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.
Here is the latest on the so called attempted coup that South Korea’s political left is claiming the Defense Security Command was planning to execute:
Rival parties on Wednesday exchanged barbs over a controversy surrounding the military intelligence unit’s documents written last year to prepare for the imposition of martial law to curb anti-government protests.
The war of words further intensified after the floor leader of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) claimed Tuesday that the Defense Security Command (DSC) had also devised a similar plan in 2004, when former liberal President Roh Moo-hyun was impeached.
In March 2004, Roh was impeached by parliament on charges that included illegal electioneering, but he was reinstated by the top court about two months later.
The controversy was sparked as a civic group disclosed DSC documents last month that showed the unit had set up detailed plans for declaring martial law last year to curb civilians’ candlelight protests against then corruption-ridden President Park Geun-hye, who was impeached by parliament.
The group also claimed Monday that the DSC allegedly wiretapped phone conversations between Roh and his defense minister more than a decade ago and carried out illegal surveillance on millions of civilians.
President Moon Jae-in earlier ordered an independent probe into the DSC.
The LKP raised doubts about how the Center for Military Human Rights Korea could secure such classified documents.
Kim Sung-tae, the floor leader of the LKP, even said Tuesday that it is absurd that military reforms are being moved by a civic group, whose chief is struggling with his sexual identity.
The ruling Democratic Party (DP) condemned Kim’s remarks.
“The floor leader of the largest opposition party is misleading public sentiment. It is questionable that the LKP is trying to defend the DSC,” said Baek Hye-ryun, a spokeswoman at the party.
The ruling party regarded DSC documents as evidence for a de facto coup. But the LKP, which was the ruling party under Park’s government, claimed that they might have been just drawn up to prepare for emergency situations, not for rebellion.
“The DSC documents were kind of the risk management manual, not documents over an attempted rebellion or coup,” said Kim Byong-joon, the LKP’s interim leader. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but considering the DSC’s charter planning for the defense of the ruling government is part of their job description. If thousands of protesters showed up and stormed the Blue House to remove President Park if the Constitutional Court did not approve of her impeachment, should the DSC be expected to sit back and let it happen?
If so, that means South Korea’s left believes in mob rule and not a constitutional government.
Major Gen. Kim Do-gyun (R), South Korea’s chief delegate, and his North Korean counterpart Lt, Gen. An Ik-san shake hands at the start of inter-Korean military talks at the truce village of Panmunjom on July 31, 2018. It is the second such talks since the April 27 inter-Korean summit, aimed at implementing agreements from the summit. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
It appears that the North Koreans did not pull any stunts like they have in the past such as including animal bones as part remains that have been handed over. Instead this time it appears these are legitimately the remains of Korean War era servicemembers:
Remains recently handed over by North Korea are loaded onto an Air Force transport plane at Osan Air Base, South Korea, for their trip to Hawaii, Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2018.
Fifty-five cases presumed to be holding the remains of U.S. troops killed in the Korean War began their journey home Wednesday after a formal send-off at this air base south of Seoul.
North Korea handed over the remains last week, the first repatriation in more than a decade and a move that partially fulfilled an agreement reached during the June 12 summit between leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump.
Hundreds of U.S. and South Korean servicemembers attended the ceremony along with dignitaries from the 15 other countries that fought in the 1950-53 war.
The cases lined up in a hangar at Osan were covered with blue United Nations flags pending final identification.
But a two-day forensic review showed that the remains appear to be human and “are likely to be American,” John Byrd, an anthropologist with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, told reporters before the ceremony.
“Our preliminary findings were that the remains are what the [North Korean] officials said they were,” Byrd said, adding that it was one of the largest unilateral turnovers ever received from the North.
“There’s no reason at this point to doubt that they do relate to Korean War losses,” he said. [Stars & Stripes]
Via a reader tip comes news that the US media is trying to make big news out of the fact that the North Koreans are continuing to develop missiles:
U.S. spy agencies are seeing signs that North Korea is constructing new missiles at a factory that produced the country’s first intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States, according to officials familiar with the intelligence.
