Choi: Connecting with WFWP Leaders Around the World
The WFWP International (WFWPI) hosted an online global gathering, “Connecting with WFWP Leaders Around the World,” bringing together women leaders, members, and guests from many nations via Zoom on November 28, 2025. The program was conceived as an open space to listen, reflect, and reconnect around WFWP’s shared mission of peace, with a special focus on the Korean Peninsula.
The featured speaker was Young Sun Choi, former Regional Director of WFWP Korea, who is widely recognized for her decades of dedication to peace and reunification work. Through her presentation and stories, participants could feel both the history and heart behind WFWP’s bridge-building efforts between North and South Korea.
Choi began by expressing her heartfelt prayers for the Co-founder’s safety and well-being and invited everyone to unite their hearts in the same spirit. Greeting the audience, she warmly welcomed “all women leaders who sincerely love peace and are working to create a peaceful day,” expressing gratitude that, even after stepping down from her official role seven months ago, she was given this precious time to share with global WFWP sisters again.
Choi shared that she has spent more than 30 years of her life with WFWP, beginning as the Guri City Chapter President in Gyeonggi Province and later serving in key leadership roles at the national level. She reminded participants that WFWP’s goal “One Global Family Under God” is clear, and that the essential tool for achieving it is true love. She reflected that earlier generations of WFWP women “ran without rest” toward this vision, and today’s leaders continue in their footsteps, often facing walls of reality that make them want to stop or give up.
The heart of Choi’s presentation was a series of powerful stories from her long involvement in North–South women’s exchange and civil society dialogue.
She recalled her first visit to Pyongyang for the August 15 National Unification Rally in 2001, arriving at Sunan Airport to find rows of North Korean women in colorful hanbok, standing under the scorching summer sun, waving flowers to welcome the South Korean delegation. Their sincerity moved her deeply and made her feel sorry for the long wait they had endured to greet them.
She also shared about the Global Women Leaders Conference in Mt. Kumgang in 2007, where 720 WFWP leaders from around the world gathered with North Korean women leaders who had traveled six hours from Pyongyang. She described the daily realities and limitations they encountered: flickering lights in meeting rooms, toilets that did not flush, strict restrictions on where vehicles could stop and where people could step out.
Once, a yellow flag marking a South Korean car fell off in a sensitive zone; an unknowing staff member stepped out of the car to pick it up. Only later did they learn that such an action could have been treated as a serious security violation. Remembering this, she said, still makes her shiver.
Looking back on approximately 25 rounds of North–South exchanges in Pyongyang, Seoul, Kaesong, and Mt. Kumgang, Mrs. Choi summarized her main lesson in simple words: “Without patience, trust, and true love, North–South relations cannot move forward.”
She reminded participants that the Korean Peninsula has been divided since 1945, with the trauma of the Korean War and 70-80 years of accumulated mistrust and hostility. Melting such deep-rooted pain cannot be achieved by a single conference or a single visit. It requires continuous encounters, sincere listening, and many small acts of love, sustained over time.
For Choi, the work of WFWP women in this context is not about idealizing anyone, but about being honest, courageous, and faithful to the vision of one human family under God.
Throughout the webinar, participants listened attentively to Choi’s heartfelt testimony, and many expressed in the chat how moved they were by her courage, honesty, and long-term commitment, and how inspired they felt to continue working for peace in their own nations and regions.
The event once again confirmed that connecting with WFWP leaders around the world is not only about sharing reports, but about inheriting experiences, learning from one another’s victories and mistakes, and strengthening the heart of a global sisterhood that refuses to give up on peace.
