Author: GIKorea

What gets me the most about this case is that when the sexual assault allegation occurred the ROK Foreign Ministry relocated the diplomat to the Philippines of all places:

 A New Zealand advocate for sexual assault victims has expressed disappointment towards the South Korean foreign minister’s recent apology over sexual abuse allegations against a Korean diplomat in the Oceanian country, according to a news report Tuesday.

A former New Zealand employee at South Korea’s Embassy in Wellington has accused a senior South Korean diplomat of groping his body on three occasions in 2017, a case that has drawn attention after the country’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern raised the issue in last month’s phone talks with President Moon Jae-in. 

On Monday, South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha in a meeting with senior officials made an apology over the case. According to the minister’s office, Kang stated that the case has been “a diplomatic burden” for the government and apologized “for causing concern to the public.”

Louise Nicholas, a New Zealand advocate for victims of sexual assault, however, expressed frustration with Kang’s apology for it not addressing the victim himself. 

“He’s quite distraught over (the apology) and I don’t blame him at all,” Nicholas, who has been supporting the victim, said in an interview with New Zealand broadcaster Newshub.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The latest growth in coronavirus infections in the Seoul area has now forced schools to go back to online education:

All students in the greater Seoul area from kindergarten to 11th grade will go back to remote learning for the next two weeks as the coronavirus continues to spread throughout the country’s most populous region.  
   
The Education Ministry said Tuesday that 12th graders will be spared from the latest measures as they have to prepare for the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT), the grueling eight-hour marathon known here as suneung, which students spend their whole school careers preparing for. The test is slated for Dec. 3.  
   
The online learning mandate for students in Seoul, Incheon and Gyeonggi goes into effect Wednesday and tentatively lasts through Sept. 11, the ministry said, though the duration could be extended depending on the surge in cases. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

It appears the spread of the coronavirus in South Korea may be slowing:

South Korea has reported less than 300 new COVID-19 cases for the second consecutive day. 

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention(KCDC) on Tuesday announced 280 cases compiled throughout the previous day, bringing the cumulative total to 17-thousand-945. 

The nation registered 266 cases on Monday after the daily tally hovered over 300 for three days in a row, including the five-month high of 397 on Sunday. 

KBS World

You can read more at the link.

This strike has to do with how the Moon administration plans to increase the quota of students allowed into medical school. The government believes this will allow more doctors to staff rural areas. The Korean Medical Association believes the problem is not the number of doctors, but the fact many of them flock to the Seoul area because of better hospitals and quality of life concerns. If the hospitals and quality of life improved in rural areas the doctors would work there:

Tens of thousands of doctors will go on a full-scale strike as scheduled this week in protest of the government’s medical workforce reform plan and proceed with a rally in a non-contact manner amid spiking virus cases. 

Doctors, including interns and resident doctors at general hospitals and practitioners at neighborhood clinics, plan to begin a three-day nationwide strike starting Wednesday to protest the government’s move to increase the number of medical students, according to the Korean Medical Association (KMA), which has some 130,000 members.

The collective action comes as thousands of trainee doctors have already been staging an indefinite strike since late last week, calling for the government to scrap the plan.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but the Korean Medical Association says that doctors supporting COVID-19 care will still report for duty.

There is an editorial in the Joong Ang Ilbo that discusses how even liberal politicians are attacked by the Moon administration’s allies for not following the party line. The editorial also mentions how the Moon administration has been manipulating statistics which should be no surprise after the head of Statistics Korea was replaced for not producing government friendly statistics:

Finally, even statistics have turned into a magic tool to cover up the government’s repeated failures in real estate policy. Land Minister Kim Hyun-mee said that housing prices rose by 11 percent during the three years of the Moon administration, based on data from the Korea Appraisal Board, making a fool out of anyone who agrees with the neutral analysis by the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ) that said home prices skyrocketed over 50 percent.

Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs Hong Nam-ki said he would change the statistical methods that only covered new contracts to include renewed contracts after rental prices continue to skyrocket after the Aug. 4 real estate measures.

Two years ago, the Moon administration replaced the head of Statistics Korea after it produced data that showed failures of the income-led growth policy ardently pushed by the administration.

The international community always punishes a country that manipulates statistics. North Korea could not join the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in 2015 due to its history of manipulating statistics, said Kim Byung-yeon, an economics professor at Seoul National University. Greece faced a national bankruptcy after manipulating statistics.

The powers that are working against common sense are based on the Moon loyalists’ firm belief that “our president has done nothing wrong.” Even North Korean leader Kim Jong-un admitted to his economic failures at a Workers’ Party meeting last week, even though he is the “supreme being without any error.” And yet, criticizing the Moon administration is prohibited, as the government presents statistics selectively. This weird situation is undeniable evidence that Korea’s democracy has regressed.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.