Newly obtained evidence, including satellite photos taken in recent weeks, indicates that work is underway on at least one and possibly two liquid-fueled ICBMs at a large research facility in Sanumdong, on the outskirts of Pyongyang, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe classified intelligence. [MSN]
I don’t know why anyone would consider this big news? The North Koreans never agreed to stop missile development. The only thing agreed to was to work towards denuclearization. The definition of what denuclearization means is still be negotiated.
Not everyone is surprised by this news though:
Several U.S. officials and private analysts said the continued activity inside North Korea’s weapons complex is not surprising, given that Kim made no public promise at the summit to halt work at the scores of nuclear and missiles facilities scattered around the country.
The North Koreans “never agreed to give up their nuclear program,” said Ken Gause, a North Korea expert at the Center for Naval Analysis. And it is foolish to expect that they would do so — at the outset of talks, he said.
Mr. Gausse may be right about this not be surprising, but here is where I believe he makes an incorrect assessment:
“Regime survival and perpetuation of Kim family rule” are Kim’s guiding principles, he said. “The nuclear program provides them with a deterrent in their mind against regime change by the United States. Giving up the nuclear capability will violate the two fundamental centers of gravity in the North Korean regime.”
The nuclear program’s main purpose in my opinion was not to prevent regime change. The North’s conventional threat, mainly the artillery batteries located along the DMZ has prevented any regime threatening attacks for decades despite deadly provocations by the Kim regime over many decades.
Not everyone is fooled by the Kim regime’s intentions:
“We have this backward. North Korea is not negotiating to give up their nuclear weapons,” Lewis said. “They are negotiating for recognition of their nuclear weapons. They’re willing to put up with certain limits, like no nuclear testing and no ICBM testing. What they’re offering is: They keep the bomb, but they stop talking about it.”
The further analysis to this is that the Kim regime needs the nuclear weapons and a delivery system to threaten the United States to begin the negotiations that will lead to a peace treaty and eventual withdrawal of US troops. The removal of USFK is needed in order to realize the Kim regime’s ultimate goal of a confederation. They needed a left wing administration in charge of the ROK and nuclear weapons to accomplish this goal, and they now have both.
A photo of Gwanghwamun in central Seoul taken by a thermal image camera, right, shows that the temperature in the area is very high. The temperature in Seoul peaked at 39.6 degrees Celsius (103.3 degrees Fahrenheit) at 3:36 p.m. Wednesday. The photo on the left was taken with a normal camera. [YONHAP]Wednesday was the hottest day ever recorded in Seoul.
The temperature in the city peaked at 39.6 degrees Celsius (103.3 degrees Fahrenheit) at 3:36 p.m. Wednesday, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA). It broke the record from the summer of 1994, when the mercury hit 38.4 degrees Celsius.
The temperature in Seoul Wednesday set the record for the highest temperature in the city since the KMA started to keep record of temperatures from 1907.
Wednesday was also the day Korea’s highest temperature ever was recorded: The temperature in Hongcheon, Gangwon, hit 41 degrees Celsius, breaking the record of highest temperature recorded in Korea, which was 40 degrees Celsius in Daegu in 1942. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
It looks like the Korean conservative party in an effort to protect the DSC is claiming that the organization once drew up martial law plans to protect former left-wing President Roh Moo-hyun:
This photo shows the Defense Security Command. (Yonhap)
The Defense Security Command (DSC) on Tuesday dismissed an opposition floor leader’s allegations that it drew up a document on the possible imposition of martial law after the 2004 impeachment of liberal former President Roh Moo-hyun.
Earlier in the day, Rep. Kim Sung-tae of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party raised the allegations amid criticism that the DSC explored the possibility of imposing martial law to quash public protests against then corruption-tainted President Park Geun-hye.
“Rep. Kim’s argument is different from facts,” the DSC said in a text message sent to reporters.
“The DSC under the former government checked if there was any problem (on the part of the DSC), and there was nothing whatsoever that indicates the unit considered the (possible invocation of) martial law,” it added. [Yonhap]
The roles of the DSC includes planning security measures and gathering information regarding military-related activities. Its primary mission is to protect national security, which includes anti-espionage and anti-terrorism activities and protecting defense industry-relation information. The commander of the DSC reports to the Defense Minister, but can report directly to the President as well.
It is arguable the South Korean political left want to either disband or “reform” the DSC before pursuing their own goal of creating a confederation with North Korea.
