S. Korean civic group to appeal French court ruling on looted royal texts

SEOUL, Jan. 25 (Yonhap) -- A South Korean civic group said Monday that it will
appeal a French court's decision to reject the return of Korea's royal texts that
were looted by French troops during a 19th-century invasion.
The Seoul-based Cultural Action said it has decided to file an appeal later this
week over the Dec. 24 ruling by the administration court in Paris, which found
that the 296 historic Korean royal books now preserved by the National Library of
France are a "national property" that cannot be handed over.
"We are filing an appeal because not doing so would only mean that we are
accepting the wrong judgment of the French court," Hwang Pyung-woo, a cultural
property head with the organization, said.
The collection chronicling most of the royal history of Korea's Joseon Dynasty
(1392-1910) was stored in an exclusive archive called "Oegyujanggak" on Ganghwa
Island off Korea's west coast. French troops invaded the island in 1866, and over
the course of their withdrawal, spirited away the royal texts from the archive
that held about 1,000 books. Other books were destroyed by fire set by the
troops.
Probably unaware of their origin, the National Library in Paris had classified
them under its Chinese index until they were discovered and brought to the
limelight by a Korean historian living in France, Park Byeong-seon, in 1978.
In government-level negotiations over the past decade, France agreed to lease the
collection on a "long-term and regular basis" to South Korea for display. But the
accord never materialized due to differences on the form of the exhibit and calls
from Korea that they be repatriated, not leased.
France has digitalized the collection for online reading and given a digital
edition to South Korea.
In the December ruling, the French court said the books have become public
material in France over the past 140 years, and the circumstances of their
acquisition do not change their current status.
The court also asserted that international rules banning pillaging were not in
place in the late 19th century.
The civic group argues that the French claim to the books' public status is
absurd because no one even knew of their existence until the Korean historian
discovered them and that they had been wrongfully classified as Chinese.
The Korean group also criticizes the South Korean government's low-profile
approach, which has demanded a permanent lease rather than repatriation, contrary
to Egypt's hard-line stance that led to the recent handover of several looted
Egyptian tomb wall paintings acquired by the Louvre museum from 2000-2003.
"The government's idea is to have them displayed in Korea, but their ownership
will still remain in France. We believe that the wrong history cannot be
corrected until the ownership is returned," Hwang said.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)