Is it just me or does the Stars and Stripes seem more like a blotter report anymore? First of all the beer bottle GI received his sentence in a Korean court:
A U.S. soldier who attacked a man with a beer bottle in July was sentenced to 2½ years in South Korean prison on Wednesday.
But chief judge Kim Byung-ju, of the Uijeongbu District Court, suspended the sentence for three years, warning Pfc. Anthony Walker Jr. not to be “involved in another crime.â€
As part of the ruling, the judge stated Walker showed remorse for the crime and paid a settlement to the victim, Cho Su-whan.
Walker paid Cho $15,000 in connection with the assault, both Cho and 2nd Infantry Division officials have said.
Now that is one expensive night out. $15,000 for being drunk and stupid.
Here is another sentenced handed down in the infamous False Marriage Proposal Case:
A married U.S. soldier accused of persuading his girlfriend to have sex in return for marriage was sentenced Wednesday to 10 months in South Korean prison.
Amazingly the judge didn’t hand down any monetary compensation for the woman he promised to marry, especially when the woman had originally demanded millions from him.
Here are two more examples of GI’s tried in Korean courts yet I wouldn’t be surprised if the Korea Times ran another article claiming GI’s have never been tried in Korean courts.
Nomad has more here and here.
UPDATE: One Free Korea has a good posting on this as well.
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The US has requested assistance from the Zayutn Unit in Iraq to move the government agency USAID on to the Stun compound in Irbil:
A Defense Ministry source said Thursday the official request from the U.S. came by way of the Foreign Ministry in November, asking Korea to let USAID move into the base in Kurdish-majority Irbil, which is relatively calm compared to the rest of the war-torn country. The Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which oversees the Stun base, feels the USAID office would be no hindrance to base operations and is likely to permit it to move in around mid-February, the source said.
Of course there are already concerns that the agency would bring unwanted attention to the Stun unit:
However, there are concerns that if the U.S. organization moves into the base, the Stun Unit could become a more attractive target for insurgents.
I thought the Stun unit was brought to Iraq to help with reconstruction and yet you have naysayers saying that allowing a reconstruction agency such as USAID on to their compound is to dangerous? Going on patrol in the Sunni Triangle like the US soldiers are doing every day is dangerous, building toilet seats is not. When is the Korean government going to let these guys be soldiers?
I want to emphasise that I have nothing against the ROK Army because I think they are a fine organization, I am just against the policy that makes them nothing more than a window dressing army. The ROK Army and the Iraqis deserve better than that.
Is it just me or does this punishment seem a little to steep for stealing $500?:
A U.S. Army sergeant received 13 months confinement Monday after pleading guilty to stealing more than $500 by lying about his base housing allowance needs, according to the public affairs office at 2nd Infantry Division.
Mark A. Byrd, of Headquarters and Headquarters Service Company, Special Troops Battalion at Camp Red Cloud, also was reduced to the Army’s lowest rank and pay level, E-1.
Maybe there is more to this story but I can’t help but to think back to the whole 1LT Davis saga down in Osan where he only got two years for crimes far more serious than what this NCO on Red Cloud committed.
The US and Korean governments have agreed to begin the first ever Strategic Consultations for Allied Partnership talks:
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will host South Korea’s Foreign Minister Ban Ki-Moon for the inaugural session of the so-called Strategic Consultations for Allied Partnership on January 19, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters.
I have a feeling these talks will have more to do with getting the US out of Korea than Allied Partnership, but let’s take a look at the agenda:
“Topics of discussion will include global, regional and bilateral issues of mutual concern,” he said.
What the US is probably refering to here is the US’s desire to deploy forces from the peninsula for global use and the on going nuclear situation with North Korea plus the status on the Camp Humphreys land deal.
“The strategic consultations reflect the dynamic global partnership we have developed with the Republic of Korea and consolidate the strong bilateral cooperation that we have long shared,” McCormack said.
This sounds like nice diplomatic speak for: “we want out of Korea as quickly as possible and their is nothing you can do about it.”
Efforts to end North Korea’s nuclear weapons drive and the readjustment of the traditional American-South Korean military alliance are expected to be among key topics of the discussions, analysts say.
I take this to mean that the US will end the nuclear crisis in its own way if North Korea doesn’t begin cooperating by implementing sanctions even at the expense of the US-ROK Alliance.
However you interpret the meaning of these talks it should hopefully resolve many of the outstanding issues between the two countries.
The NY Times has a good article about everyone’s favorite Korean rioters. I like the Hong Kong government’s response to the demands from the Korean government, movie stars, and others for the immediate release of the criminal rioters:
The South Korean government has appealed to the Hong Kong government repeatedly to release the protesters, all of them men. But the Hong Kong authorities have refused, pointing out that the protest here on the night of Dec. 17 left 137 people injured, including 67 police officers.
“Hong Kong is a place where the rule of law is strongly upheld,” said Wong Yan-lung, Hong Kong’s secretary for justice, after meeting here on Monday with three opposition lawmakers from South Korea who complained about the prosecution. “This case is being processed in accordance with the laws of Hong Kong and our established and announced prosecution policy.”
