Unlike the last hostage crisis the ROK was involved in, the Moon administration cannot blame this one on the United States:
A screen grab from a video footage on the Facebook account of a Libyan media outlet, 218 News, Wednesday shows a Korean hostage drinking water in Jabal Hasouna, western Libya. [YONHAP]President Moon Jae-in ordered the use of Korea’s “utmost abilities” and resources to rescue a Korean citizen who has been held by unidentified armed militants in Libya for nearly a month, according to the Blue House Thursday. Three Philippine nationals are also being held.
An anti-piracy unit operating in the Gulf of Aden, which is on a 4,400-ton Korean Navy destroyer, has been deployed to North African waters to lend support.
On July 6, an unidentified armed group entered lodgings for foreign workers at a local water management plant in Jabal Hasouna, western Libya, and abducted the Korean and three Filipinos. They took off with goods as well. A video clip of the hostages was circulated on Facebook on Wednesday, and the Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially confirmed later that day that a Korean national was among the four men held in Libya. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but really long time ROK Heads may remember when the Korean missionaries were taken hostage by the Taliban in Afghanistan back in 2007, South Korea’s leftists blamed the US for the incident. The Chief of Staff of the left wing Roh Moo-hyun administration in power during this time was current ROK President Moon Jae-in.
Here is the latest update in the Druking online opinion rigging scandal:
This photo shows South Gyeongsang Province Gov. Kim Kyoung-soo speaking at a governors’ meeting in the southeastern city of Ulsan on June 26, 2018. (Yonhap)
Special prosecutors raided the residence and office of South Gyeongsang Province Gov. Kim Kyoung-soo on Thursday as part of an ongoing investigation into a massive manipulation of online political comments by an arrested power blogger.
Investigators were sent to search the premises in Changwon, 398 kilometers south of the capital, they said.
The blogger, better known as Druking, has been accused of manipulating clicks on Internet news comments to sway public opinion in favor of the ruling Democratic Party.
Kim, who was elected as the governor in the June local elections, allegedly communicated with Druking frequently through untraceable messenger apps. He has denied any involvement in the alleged crime.
Kim is currently on summer vacation and is scheduled to return to office soon, according to his office.
It is the second time the special prosecution sought to search Kim’s workplace and home. They requested the first search warrant to a Seoul court Tuesday and were denied.
Prosecutors are said to have obtained enough evidence to bring Kim in for formal questioning as a suspect by summoning him, possibly over the weekend.
An assistant prosecutor told a press briefing that Kim was cited as an alleged accomplice to Druking in the search warrant.
Kim said on his Facebook page that he could not understand why prosecutors raided his provincial office that opened just about one month ago, but he will cooperate with prosecutors’ investigation. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but how much evidence do the prosecutors think they would find in an office that is a month old? I would not be surprised that this is all to create the appearance that there is nothing linking Kim Kyoung-soo to Druking.
For those that don’t know Kim Kyoung-soo is a trusted friend and confidant of ROK President Moon Jae-in. The power blogger called Druking alleges that Kim directed his team’s online opinion rigging operation to turn public opinion against liberal rival Ahn Cheol-soo and then conservative rivals during the last presidential election. When Druking’s team did not receive the political payback they had been promised they turned on Kim Kyoung-soo and began targeting President Moon with their opinion rigging software. Once they turned on Moon that is when authorities arrested them, not when they were targeting conservatives.
I have always maintained that Kim Kyoung-soo and others from the Moon administration involved in this scandal would never be held accountable. I would not be surprised if this “raid” is not just part of the cover up, I guess we will see.
Park Sang-yung, a member of a special prosecutor team investigating an opinion rigging scandal, talks to reporters after arriving at the team’s office in Seoul on July 20, 2018. A court on the night before rejected the team’s request for a writ, the first by the special prosecutor, to arrest a lawyer implicated in the scandal, dealing a setback to the probe. (Yonhap)
A special counsel team sought an arrest warrant for a lawyer surnamed Do, 61, a key figure in the “opinion-rigging” scandal masterminded by an influential blogger who went by the nickname “Druking.”
