 1-15 years.

Jeju communities, Korean and U.S. scholars, and international human rights groups have led an ongoing 20-year reconciliation initiative calling on the U.S. to engage in the social healing process.

Last year, we invited legal scholars Eric Yamamoto and Miyoko Pettit-Toledo to share how survivors and their descendents achieved redress through transnational legal advocacy efforts. Yamamoto and Pettit-Toledo have been involved in Jeju 4.3 justice issues for over a decade, working across Jeju, Seoul, Hawai’i, and Washington DC. They’ve also drawn important connections between legal advocacy led by Jeju 4.3 survivors and Japanese American survivors of World War II incarceration camps.

Survivor-led efforts shed light on the impact of and possibilities for legal advocacy in processes of redress, healing, and social justice. In particular, they show how a national court system can respond to and correct egregious wrongs committed by the government against its own citizens.