The Conference was held to strengthen the ability of female council members who take leading roles in the peaceful unification and expand communication and exchange among them. 20 municipal chapters in the U.S.A., Canada and South America attended, including the Vice-chairperson of America and heads of municipal chapters in the region.

After the event in Seattle, they moved to LA to hold a lecture on inter-Korean policy under the presence of council members of the LA Municipal Chapter and OCSD Municipal Chapter to unite the strong will of the national unification of the people in the LA region.

Day 1 started with introducing female council members attending the conference. After orientation, Martha Choe, Chief Administration Officer of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, gave a special lecture under the title “Courageous and Transparent Leadership.”

After the lecture, an appreciation event was with Korea War veterans over dinner. Park Nam-pyo, Kwon Yeong-bae, Alfred Smith Dembowski and Alvin Hendricks attended the dinner and NUAC presented them with gifts.

A Women’s Conference was held for the first time in the American Region by the Seattle Municipal Chapter. It started with an opening address by the Head of the Seattle Municipal Chapter Lee Susan. She said in her opening speech, “It is our pleasure to hold a Women’s Conference at a time when the activities of women are regarded as being more important than ever. The delicacy and softness of women will add bigger power to the Trust Building Process the current Korean government is pursuing. We want this conference to be a little foundation for national unification policy of the Korean government.”

Kim Ki-cheol, Vice-chairperson of American Council, said in his congratulatory speech, “Our will of participating actively is important. We especially appreciate the council members who came a long distance from South America to attend the conference.”

Song Yeong-wan, Consul General to Seattle said, “The index of advancement into a society by women is used as one of the scales to evaluate a society. The U.S.A. is much more advanced in that regard and Korea falls a little bit behind, but Korean women’s advancement into a society will be accelerated on the occasion of electing a woman as the state president. We expect female council members will be more active in the national unification movement.” Also, he congratulated Lee Yi-ho who was elected to be a city council member of Montana the previous day.

Hyun Kyung-dae, Executive Vice-chairperson of NUAC delivered a keynote address under the title “National Unification Vision of Park Geun-hye’s Administration and Understanding the Korean Peninsula Trust-Building Process.” He said in the address, “The current government decided that building the foundation for a peaceful unification is one of the four keynotes of state affairs unlike previous governments of Korea and put the unification issue in front. It indicates that even though national unification may not be achieved during this presidential term, the current administration has a strong will to build a foundation for unification. President Park has been delivering consistent messages to the four big powers surrounding the Korean Peninsula, saying that unification of the Korean Peninsula will be helpful for them as well. It can encourage the four big powers accept a national unification led by South Korea. Considering the internal turmoil of North Korea, the external environments for unification are formulated to some extent and now it’s time for the Korean people to play their roles of achieving national unification more actively with a more determined will.” He encouraged overseas Koreans living in America to be more involved in the activities for unification. He added that cost for national unification is higher than the one to manage the division of our country and a unified Korea could grow to be one of the world’s big powers. Construction of SOC (social overhead capital) in North Korea should be approached through an aspect of investment and using the natural resources of North Korea could be great momentum for further remarkable development of the Korean Peninsula.

After Hyun’s keynote address, the manager of overseas regions of NUAC secretariat reported on the activities of female council members. This was followed by lectures by invited specialists on national unification. Prof. Lee Seong-yoon of Tufts University said in his special lecture, “We should understand North Korean strategy and its system’s contradiction to prepare our long term strategy. Korean refugees need our assistance. Female refugees especially need our help desperately.” He asked female council members to more actively help them.

Dr. Sumiteri, a senior researcher at Columbia University, had given another special lecture to the Youth Conference of Washington D.C. earlier and delivered his special lecture. He said, “The current behavior of North Korea is available because its brinkmanship could work. A long-term plan through the joint efforts of U.S.A. and South Korea is essential. The National unification of Korea comes with many challenges and expenses, but unification will bring more opportunities and benefits.” He added that modern women should be the leaders in terms of appearance, speech, writing and ability of judgment. He emphasized that we should convince the people around us to support the efforts for national unification, encourage them to join the unification movement and that the national unification of Korea depends upon the will and behavior of Korean people. Grace Yoo, Secretary General of the Korea-U.S. Association of LA gave her lecture in relation to 'T.H.I.N.K'.