Druking and his followers initially used software to boost the popularity of Moon Jae-in in the lead up to the presidential election last May, hoping their “successful months-long campaigning efforts” would be “rewarded.” But after Kim Kyoung-soo, Moon’s key aide and now governor of South Gyeongsang Province, dismissed the blogger’s recommendation to appoint Do as the consul general of Korea in Osaka, they used the same tools to disparage Moon. Do, one of seven members in the group of followers, is suspected of offering legal consultation as well as controlling the group’s activities overall.
The team led by special counsel Huh Ik-bum sought an arrest warrant for Do on charges of violating the Political Campaign Fund Law and destroying evidence. Assistant special counsel Park Sang-yong said the team believed Do helped Druking meet with Rep. Roh Hoe-chan, the floor leader of the minor opposition Justice Party, and gave him 50 million won ($48,000) in illicit campaign funds. [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but a judge denied the prosecutors request to arrest Do:
A Seoul court on Thursday denied the special prosecutors’ request to arrest a lawyer linked to an opinion rigging scandal on charges he gave illegal political funds to a prominent opposition lawmaker.
The 61-year-old suspect, identified only by his surname, Do, is under suspicion of being involved in setting up a meeting between a political power blogger known as Druking and Rep. Roh Hoe-chan of the Justice Party in 2016 to deliver 50 million won (US$44,500) to Roh. [Yonhap]
A gang rape in Daegu is drawing national media attention in South Korea after a mother’s petition to the ROK Blue House draws large public support:
A petition to the Cheong Wa Dae website posted by the mother of a gang-rape victim has garnered more than 300,000 supporters in less than a month.
This means the presidential office should act on the petition within 30 days.
In the petition, the mother said her daughter is still suffering from threats from the alleged perpetrators and their friends.
“They boasted about raping my daughter and posted on Facebook their claim that my daughter had seduced them to have sex, which is not true,” the mother said. “My daughter couldn’t bear it and stopped going to school.”
According to Jungbu Police Station in Daegu, six middle school and high school students have been charged with raping the girl in April.
The mother said in an interview with a local daily that it was not six but seven involved in the crime, with one getting away because he didn’t have sex. She said the students and their parents never apologized. [Korea Times]
Here is an extremely horrible story out of Incheon:
A 43-year-old housewife and her three children – 2, 4 and 6 years old – were found dead in their car at an outdoor parking lot in Incheon on Saturday. Articles commonly used to commit suicide, and a short memo, presumably a suicide note, were also found inside the car.
Upon receiving a report from the mother of the housewife, who had gotten a text message from her daughter hinting that she would end her own life, police tracked down the housewife’s car and dispatched police officers to the location.
The housewife was not under any financial pressure, according to authorities after a police investigation. She also had no medical record of treatment for depression or other mental illnesses. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
This was some smart thinking by this 9 year old Korean boy on vacation in Hawaii with his parents when he was kidnapped as part of a car theft:
A 9-year-old boy from South Korea and witnesses helped lead Honolulu police to the man who allegedly stole a car with the child inside in Kailua late Thursday morning.
Police said officers arrested a 35-year-old Enchanted Lake man on suspicion of kidnapping, auto theft, theft of property and two warrants after he allegedly stole a rental car with the boy inside.
Police gave the following account of the incident: The boy’s parents, visiting from Korea, left the child inside the car with the air conditioning on, and stopped near the Kailua boat ramp to take pictures of the scenery. At 11:23 a.m. near 729 Mokulua Drive, the suspect jumped into the car and drove off with the boy inside. The boy, who speaks English, asked the man to drop him off at Kalapawai Market and the suspect complied.
The child was able to give officers the car’s license plate number and a description of the vehicle, police said.
Witnesses called 911 and police located the car, which had collided with another vehicle at the intersection of Kamehameha Highway and Mokulele Drive in Kaneohe.
Police said the driver got out and ran on foot, but officers captured him a short distance away. The suspect had personal property from the vehicle on his person, police said.
