A young man who was executed by military authorities for aiding rebels amid deepening ideological division on the Korean Peninsula has been exonerated posthumously, more than seven decades after his death. 

The Suncheon branch of the Gwangju District Court delivered the verdict Monday and issued an apology to the bereaved family of Jang Hwan-bong for the miscarriage of justice by public authorities and their failure to prove his innocence earlier.  

Presiding Justice Kim Jung-ah also expressed hope for the swift enactment of a special law to restore honor to all the victims of the so-called Yeo-Sun incident. 

The incident refers to the authorities’ violent crackdown on the anti-government movement in Yeosu and Suncheon in South Jeolla Province in 1948, following the bloody April third uprising that broke out on Jeju Island that same year. As many as 30-thousand people were estimated to have died in government crackdowns during the Jeju incident. 

Jang, who was a locomotive engineer, was executed at the age of 29, less than a month after he was arrested on charges of aiding left-leaning soldiers and thus violating the laws against rebellions and acts against national sovereignty in October 1948. 

Jang’s family asked for a retrial of the case in 2011, and the court reopened the case in 2018.