Yoon to visit Jeju to attend memorial for 1948 massacre victims

President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol will visit the southern island of Jeju this weekend to attend a memorial for victims of a 1948 civilian massacre, his spokesperson said Friday.

Yoon plans to attend the memorial ceremony Sunday, keeping a promise he made during the campaign, Kim Eun-hye said during a press briefing.

"Whatever the reason, regarding the fact that civilians were innocently sacrificed, President-elect Yoon has stressed it is the obligation and duty of a liberal democracy to honor the spirits and for all the people to warmly embrace and console them," she said.

The ceremony will mark the anniversary of the April 3, 1948, uprising of Jeju islanders against the US military-led rule following Japan's 1910-45 occupation of Korea.

The then government distorted the uprising as a communist riot and massacred an estimated 14,000-30,000 civilians, or up to 10 percent of the island's population at the time, in armed crackdowns over seven years beginning in 1947, starting before the April 3 incident.

Yoon promised during the campaign to do his best to properly compensate the victims' families if elected.

This will be the first time a president-elect has attended the annual memorial ceremony due to the change in the political calendar following President Park Geun-hye's ouster in 2017.

Former President Roh Moo-hyun, who was the first president to apologize for the incident in 2003, was also the first to attend the ceremony in 2006.

His conservative successors skipped the event, but liberal President Moon Jae-in attended the ceremony in 2018. (Yonhap)