SEOUL-- Former victims of forced labor and harsh military training at a detention camp set up by the military junta in the early 1980s have filed a damage suit against the government, a lawyers group said Tuesday.

Lawyers for a Democratic Society, a progressive group, said it has filed the suit on behalf of 22 people who received training at the so-called Samcheong Re-education Camp, which operated for six months from August 1980, and their families.

The then-military junta government, which was set up after Chun Doo-hwan took power through a military coup in 1979, established the repressive camp under the name of purification training. It served as a detention center for rebels and critics, many of whom had no criminal records.

Lawyers representing the victims insisted that "human rights violations of innocent citizens occurred on a large scale" for the sake of political stability of the military junta.

A plaintiff said he received four weeks of training at the camp after being detained by police while trying to break up a quarrel between workers at a cafe. Another victim said that he ended up at the camp after being picked up by police on the street and later being charged for failing to pay bills.

Many victims of the program have testified to having experienced physical and psychological trauma from their harrowing experiences at the camp. According to a 2006 government report, 54 people were found to have died at the camp.

Source: Yonhap News Agency