Supreme Court Dismisses Injunction Request to Ban Sale and Distribution of Kim Il-sung's Memoir 'With the Century'

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Jung-yoon] The Supreme Court dismissed a provisional injunction filed by civic groups requesting a ban on the sale and distribution of North Korean leader Kim Il-sung's memoir "With the Century."

According to the legal community on the 20th, the Supreme Court's 3rd Division (Presiding Justice Kim Jae-hyung) on the 18th rejected the appeal against the provisional injunction filed by civic groups NPK Academy, the Rule of Law and Liberal Democracy Solidarity, and 19 citizens against Kim Seung-gyun, CEO of Minjok Sarangbang Publishing House.

"With the Century," officially published by Minjok Sarangbang Publishing House in April last year, is known to have directly reproduced the original text published by the North Korean Workers' Party Publishing House, sparking controversy over historical distortion and violations of current laws.

NPK and others filed the injunction arguing that although the book, which glorifies the Kim Il-sung family, was recognized as enemy propaganda under the National Security Act, its sale and distribution were allowed, thereby infringing on human dignity and personality rights as stipulated by the Constitution and undermining the free democratic basic order.

The first-instance court dismissed the application, and although NPK and others appealed, the second-instance court also ruled that "even if the content of the book is based on a totalitarian system founded on the Juche ideology, it is difficult to see that ordinary people would blindly accept the content and be unable to engage in mental activities with different content," thus upholding the first-instance decision.

Following the provisional injunction request to ban sale and distribution, online bookstores voluntarily stopped wholesale sales, and the police, who launched an investigation, referred CEO Kim and others to the prosecution under the National Security Act.