Tag: East Sea

It will be interesting to see how long it takes the North Koreans to rescue the people on this ship:

This file photo, taken Oct. 27, 2017, shows a South Korean patrol ship departing a port in Sokcho, 151 kilometers northeast of Seoul. (Yonhap)

A South Korean patrol ship on Sunday spotted a North Korean vessel stranded near the de-facto inter-Korean sea border in the East Sea and provided humanitarian assistance, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said.

The patrol ship was dispatched after a maritime patrol aircraft spotted the distressed vessel drifting in waters 200 kilometers east of the coastal town of Jejin and around 3 km north of the eastern Northern Limit Line (NLL) at 2:16 p.m., according to the JCS.

The South Korean ship initially deployed one inflatable boat to approach the vessel and confirmed it as a North Korean ship.

The North Korean vessel is suspected to be a small commercial ship some 10 meters long, according to an informed source. The military reportedly did not inspect the identities of those on board as the ship was in waters north of the NLL.

The people on board the North Korean ship said they have been adrift for 10 days and wished to return to their homeland, requesting assistance with food and water.

The South Korean military provided food and water “on humanitarian grounds,” and notified the North of the situation through the United Nations Command and international maritime communication channels for its assistance.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but I also wonder what this so called commerical ship was transporting and where from?

This is interesting because is the first time I have seen North Korea issue such a warning to a civilian ship in the East Sea. It makes me think they may have thought it was being used for intelligence collection purposes:

A North Korean boat warned a South Korean cargo ship sailing in the international waters of the East Sea to “move out to the open sea” earlier this month, a source said Tuesday, raising maritime safety concerns amid heightened cross-border tensions.

People aboard the North Korean boat gesticulated toward the 30,000-ton cargo ship and sent a message demanding it move farther out into the high seas through an international maritime communication network on May 8, according to the source.

The cargo ship was reportedly carrying 21 crewmembers, including two South Koreans.

It remains unclear whether the North Koreans are civilians or military personnel.

Following the message from the North, the South Korean ship informed its headquarters and the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries of what happened and took a detour to reach the waters south of the Northern Limit Line, a de facto inter-Korean sea border.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The Russians are trying to flex their muscles in the East Sea:

Two Russian Tu-95 bombers flew through Korea’s air defense identification zone (Kadiz) Tuesday, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).  
   
The JCS confirmed that the planes entered the Kadiz after the Russian Ministry of Defense warned they would.  
   
“Two strategic missile carriers for long-range aviation performed a scheduled flight in the airspace over the neutral waters of the Sea of Japan,” the ministry said in a statement, referring to the East Sea. “The flight duration was about seven hours. At certain stages during the route, the strategic missile carriers were escorted by F-16 fighters of the Republic of Korea air force.” 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

I would love to know what the context is in regards to these maps that were found on these government websites. This sounds like more stirring of the pot to get anti-Japanese issues back in the headlines:

Here is the latest on the Dokdo front:

South Korea urged Japan on Tuesday to retract its repeated territorial claim over Dokdo, a pair of rocky outcroppings in the East Sea, saying it will only impede efforts to move forward bilateral ties.

It was a reminder of longstanding diplomatic rifts between the neighboring countries despite a call for firm unity among regional powers to handle Pyongyang’s recent peace overtures.

In a statement, South Korea’s foreign ministry denounced the description of sovereignty over Dokdo in Japan’s yearly foreign policy document, known as the Diplomatic Bluebook, reported to the Cabinet earlier in the day.  [Yonhap]

Maybe the ROK government should summon the Japanese ambassador and have Flag Eater Man,  Finger Chopping Lady, Knife in the Gut Man, Weed Killer Man, the Dokdo Riders, and Bee Man all to waiting for him so they can demonstrate their Dokdo patriotism.  Despite the hyperbole over this issue, I believe Korea clearly wins on the Dokdo debate, but why muddle this issue with the stupid East Sea issue?:

The ministry summoned Koichi Mizushima, minister at the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, to lodge a formal protest. He refused to answer questions from reporters, entering the ministry building.

Kim Yong-kil, director general for the ministry’s Northeast Asian affairs, told the minister that Seoul can’t accept Tokyo’s unilateral naming of the body of waters between the two nations, officials said.

In the diplomatic paper, Japan said the waters shouldn’t be called the East Sea.

