Author: GIKorea

The COVID spread is getting worse in USFK:

 U.S. Forces Korea on Tuesday announced the fastest surge of new coronavirus cases among its personnel, surpassing a record set in July.

Forty people, including U.S. military family members and South Korean contractors, tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday and Friday, the command said in a news release. The previous record was 37 infections over a three-day span between July 5 and 7.

Fifty-one USFK personnel tested positive between Aug. 23 and Friday, which is, so far, fewer than the previous record of 58 cases during a weeklong period in July.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but according to the article half the cases are at Osan Airbase. It is unknown if the higher number of positives had anything to do with the maskless party recently held at the Enlisted Club.

Its surprising this guy just turned himself in after committing these crimes:

A man, who had cut off his monitoring ankle bracelet and took off, turned himself in to police and said he killed two women, police said.

Songpa Police Station arrested the 56-year-old man, surnamed Kang, on Sunday for ripping off the electronic device and allegedly murdering two — one before he ran off and the other while he was on the run.

The man turned himself over to police at around 8 a.m. Sunday, reportedly saying he feared being arrested soon for his crimes. Police had been chasing him since Friday, when he ran away.

The police found the victims’ bodies at the man’s house and in his car. The two women, in their 40s and 50s, respectively, are said to have known the man.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It was inevitable that South Korea was going to have to issue booster shots to deal with variants of the coronavirus:

South Korea’s daily new coronavirus cases fell below 1,500 on Monday due to fewer tests over the weekend, with the country planning to offer booster shots to those who have been fully vaccinated in the fourth quarter to cope with the variant strains. 

The country added 1,487 more COVID-19 cases, including 1,426 local infections, raising the total caseload to 250,051, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA).

Monday’s tally marked a drop from 1,793 on Saturday and 1,619 on Sunday. The number of patients normally falls over the weekend and rises later in the week as more people get tested.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

I have figured that there is probably back channel talks going on and the firing up of the Yongbyon nuclear reactor to me is an indication of the Kim regime playing one of their cards. They can negotiate to shutdown the reactor and give the U.S. & the ROK a “win” in any agreement knowing full well they can just turn back on in the future at a time of their choosing:

The U.N. nuclear watchdog has detected “deeply troubling” indications that a key nuclear reactor at North Korea’s main Yongbyon complex has been in operation since July, including the release of cooling water, an annual report showed Monday.

Submitted to the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors on Friday, the report covered new developments of the five megawatt reactor, from which the North obtained spent fuel rods to extract plutonium — a fissile material used for a bomb — in the past.

The report based on satellite imagery and other sources came as Seoul and Washington push to resume dialogue with the North, following its furious reactions to the allies’ recently concluded annual military exercises.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the North Koreans are continuing to bide their time:

U.S. and South Korean forces completed a joint training exercise with little apparent notice from North Korea, which had complained the drills were a provocation, a Defense Ministry official said Friday.

The two allies on Thursday concluded their Combined Command Post Training, a computer-simulated military exercise. A four-day preliminary crisis management session was also conducted prior to the drills.

“South Korea and the U.S. ended the [command-post exercise] for the second half of this year after achieving training goals,” a South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff official told Stars and Stripes on the customary condition of anonymity Friday.

The official said the two countries “successfully” finalized the training “while … in difficult overall conditions, such as the COVID-19 situation.”

Despite Pyongyang frequently railing against such joint drills, “there has been no unusual activity from North Korea during the training,” the JCS official added.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the U.S. wants South Korea to play a larger role in space policy:

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Park In-ho has signed a deal with the chief of the U.S. space operations and agreed to form a joint consultative body on space policy to strengthen cooperation, his office said Sunday.

During his visit to the Air Force Space Command in Colorado, Park signed a memorandum of understanding with Gen. John Raymond on the formation of a joint space policy consultative body on Friday (U.S. time), becoming official partners in space security cooperation.

The Air Force plans to further boost cooperation with the U.S. space force, including exchanging information, through the consultative body.

Park also held a bilateral meeting with the command chief, Gen. James Dickinson, and agreed to strengthen partnership on sharing information on space surveillance, as well as improving joint space operations capabilities, such as missile defense.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.