On June 1st, The Voluntary Agency Network of Korea, VANK, announced that they are launching a global campaign to inform historians, archaeologists, university history professors and UNESCO member states about the largest heritage site of the Bronze Age in the Korean peninsula ruined by the development of Legoland.

 

The VANK posted an English petition in the biggest petition website, giving the information on an issue about the biggest heritage from the Bronze Age in Korean peninsular, destroyed by the development of Legoland.

 

In addition to the petition, they created 14 global promotion posters(English, Korean, French, and Italian) and posted them on their social media to let the world citizens know about the issue.

 

The posters consist of the contents that can draw the attention and present the issue on the construction of Legoland after destroying the worldwide famous heritage such as the Stonehenge in the UK, the Parthenon in Greece, the Pyramid in Egypt, the Colosseum in Italy, the Palace of Versailles in France and the Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Also, there is a link to go to the petition website where they explain about the Jungdo in the Republic of Korea.

 

For just a couple of days since they posted the poster that targets British people, saying “What if the Legoland is built after the Stonehenge is demolished in the United Kingdom?”, 31,000 foreigners have put a like, 158 people have shared and 108 comments have been written.

 

“The culture and beliefs of humankind in the Jungdo are deliberately destroyed by the short-sighted development policy, and we are on the verge of losing the important opportunity to see, hear, and learn about expression and ideas of humankind” the VANK said.

 

So far, the amount of 9,000 relics, 1,266 house sites and 149 tombs of the prehistoric period have been excavated in the Jungdo.

 

In the excavation of buried cultural assets in the Jungdo, the dwellings and agricultural remains of the Bronze Age such as dolmens, housing sites and large-scale ditch to protect the village have been discovered, which will mark a milestone in the research on the Bronze Age in the world.

 

Especially, the large-scale ditch to protect the village is the first square-shaped one found in the Korean peninsular, and surrounds the town as the boundary, showing that the surplus of products was accumulated and the community-dominating order was formed here.

 

The Jungdo site is regarded as the key historic heritage to mark the world history of the Bronze Age, preserving the trace of people living in one place for more than 1,000 years.

 

So, the VANK emphasized that the world-class prehistoric relics that have not been found yet will be destroyed without excavation, if the construction of Legoland is continued.

 

Park Gi-tae, Even, The leader of VANK, said “its developer is suspected of dumping the construction waste in the Jungdo, and has not complied with the preservation guidelines of the cultural heritage while its construction. And also, there is a group of 48 dolmens, which is unusual to find such amount of dolmens in one area, but the dolmens are carried in plastic bags, and even some of them are treated as miscellaneous stones.”

 

And he emphasized that “The international community recognizes the importance of the protection of cultural heritage and takes responsibility to fight against its intentional destruction in any form.”