“In particular, (Kim) made clear that (the government) can’t accept Japan’s unjust claim regarding the East Sea name,” the ministry’s spokesman Noh Kyu-duk said at a press briefing. “(He) stressed that the East Sea is the correct name that has been used for more than 2,000 years in our country.”

f Koreans want to call the body of water East Sea I have no problem with that, but internationally the term Sea of Japan makes more sense.  That is because East Sea is not East of Japan and thus makes no sense for an international observer not invested in the Dokdo/East Sea issue when they see it on a map.  Korea would make a better case for renaming the body of water if they had a more generic description such as “Asian Sea”.

They could always go with my suggestion and just call it the “Nameless Sea”.

The long advertised joint drills involving three US aircraft carriers is currently taking place:

The Reagan, the flag ship of the 7th Fleet’s Carrier Strike Group 5, was conducting a combined exercise with two other supercarriers — the USS Nimitz and the USS Theodore Roosevelt — in the Korea Theater of Operations (KTO) and was also joined by South Korea’s naval ships.

“There’s an advantage to operate together, in that combined three carriers really create a tremendous amount of combat power very flexible and create a lot of options for our national leadership,” Rear Adm. Marc Dalton, commander of the Reagan strike unit, said in an interview at the ship’s “flag bridge,” which commands a view of the whole flight deck.

He would not reveal the exact location of the carrier.

According to an informed source, it was transiting the waters 50 nautical miles, or 92 kilometers, south of the Northern Limit Line (NLL), the de-facto inter-Korean sea border, and 40 nautical miles north of Ulleung Island.

It’s unusual for the Japan-based carrier to sail so close to the NLL. It’s unprecedented for the South’s Navy to train with three U.S. flattops at the same time.

The last time three U.S. carriers were mobilized for joint drills in the Western Pacific was in 2007 near Guam.

The current training is apparently a warning message to the North’s Kim Jong-un regime and a way to put pressure on it. [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but this is a tremendous amount of fire power sitting such a short distance from North Korea.  Hopefully a strong message was sent to the Kim regime.

Shown is a map made by British publisher Herman Moll in 1712 that depicts waters between Korea and Japan as the “Sea of Corea.” The map was given to the Independence Hall of Korea in Cheonan, South Chungcheong Province, by professor Kim Nam-hoon of Kongju National University, the hall said Aug. 7, 2017. (Yonhap)

Here is an update from the frontlines of the East Sea versus Sea of Japan conflict:

The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO), agreed Friday to form an unofficial consultation group to discuss South Korea’s proposal to use “East Sea” alongside “Sea of Japan” when referring to the waters between the two countries, Seoul officials said.

The decision was made on the last day of the global hydrography standard-setter’s five-day assembly in Monaco. It calls for the formation of the consultation group of concerned countries, namely South Korea, Japan and others, to carry out a three-year discussion on the revision of the IHO’s “Limits of Oceans and Seas”, also known as S-23, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The group is required to report the results to an IHO assembly in 2020.

The sea chart, used as the standard for world map production, currently uses the Japanese name for the sea between the two countries.

South Korea began diplomatic efforts to revise it in the early 2000s. The IHO had dropped the initial revision discussion in 2012 amid broiling tension between Seoul and Tokyo.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but I continue to maintain it should just be called the “Nameless Sea”.

The Sea of Japan/East Sea issue has come back up again:

Shortly after North Korea’s ballistic missile launch on Wednesday, the U.S. military issued a statement that may add to the anger of Koreans over the naming of the waters between the peninsula and Japan.

In a five-paragraph document posted on its website, the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM), headquartered in Hawaii, confirmed the North’s firing of a missile, saying it flew nine minutes before falling into the “Sea of Japan.”

Almost simultaneously, the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) here uploaded a statement on its own homepage with mostly the same content.

The only differences were the time, as PACOM’s version is based on Hawaii time and the USFK’s notes Korean standard time, and the name of the waters, which Koreans call the East Sea.

The USFK’s statement said the missile landed in “waters East of the Korean Peninsula.”

Some South Korean journalists stationed at the defense ministry’s press room complained about PACOM’s use of the Sea of Japan alone in the official document directly involving Korea and read by many people in the key regional ally.  [Yonhap]

You can read the rest at the link, but USFK admitted they modified the naming in their statement which makes sense since their statement is directed more towards a Korean audience.  PACOM on the other hand makes statements directed towards a regional audience that includes Japan, so of course they are going to use the internationally recognized naming convention for the body of water between the two countries which is the Sea of Japan.