After the lectures by the invited unification specialists, the Vice-chairperson of America regions held a luncheon for the attendants and group discussion. Subjects given to the groups were “How to Build Trust between the South and North during the Process of Unification?” for Group 1; “What women can do for national unification” for Group 2; “What are the desirable action models that overseas female council members can do?” for Group 3; “How can the networks of the female council members in the American Regions be reinforced?” for Group 4. All the group discussions lasted for 90 minutes.

Cases of female members’ activities of the municipal chapters were presented by the chapters in Washington D.C., Vancouver, Orange San Diego, West of South America, Seattle, LA, Boston and Dallas.

The attendants watched a video entitled, “National Anthem, Breathing with the Republic of Korea” and Prof. Han Yeong-sil, former President of Sookmyung Women’s University and Chief of the Women Standing Committee of NUAC, delivered her special lecture, “Women’s power changing the world.” She said, “National unification needs ‘Wind.’ Let’s blow wind by flapping women’s wings. I wish Korean women in America could lead the unification movement. We should do what we can do for unification in our generation without hesitating.” The Head of Seattle Municipal Chapter provided dinner to the attendants after the lecture.

The final day of the conference started with presenting what was discussed at the group discussion held on the previous day.

After presenting the results of the group discussion, the Conference was evaluated. Kim Ki-cheol, Vice-chairperson of America Region Council, heads of the respective Municipal Chapters Jin An-sun, Chicago, Seo Byung-gil, Vancouver, Jeong Kyung-ae, San Francisco, and Kim Seong-hyuk, Boston, evaluated the conference to be a good opportunity to strengthen unification movements among the overseas Koreans living in the America Regions and that male members should learn and female members should try harder to be new leaders of unified Korea.

After the evaluation, essays and poems submitted during the conference contest were awarded. Out of the 36 essays and 55 poems that were submitted, 5 works were given awards. Essay awards were given to Jeong Yeong-tae, a member of Orange San Diego Municipal Chapter, Park Susan of Atlanta, Song Yeong-suk of Miami, Jeong Hyun-ah of Seattle, and Yoo Yang-ok of Central America and the Caribbean. Poem awards were given to Nam Hye-yeong of West South America, Lee Yeong-suk of Orange San Diego, Son Jeong-suk of Toronto, Gong Seon-yeong of Miami and Lee Hye-ryun of Hawaii.

Hyun Kyung-dae, Executive Vice-chairperson of NUAC, evaluated the conference and said, “I was glad to reconfirm the excellent ability of female council members while I watched the group discussion. I was also satisfied with the good results they created during the conference. The national unification we are pursuing is a unification based on the basic order of free democracy and peaceful unification. There could be various ways to achieve it, but the current Korean government is focused on recovering mutual trust between South and North Korea. We pursue little unification to large unification gradually like piling up bricks one by one. You may have heard something bad about North Korean refugees but we should understand and admit special circumstances they are facing with patience and embrace them with a warm heart.”

All the attendants were hand-in-hand singing aloud “Our Wish is Unification” at the close of the women conference.

[Lecture on Inter-Korean Policy]

A lecture on Inter-Korean Policy was delivered on Veteran’s Day at the LA Garden Suite Hotel in America with the Executive Vice-chairperson of NUAC.

Choi Jae-hyun, head of the LA Municipal Chapter delivered an opening speech, which was followed by a welcoming address from Kwon Seok-dae, head of the Orange San Diego Municipal Chapter, a congratulatory speech by Shin Yeon-seong, Consul General to LA, Bae Mu-han, President of the LA Korean Association and Oh Deuk-jae from the OC Korean Association.

Hyun Kyung-dae, the Executive Vice-chairperson of NUAC, delivered his address for one hour with the same subject he presented at the Women’s Conference. During the dinner, he presented souvenirs to two Korean War Veterans (David Ropez, George Silva) on the occasion of Veteran’s Day.