Author: GIKorea

It looks like for the next year USFK can count on maintaining a troop strength of at least 22,000 personnel:

President Donald Trump has objected to a series of provisions in the newly passed 2019 National Defense Authorization Act, including limits on the reduction of troops in South Korea and recognizing Crimea as a Russian province.

The defense legislation, which Trump signed into law Monday, sets new restrictions to keep the administration from decreasing troops in South Korea to less than 22,000. It also prohibits U.S. funds from helping legitimize Russia’s control of Crimea.

Both provisions, among several others in the NDAA, reflect congressional concerns about the president and drew objections from the White House.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

It is pretty sad when politicians can’t even agree on what day their country was founded:

Rival parties clashed over a long-running controversy over the founding day of the Republic of Korea Wednesday as the country marked the 73rd anniversary of its liberation from Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule.

Conservatives have long claimed that the country was founded on Aug. 15, 1948, when the South Korean government was launched after Korea was liberated from Japan’s control in 1945 and then divided into the capitalist South and the communist North.

But the liberal bloc says that April 13, 1919, when the Korean government-in-exile was established in Shanghai, should be regarded as the day of the republic’s founding.

The ruling Democratic Party (DP) said that the conservatives’ claim is an outdated idea based on ideological division. But the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) insisted that to deny the country’s founding in 1948 is to disavow South Korea’s legitimacy.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

How many ppl believe an unchanged N Korea – i.e., one still the Kimist DPRK – will be more peaceful,rather than more belligerent or dangerous,if it becomes more prosperous? Isn’t it much safer that NK change first, bf we help it get wealthier? Isn’t this subsidizing dictatorship? https://t.co/St0yw59ums

— Robert E Kelly (@Robert_E_Kelly) August 15, 2018

President Moon Jae-in delivers a speech commemorating the 73rd Liberation Day in Seoul on Aug. 15, 2018. (Yonhap)

I think the Moon administration may be trying to create a precedent of sanctions exemptions at the Kaesong Industrial Complex with this request.  If this gets approved down the road they could request even more small exemptions and pretty soon they have a working industrial park again:

South Korea’s foreign ministry said Wednesday it was talking with the United States to possibly obtain sanctions relief for North Korea, though the ministry didn’t specify when the relief would happen.

“The ministry is in discussions with the United States to get the go-ahead for partial sanctions relief, which will be helpful for South Korea to push forward the country’s business projects, most of which are non-commercial, with North Korea. But the South has no plans to violate U.N. sanctions now being imposed on the North,” said a ministry official.

The official added the U.N. Security Council’s actions would support and conform to the efforts of diplomatic talks toward denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula.

At the Singapore summit in June between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Trump said economic sanctions will be maintained until Pyongyang’s nuclear program is “no longer a problem.”

The remarks came after Seoul began supplying power to the liaison office located inside the joint industrial park in Gaeseong, North Korea. Seoul’s unification ministry said South Korea seeks to run the office within this month in consultation with the U.S. and the allies.

It also said the power supply will be limited to the joint liaison office, not the entire Gaeseong Industrial Complex (GIC), and that its measure should not be seen as a sign of easing the U.S.-led international sanctions on Pyongyang.

The measure however, raised suspicions whether South Korea will be walking a tightrope between abiding by the sanctions and seeking exemptions from the sanctions to help the impoverished Pyongyang regime.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link, but the Trump administration should tell them to have North Korea provide the power themselves.

Here is what President Moon had to say during his Liberation Day speech:

President Moon Jae-in on Wednesday used his Liberation Day address to pitch his Korea peace drive, calling for railway, energy and economic cooperation with the North as a cornerstone for Northeast Asian peace and prosperity.

Speaking at a ceremony marking Korea’s independence from the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule 73 years ago on the day, he renewed his commitment to end the division of the Koreas, saying “true liberation” can only be achieved when the two countries establish a lasting peace and economic community.

“We must overcome such a division for our survival and development. Even though a political unification may be a long way from here, establishing peace between the South and the North and freely visiting each other, and forming a joint economic community is true liberation to us,” Moon added in a nationally televised speech that also marked the foundation of the South Korean government 70 years ago on Wednesday.

Moon insisted the two Koreas were already moving toward peace, noting the countries have halted their hostile acts under an agreement reached at his first-ever summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un held April 27.  (………)

To this end, South Korea will seek to physically connect its roads and railways with those of North Korea before the year’s end, the president said.

Noting the European Union began with a simple bloc for coal and steel, the South Korean president proposed the two Koreas, together with the United States and four other Asian countries, form what he called a “Northeast Asian railroad community.”

The presidential office Cheong Wa Dae later explained the four Asian countries were China, Japan, Russia and Mongolia.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

Former Governor and liberal political rival of Moon Jae-in, An Hee-jung has avoided jail time for rape but his political career is probably finished:

A Seoul court has found former South Chungcheong Province Governor An Hee-jung not guilty of raping his former secretary.

In one of the highest-profile #MeToo cases here, the Seoul Western District Court said Tuesday there was insufficient evidence that An used his authority to have sexual relations with the plaintiff, Kim Ji-eun, against her will.

“The suspect was an influential politician, was touted as a potential presidential candidate, and, as governor, An had the power to dismiss and hire the victim, which can be seen that he had authority,” the court said. “However, there was no evidence he used that authority to have sexual relations with Kim.”

It said both are adults with intellect and sound judgment, there were no evidence An infringed on the victim’s sexual freedom, and the only evidence was the victim’s testimony.

In April, the 52-year-old politician was indicted for allegedly forcing sexual intercourse on his former secretary four times as well as molesting her on several occasions from mid-2017 to early this year in Seoul and during overseas business trips.

The court also pointed out that there was a lack of evidence of psychological damage which she claimed to have suffered.

“The following morning after the first sexual contact in Russia, Kim searched for a Korean restaurant that An would like. And after returning to Korea, she went to a beauty parlor, which An often visited, to get her hair done,” the court said. “The victim also continuously expressed admiration toward An not only in work-related situations but also when meeting acquaintances unrelated to work, which makes it difficult to accept the victim’s testimony.”  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

"In a 2015 study, women were 5.9 times more likely than men to not be fully dressed in Hong Kong ads, 22.89 times more likely in Japanese ads, and 56.83 times more likely in South Korean ads." https://t.co/Csu6Vr8k0L pic.twitter.com/eXrooYYzYr

— JamesTurnbull (@JamesTurnbull) August 14, 2018

This photo provided by the local police station in Pyeongchang, some 180 km east of Seoul, shows red peppers and other crops being dried in its parking lot. The station has opened the space to farmers since 2004. (Yonhap)

I wonder if this proposed ban to save children from so called “harmful” information will include websites that push anti-Japanese viewpoints?:

The government is seeking to prevent children’s access to online communities that advocate hate and discriminatory speech against selective groups of people. The move aims to counter a social rift triggered and widened by extremist, gender-divided online communities _ the far-right troll website Ilbe, frequented almost exclusively by men, and the extreme feminist website WOMAD.

According to a report submitted by the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) to Rep. Noh Woong-rae of the Democratic Party of Korea, the commission seeks to revise relevant laws to designate such websites that foster hatred and discrimination as “harmful” to children.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.