‘Keep Working to Make Peace and Justice Flower,’ Secretary-General Says

 

at Opening of Photo Exhibit on Korean Peninsula’s Demilitarized Zone

 

(Delayed for technical reasons.)

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at the opening of the photographic exhibition of the demilitarized zone (DMZ), in New York on 28 June:

Let me begin by thanking Mission of the Republic of Korea and Donga-Ilbo for organizing this important exhibition.  I also want to thank my good friend and former colleague, General Kim Hee Sang, for his role.

Thoughts of Korea’s demilitarized zone immediately call up familiar images of watchtowers, barbed wire and stone-faced soldiers at standoff.  Yet there is much that we do not know and cannot see.  The DMZ, after all, is roughly a quarter of the size of Yellowstone Park.  It stretches across mountains and valleys, from sea to sea.

For more than a generation, Mr. Choi [Byung-Kwan] has chronicled the living world of this no-man’s land.  He shows us the disconnect and confrontation between the two Koreas.

But his work goes deeper to reveal the paradox.  The world’s most heavily armed borderline is also a safe haven.  The DMZ has given new birth to rare fauna and flora — and new life to disappearing species.  We see also what has happened to the remnants of war.  Among the rusted army helmets and broken bombshells, flowers muscle through.

This exhibition comes at a fitting time.  Last Friday, we marked the sixtieth anniversary of the start of the Korean War.  We honoured the service and sacrifice of the United Nations forces who rescued the young Republic of Korea.

Last Saturday, we celebrated the sixty-fifth anniversary of the signing of the Charter of the United Nations — and the enduring power of humanity to find the way of peace.

These back-to-back anniversaries show us that history, too, is intertwined.  That is the lesson I take from this remarkable exhibition.  Mr. Choi’s photos remind us that, in time, Mother Nature overcomes artificial barriers.  So should we.

Just as the “death strip” that divided Germany during the cold war has become a nature preserve and symbol of unity, so might the DMZ one day.  Let us keep working to make peace and justice flower.  And let us also continue natural preservation even beyond the eventual reunification of Korean peninsula.  As we do, the photos displayed here will serve as a benchmark for success.

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For information media • not an official record