Note the first key phrase: “Hong Kong is a place where the rule of law is strongly upheld”. Just because Korea won’t enforce their own laws to jail these people doesn’t mean Hong Kong should not have to as well. The other key phrase is: “This case is being processed in accordance with the laws of Hong Kong”. I find it ironic that a country that constantly complains about the US-Korea SOFA Agreement to punish American soldiers arrested for crimes in Korea would in turn demand that another sovereign country should not uphold their laws for Koreans committing crimes in that country.
Here is something else the Koreans can learn from Hong Kong:
Police officers have long maintained high social standing here, with excellent benefits – especially education benefits for their children – allowing thousands of working-class men and women and their children to move up the social ladder. Donald Tsang, Hong Kong’s chief executive, is the son of a police sergeant.
Korean government take note this is how policemen should be looked upon by the country, not punching bags for idiot rioters.
Don’t give in Hong Kong. Jail these people and they won’t ever come back.
Marmot as well has a great posting on the Hong Kong 11 that is also required reading.
What’s the point of an alliance if you are not allowed to train together?:
“Since the end of last year, some in the government have been adamant that the RSOI and Foal Eagle drills must be postponed and have talked to the USFK about the issue,†a government source said Monday. “They judged that North Korea was likely to be sensitive to the joint drills to the point where that would impede progress in dialogue between the two Koreas.â€
But the sources say USFK leaders would not accept political considerations as a valid motive for delaying the long-scheduled drills, and since many in the Korean military also felt the suggestion was unreasonable, the government last Friday decided to abandon the plan and go ahead as if it never existed. It could not be confirmed on Monday whether the initiative came from the National Security Council or the Unification Ministry, both of which tend to be considerate of North Korean sensitivities.
At least the USFK leaders are willing to blow off any ideas from the Unification Ministry. Can you imagine the uproar if UFL was cancelled? At least USFK is looking out for all those Field Grade Officers that come to Korea from the states banking all that TDY money and going on Itaewon shopping sprees.
It looks like North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il has made a rare international trip to China:
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has traveled to China on a rare trip outside his country, a South Korean military intelligence official said Tuesday.
The official told The Associated Press he received the information from intelligence inside China. The official spoke on condition his name not be used because of the sensitivity of the information.
“We confirmed he went to China,” the official said. “We don’t know why.”
China’s foreign ministry said it could not confirm the report and had no immediate comment.
He probably went to China to complain about be called names by Condoleeza Rice and President Bush putting sanctions on Chinese Banks that were found passing US money counterfeited in North Korea.
Some of you may remember the last time he went to China what happened. He almost got assassinated by a huge explosion that leveled a large portion of the city Ryongchon. If only we could be so lucky that it succeeds next time.
The plug has finally been pulled on the KEDO Project in North Korea:
The United States and South Korea have withdrawn their last personnel from the site of two partly-built North Korean light-water reactors after a US-North Korean nuclear deal was officially scrapped.
A 57-strong final contingent, including a US citizen and 56 South Korean engineers and workers, returned by ship to South Korea’s east coast from North Korea on Sunday afternoon, the unification ministry said on Sunday.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO) officially terminated the project two months ago amid a fresh nuclear standoff.
The two light-water reactors were promised, along with replacement fuel supplies, under a 1994 US-brokered deal to end a crisis over North Korea’s nuclear weapons efforts.
What have these 57 engineers been doing there the last few years?
A Korean lobbyist was recently arrested in Houston on charges related to the UN Oil for Food Program Scandal:
Michael J. Garcia, the United States attorney in Manhattan, announced that Mr. Park was arrested in Houston by F.B.I. agents, but provided no information about how he was found. Mr. Park’s whereabouts had been unknown since he was first indicted on April 14, 2005, for his role in the program.
According to new charges unsealed yesterday, Mr. Park began working with an Iraqi-American businessman, Samir Vincent, as early as 1992 to represent the interests of Saddam Hussein’s government in negotiations at the United Nations to set up the program. Mr. Park and Mr. Vincent met twice in 1993 with a high-ranking United Nations official, the criminal complaint says.
Federal prosecutors charged that Mr. Park had a direct role in influencing the course of the negotiations that created the oil-for-food program in April 1995. The program was set up to alleviate the effects of international sanctions against Iraq by using proceeds from sales of Iraqi oil to buy food, medicine and other supplies for the Iraqi people.
The complaint says that Mr. Park never registered in Washington as a foreign agent. He is charged with acting as an unregistered agent, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. He will appear Monday before a federal magistrate in Houston, Mr. Garcia’s office said.
The complaint says that Mr. Park was paid at least $2 million, most of it in cash, by the Iraqi government. Much of the cash was delivered to Mr. Park in New York in Iraqi diplomatic pouches, the complaint says.
All of these people that secretly took money from Saddam at the expense of food and medicine for the Iraqi people are truly scumbags. It is a shame that this is not a bigger story and more heads are not rolling. What I find most interesting about this, is how did a Korean receive a direct role in creating the Oil for Food Program?
Can anyone indentify where this area in Korea is located?