Today's News

Korea has been known from olden times as a land of golden tapestry with beautiful mountains and clear water.

But the Japanese imperialists occupied the country in the last century and enforced colonial rule and plundered its forest resources, denuding the beautiful mountains and fields.

After occupying Korea by force of arms in 1905, the Japanese surveyed all the forests between March and August 1910 and, on that basis, promulgated the “forestry law” in June 1911 and enforced it from September that year.

They stipulated in the “forestry law” that “the governor-general of Korea can include all forests in the forest reserves if necessary” and thus created conditions for plundering any forest in the country.

It also stipulated that the forests of Korea can be turned into “state-owned forests” and they can be freely transferred and sold to Japanese capitalists or organizations or exchanged with them.

In addition, it specified that Koreans could neither enter the forests without permission from a police officer nor set fire on forests and fields or the land adjacent to them and that those who set fire or attempted to do it would be sent to prison or fined.

As a result, peasants could neither reclaim slash-and-burn fields nor obtain necessary things for their life from the forests.

During the forest survey which lasted until 1924, the Japanese imperialists plundered many forests in Korea by registering them as “state-owned forests”.

According to data released by the Japanese, the total area of “state-owned forests” amounted to 6.7 million hectares.

The Japanese plundered the forest resources on a larger scale after 1930.

There were many large trees that had grown for hundreds of years in Mt Kumgang, a famous mountain of Korea. After provoking the Sino-Japanese war, the Japanese cut down all the large trees, even those around temples on the mountains. In particular, having their eye on the inland resources, including the vast primitive forests in the area of the Paektu plateau, the Japanese built a railroad and transported a large quantity of forest resources to Japan.

After the outbreak of the Pacific war, the Japanese imperialists cut down forests in Korea on a large scale to secure war materials and build military installations.

Not content with this, they even set fires everywhere and burned many forests just before its defeat.

The Japanese imperialists’ gangster-like plundering of forest resources severely destroyed the natural environment of Korea and the people had to suffer misfortune and pain due to natural disasters caused by flooding. In addition, the development of national industries relying on forest resources for raw materials was completely restricted.

However, Japan has not yet made any reparations for such criminal acts, pretending ignorance of them.

The DPRK people will never forget the past crimes of the Japanese imperialists, but make them pay dearly for them.