The suspect was taken to Castle Medical Center with minor cuts to his hand received in the accident. He was later taken to the Kaneohe station for booking. [Star Advertiser]
The problem you run into with false rape accusations is that authorities are likely hesitant to investigate much less prosecute because they will be accused of “blaming the victim”:
More than 220,000 people have signed an online petition calling for the government and the National Assembly to toughen the law against false accusations of sex crimes.
As of Thursday, 220,450 people have signed the petition on the Cheong Wa Dae website. The person who posted the plea on May 25 said Korea needs a law that punishes those who take advantage of its faulty justice system with heavier penalties.
“False accusations destroy the lives of the accused and their families. Nevertheless, accusers rarely face legal consequences, and when they do, they get off lightly,” the person said.
The call came after YouTube star Yang Ye-won’s controversial claims that she was forced to model for pornographic pictures at a Seoul photo studio in 2015. After it was revealed that she asked the accused photographer to give her more photo opportunities, which she did not mention during her YouTube “confession,” many people have doubted her claims and expressed fear of false allegations.
According to the Ministry of Justice’s investigation guidelines, prosecutors and police cannot initiate investigations into alleged false accusations of sex crimes until they conclude that the accused is evidently innocent. [Korea Times]
Singapore is well known for a being a strict rule of law country and some KBS reporters just found that out:
Police check a car entering the Shangri-La Hotel at the hotel’s entrance on June 3. Singapore has tightened security arrangements in and around the Donald Trump-Kim Jong-un summit venue and hotels ahead of the June 12 meeting. / Korea Times photo by Jeong Min-seung
Two South Korean journalists will be expelled from Singapore Saturday for trespassing into the residence of the North Korean ambassador to Singapore, according to multiple sources, Saturday.
They arrived in Singapore a week ago ahead of the historic summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on June 12.
“The Singapore Police Force has decided to expel two Korean journalists over the criminal tresspass,” a source close to the police told The Korea Times asking not to be named.
The decision came a day after the police said in a statement Friday that they were investigating three journalists representing Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) and their interpreter after receiving a report of a case of criminal trespass at about 3.50pm,Thursday.
Among them, the two journalists from KBS who entered the residence without permission were arrested on site.
“There is another man from KBS involved in the incident but he is not subject to punishment because he was waiting outside of the residence,” he added. “Still, he will voluntarily have to leave Singapore.” [Korea Times]
It seems there could have been easier ways to get a relief for cause Officer Evaluation Report (OER) than doing something like this:
A resident captured this image of the stolen armored personnel carrier in Dinwiddie, Virginia.
A Virginia National Guard soldier faces charges of driving under the influence of drugs and eluding police after authorities say he drove an armored military vehicle in a two-hour police chase.
Police on Tuesday night pursued the M577 armored personnel carrier along Route 460 and Interstate 95 before the chase ended with the driver’s arrest in downtown Richmond.
In Richmond, bystanders captured the slow pursuit on video. Onlookers gawked as the boxy armored vehicle moved down a commercial street and traffic stopped for a line of police cars that followed behind, sirens blaring. Overhead, a police helicopter tracked the chase’s progress.
The vehicle was taken from Fort Pickett, a National Guard base in Blackstone shortly before 8 p.m. The vehicle can only drive a maximum speed of about 40 mph and wasn’t equipped with any weaponry.
Joshua Philip Yabut, 29, of Richmond, was arrested for allegedly driving under the influence of drugs, and state police charged him with one felony count of eluding police and one felony count of unauthorized use of a vehicle, the Virginia National Guard said. [CNN]
Does anyone think this will be a fair and transparent investigation or is the fix in?:
Special counsel Huh Ik-bum (Yonhap)
President Moon Jae-in appointed a special counsel Thursday to investigate a opinion rigging scandal that involves one of his confidants.
Moon named prosecutor-turned-lawyer Huh Ik-Bum as a special prosecutor, his office Cheong Wa Dae said.
The appointment came three days after Huh was named one of two candidates by opposition parties as required by the law on the special counsel.
“President Moon will present special counsel Huh with a certificate of appointment on Friday,” Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom told a press briefing. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but the special counsel has 90 days to report their findings.
