Volta
Politics27 November 1943 (published 1 December)

Cairo Declaration

The leaders of the United States, Britain and China met in Cairo and declared that Korea would become free and independent in due course, the first international pledge of Korean independence.

Chiang Kai-shek, Roosevelt and Churchill at the Cairo Conference — 25 November 1943
Chiang Kai-shek, Roosevelt and Churchill at the Cairo Conference — 25 November 1943

Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), · Public domain · Source

Roosevelt, Churchill and Chiang Kai-shek met in Cairo in November 1943 and published the declaration on 1 December: "mindful of the enslavement of the people of Korea, [they] are determined that in due course Korea shall become free and independent." Kim Gu and the Provisional Government had asked Chiang to include Korean independence.

The Potsdam Declaration of July 1945 reaffirmed the Cairo terms. The Provisional Government objected to "in due course" as falling short of immediate independence.

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States and rulers at the time
United States · signatory — President Franklin D. Roosevelt
Great Britain · signatory
Republic of China · signatory
Places
Mena House

People

  • Kim Gu1876 – 1949

    related figure · Known as Baekbeom; founded the Korean Patriotic Organization and led the Liberation Army as Chairman of the Provisional Government

Before and after

Earlier
1942 Korean Independence League and Korean Volunteer Army
Later
1944 Deaths in Prison of Yi Yuk-sa and Yun Dong-ju

Themes that include this event

  • World War II and Korea1937 – 1945

    Wartime mobilization and exploitation, independence armies, from the Cairo Declaration to liberation

  • Republican China and Imperial Japan1912 – 1949

    The age when the Republic of China, born of the 1911 Revolution, passed through warlord division, the May Fourth Movement, the United Front and the Northern Expedition, fought Japan’s invasion and split in civil war — as Japan moved from Taishō democracy through the Manchurian Incident and military coups to the war in China and the Co-Prosperity Sphere, and colonized Korea resisted through the March First Movement and armed struggle

  • World War II1939 – 1945

    From the invasion of Poland to the surrender of Japan — the largest war in human history, across Europe, Asia and the Pacific