"Historical Preservation" vs "Development Important"…The old 'Sex Disease Control Center' at the crossroads of demolition.

Former STD Management Office at the entrance of Soyosan Mountain in Dongducheon-si, Gyeonggi-do / Yonhap News

Controversy is brewing over the demolition of the former STD management office building, which forcibly quarantined and housed the U.S. military's "Japanese Military Sexual Slavery" in the past.

On October 1, a cultural festival was held in the parking lot of Soyosan Mountain in Dongducheon-si, Gyeonggi-do against the demolition of the old STD management center.

A woman who was accommodated at the Dongducheon STD Management Center covered her face and said, "I worked in a base village where I could solve food, clothing and shelter because I had many brothers in a poor country and couldn't come out of school properly," adding, "As a result of the gynecological examination, I was trapped like a monkey for a week even though I didn't get sexually transmitted by penicillin injections and my legs were cramping and unable to walk."

"The demolition of the STD management center is the disappearance of the evidence that was forcibly locked up and monitored by women in the base village," he said. "It's heartbreaking when you look at that building, but you have to leave it for future generations to show it and prevent it from happening again."

The former venereal disease management office in Dongducheon was established in 1973 and closed in 1996 as a place where the government conducted a venereal disease test on a U.S. Japanese Military Sexual Slavery and locked up a failed examiner (a person who failed the test) until he was completely cured.

At the ti

me, the U.S. military called the building "Monkey House," meaning that the women in captivity were like monkeys trapped in bars.

Tent Farming Center / Provision of a joint task force to prevent the demolition of the former STD management center, Yonhap News

Dongducheon City purchased the buildings and land of the sexually transmitted disease management center in February last year while promoting the expansion and development project of Soyosan Mountain tourist attractions. The company will be selected and demolished this month.

Merchants and residents near the Soyosan Mountain tourist attraction are expressing expectations that the demolition of the STD management center, which has long been neglected and recognized as a hideous object, will boost the local economy.

On the other hand, the air defense committee says that as it is a painful historical site, it should be preserved and informed to future generations. The air defense committee has been staging a tent sit-in for more than a month against the demolition of the STD management center.

Reporter Park Sun-young of Digital News Team