Author: GIKorea

According to the article, unsurprisingly the Korean woman in this altercation was drunk. Some people really should not drink, especially when traveling overseas:

A video of a Korean woman assaulting a Vietnamese woman at a self-photo booth in Hanoi has gone viral online, sparking outrage among local residents, according to news reports Wednesday.

The Vietnamese victim revealed the incident in her social media post on Tuesday, saying she and her friend were using the booth around 9 p.m. on July 11, after paying properly and within their allotted time.

A Korean woman approached them while they were taking photos, and according to the victim, told them to hurry up and come out.

Security camera footage shows the Korean woman striking the victim on the arm and a full-blown physical altercation began when she snatched her hat. The two women grabbed each other’s hair. Despite attempts by their companions and staff to intervene, the fight lasted several minutes.

The footage showed the Korean woman kicked the Vietnamese woman after she fell to the ground and continued assaulting her after they exited the booth.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

Mr. Tan is claiming that President Lee was part of a gang rape and murder of a woman as a juvenile. I find this very hard to believe considering how long he has been in the public spotlight. Evidence of something like this occuring would have definitely leaked out by now:

Police have opened an investigation into a Korean American professor for possible defamation charges after he allegedly made damaging comments about President Lee Jae Myung with false information, officials said Tuesday.

The investigation against Morse Tan, dean of Liberty University School of Law, came after a conservative civic group had filed a complaint with the police, accusing Tan of defaming Lee by spreading false information about him.

In June, Tan said during an event in Washington that Lee had been involved in the gang rape and murder of a girl during his youth, and that he was sent to a juvenile detention center and unable to finish middle and high school.

The civic group said these claims are unfounded.

Tan, former U.S. ambassador-at-large for global criminal justice under the first Donald Trump administration, is known for promoting conspiracy theories about election fraud in South Korea.

According to the civic group that filed the complaint, Tan also claimed that the June 3 snap election won by Lee was rigged.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but with Tan currently in Korea it will be interesting if the ROK government tries to detain him or just let him go back to the U.S. and deny future entry.

The crux of this issue is that from Japan’s perspective Japanese citizens during the Imperial era were mobilized to work in industries to support Japan’s war effort. At the time, Imperial Japan considered Koreans as Japanese citizens. The ROK wants special mention that Koreans were discriminated against and forced to work at these sites which the Japanese viewpoint disagrees with. Their viewpoint is that Koreans were mobilized to work just like Japanese in support of the empire:

South Korea on Tuesday called on UNESCO’s heritage oversight body to step in if Japan continues to backtrack on its promise to honor wartime forced labor victims from its UNESCO World Heritage-listed industrial sites. 

South Korean Ambassador to UNESCO Bak Sang-mee made the call during a session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee (WHC) in Paris, about a week after Seoul’s attempt to place the industrial sites on this year’s WHC agenda was blocked by a rare vote among member states, including both South Korea and Japan.

Seoul sought to bring attention to Japan’s lukewarm efforts in implementing WHC recommendations on presenting the full history of the Meiji industrial revolution sites, which were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2015. 

One of the sites is Hashima Island, where many Koreans were taken to toil during World War II, when Korea was under Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule. 

“The case of the site of Japan’s Meiji industrial revolution is notable for the committee’s consistent request through four consecutive decisions for the development of an interpretation strategy that allows for an understanding of the full history of each site,” Bak said. “However, nearly a decade later, its implementation remains insufficient and continues to raise concerns.”

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

We will see in a couple of years where his approval rating is at because new Presidents usually do have a honeymoon period when it comes to approval ratings:

President Lee Jae Myung’s approval rating rose for the fifth consecutive week to 64.6 percent, a survey showed Monday.

According to the survey by Realmeter and commissioned by a local news outlet, the positive assessment of Lee’s performance rose 2.5 percentage points from the previous week, while the negative assessment fell 1.4 percentage points to 30 percent.

The pollster said Lee’s approval rating has continued to rise for the fifth straight week since taking office on June 4.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Considering the revolution in drone warfare going on in Ukraine right now, every servicemember should learn how to fly and operate a drone:

The Pentagon wants more small, cheap, easily replaced drones in the hands of troops as quickly as possible, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he is cutting red tape to make that happen. Hegseth, dressed in a dark-colored suit, took to the Pentagon’s parade field on Thursday to record a video announcing his policies on new small drones — officially, unmanned aerial systems — and promoting his memorandum on the matter as an American Flag-bearing drone was flown to him by a service member. Hegseth said the memo would build off a June 6 executive order issued by President Donald Trump meant to boost America’s commercial drone manufacturing and integrate them into the nation’s transportation and military sectors. “This is the future,” Hegseth said over the buzz of the small drone and the blasting of Metallica’s 1991 hit song “Enter Sandman.”

“We’re in the fight. We’re in the fight to win it, and I’m never going to back down.” Hegseth’s new policies aim to cut through bureaucratic policies that limited the military’s ability to quickly purchase and field small drones with vast capabilities ranging from gathering intelligence to dropping small supplies to troops all the way to delivering lethal munitions on enemy positions. “Lethality will not be hindered by self-imposed restrictions, especially when it comes to harnessing technologies we invented but were slow to pursue. Drone technology is advancing so rapidly, our major risk is risk-avoidance,” Hegseth wrote. “The department’s bureaucratic gloves are coming off.”

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but the biggest problem I see with this initiative is that American drone manufacturers make expensive drones with less capability than China’s DJI drones. They are way ahead of U.S. manufacturers right now, but the U.S. appears to now finally acknowledge it is time to catch up.

If proven that Yoon Suk-yeol was trying to get North Korea to launch a provocation against South Korea to justify martial law, this seems like it would be an abuse of power:

This image, provided by the Korean Central News Agency on Oct. 19, shows the remains of a drone that Pyongyang claims was sent from South Korea. The drone was described as the same type that was publicly displayed on Armed Forces Day in Seoul earlier in the month. [YONHAP]

“The search warrants are being executed at 24 military-related locations,” the special counsel team said. “We cannot disclose the exact sites due to military security concerns.” 
  
Investigators are probing whether Yoon, as commander-in-chief, directly ordered the drone command in October 2024 to carry out a drone operation over Pyongyang to manufacture conditions justifying a martial law declaration. The investigation is also examining whether the military engaged in a systematic cover-up. 
  
A recorded testimony from an active-duty officer — already questioned as a witness — claims that Kim told subordinates the order came from “V,” and had to proceed without notifying the Defense Ministry or Joint Chiefs. The officer said the operation included dispersing propaganda leaflets and intentionally exposing drones to North Korean detection. “V” is a designation used by the South Korean military to refer to the sitting president, and is used especially when dealing with matters of national security or covert operations. It is shortened from “VIP,” which is also used to refer to the president.

“The search warrants are being executed at 24 military-related locations,” the special counsel team said. “We cannot disclose the exact sites due to military security concerns.” 
  
Investigators are probing whether Yoon, as commander-in-chief, directly ordered the drone command in October 2024 to carry out a drone operation over Pyongyang to manufacture conditions justifying a martial law declaration. The investigation is also examining whether the military engaged in a systematic cover-up. 
  
A recorded testimony from an active-duty officer — already questioned as a witness — claims that Kim told subordinates the order came from “V,” and had to proceed without notifying the Defense Ministry or Joint Chiefs. The officer said the operation included dispersing propaganda leaflets and intentionally exposing drones to North Korean detection. “V” is a designation used by the South Korean military to refer to the sitting president, and is used especially when dealing with matters of national security or covert operations. It is shortened from “VIP,” which is also used to refer to the president.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.