Category: Uncategorized

It looks like everyone coming from the states will get their TDY money again this year in Korea:

U.S. and South Korean troops will hold a joint exercise next month, the U.S. military said Friday, in an annual drill that North Korea routinely brands a rehearsal for invasion of the communist nation.

This year¿s Ulchi Focus Lens drill, set for Aug. 21 through Sept. 1, comes as tensions escalate on the Korean Peninsula. North Korea test-fired a series of missiles on July 5.

The exercise, conducted every year since 1975, is largely a computer-simulated war game ¿designed to train, evaluate and improve combined and joint procedures, plans and systems for conducting operations critical to the defense of the peninsula,¿ the U.S. military command said in a statement.

From the Stars and Stripes:

No negotiations had begun between Worldcup Arirang Tourism Company Ltd. and its 270 drivers as of Tuesday afternoon, day four of a strike that left U.S. military bases in Area I and Area II without taxi service, according to the drivers¿ union president.

¿So far, we haven¿t heard any single word of (that suggested) negotiating from the company,¿ Shim Woo-chang said Tuesday afternoon.

Tuesday morning, Arirang manager Kim Hong-yeon told Stars and Stripes he couldn¿t talk because he was meeting with union officials. Later attempts to contact him were unsuccessful.

Meanwhile, Army and Air Force Exchange Service officials on Tuesday released a short statement saying they expected taxi service to resume ¿as quickly as possible,¿ according to AAFES spokesman Air Force Master Sgt. Donovan Potter.

In a separate statement, Area II AAFES general manager Betty O¿Brien said AAFES was exploring other options.

¿AAFES is contacting other taxi companies to determine if they would be interested in providing taxi service in Area II,¿ O¿Brien said in the statement.

I think if AAFES starts looking at bringing in another cab company to take over the contract this dispute will end real quick.

I wonder if this rapist was linked to the raped Philippina woman I reported on earlier this week or any of the raped female US soldiers and citizens in Korea?:

A 30-year-old man was arrested and detained by police yesterday, charged with the rape-robbery of 44 women and the robbery of six more in a crime spree from April 2005 until last month.
The Gangnam police in Seoul did not reveal his name, but said he had been convicted of rape in 2002 and served 30 months in prison. He reportedly confessed to the 50 rapes and robberies.
Police said the man targeted women working alone, usually in cafes or medical clinics, cleaning up their places of employment before and after hours.

Here is good point brought up by the Joong Ang Ilbo journalist:

The man was arrested after being identified by people at a gymnasium, who reported his presence to police.
It was less clear why police did not take further steps, such as a press conference, to warn the public or why journalists did not seize on the story before the man’s arrest.

The answer is because rape remains a taboo subject in Korea and is not a problem that is going to go away any time soon if crimes are not publicized to catch criminals and when criminals are caught they are given long jail time which rapists in Korea are currently not given, which is evident by this latest example.

Hat Tip: Nomad

Why do liberals even when they write an article supporting the Bush administration’s approach towards handling North Korea they still have to add paragraphs worth of anti-Bush rhetoric in the article?

Remember these anti-US protesters that got beaten by the Camp Humphrey’s merchants?  Now they are back and have Amnesty International on their side claiming that the Camp Humphreys merchants have violated the protesters human rights.

“Park Lae-goon is a prisoner of conscience and must be released immediately,” said Rajiv Narayan, East Asia researcher at Amnesty International. “He has been detained for over a week solely because of his peaceful campainging for the Pyongtaek farmers.”

Park Lae-goon was arrested on 9 July. He had been demonstrating for the rights of farmers in Pyongtaek, whose land is subject to an eviction order to make way for the expansion of a US army base. According to witnesses, Park and other demonstrators were attacked by another group wielding wooden staffs, but police officers monitoring the demonstration did nothing to stop the attackers. One protester suffered a severe head injury and had his teeth broken, according to a local human rights group.

Some of the demonstrators, including Park, went to the police station to complain about the lack of action on the part of the police. They also complained that the police had blocked the road into the village of Daechuri, preventing residents from getting into their own homes. Rather than consider their complaints, the demonstrators say the police beat up Park and other protesters and arrested them. Most have now been released, but Park Lae-goon remains behind bars.

“Everyone has the right to demonstrate peacefully and the police should be upholding this right, not attacking and arresting people who exercise it,” said Rajiv Narayan. “The dispute over villagers’ land around Pyongtaek should be settled by means of a fresh consultation that takes account of the farmers’ concerns — not through force.”

I think this picture here best sums up the absurdity of Amnesty International:

It is okay for the “farmers” what few are left and the anti-US hate groups to use force on the Korean police and bash their heads in, but it is not okay for the police or Pyeongtaek residents to use force back on the protesters?

I don’t know what to say about this:

Pop star Vicky has refused to allow her nude photos to be exported to Japan.

Vicky was recently offered a US$100,000 contract from Hong Kong-based WUFU Business Co., Ltd. to release her nude photo collection on Japanese portal sites. Vicky, however, frankly stated her opposition, saying, “No matter how much I needed money, I wouldn’t want my nude photos sent to Japan.”

So who knows where this house is located at in Korea?

The more things change the more they stay the same in some instances. 

Then:

 

Korean Farmer in 1971 

Now:

Korean farmer today in Gangwon Province

I have to agree with this editorial from the Chosun:

The Roh government accuses the U.S., Japan and opponents here of making political capital of the missile crisis. If the North’s missile tests were non-military actions, and ¿did not target any country,” as the Roh government maintains, what was their point? Naturally, they were political. Even Cheong Wa Dae said they were “political events.¿ It is self-contradictory then to accuse other countries of using them for political purposes. Saying North Korea’s political maneuvers are fine but moves by its potential victims are bad because they are political shows how pro-Pyongyang this administration’s thinking is. In that sense, Cheong Wa Dae¿s response to the missile crisis is evidently “political.” The difference, if there is one, is that the maneuvers of others are abuses, but ours are for a good cause.

Even if North Korea¿s display of military power is politically packaged, we should be on the alert. An examination of the specifications of the North¿s missiles suggests that, assuming Pyongyang has any political sense, they target neither the U.S. nor Japan. The remaining target is the southern half of the Korean Peninsula. Kim Jong-il is neither so stupid nor so reckless as to provoke a world war. His gamble is always toward localized warfare. What South Korea must fear and guard against is a local war. That is the message the missiles send.

This seems to sum up the Korean government’s attitude towards everything with North Korea.

Tags: north korea, korea

UPDATE:  Damn that’s a lot of water, I have never seen the Han River run this high before.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Heavy monsoon rains turn deadly in Korea:

At least 31 people were dead or missing in South Korea after heavy monsoon rain pounded the country’s eastern province for a third consecutive day, officials have said.

Torrential rain since Friday left at least 13 people killed in landslides and 18 missing in flash floods as of early Sunday, the National Emergency Management Agency said in an updated report.  Victims came mostly from the eastern province of Gangwon that had received up to 500 millimeters (20 inches) of rain in the past three days, it said.

More than 2,000 people remained homeless Sunday after the downpours flooded homes, swept away roads and inundated farmland and villages in the province, it said.  Police, military and disaster agencies have evacuated flood victims to schools and other safer areas, while airlifting relief to flood-hit areas.  Meteorologists expect the heavy rain to continue sporadically in South Korea until Thursday.