Notice Kim Jong-un said that North Korea would abandon efforts to peacefully reunify with South Korea, this means takign over the South by force is still on the table. In other words really nothing has changed:

North Korea will scrap its efforts to reunify the Korean Peninsula due to South Korea’s “collusion with foreign forces,” the country’s state-run news agency reported Sunday.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during the five-day, end-of-year ruling party plenary meeting in Pyongyang last week made a “decisive policy change” toward South Korea, according to a Korean Central News Agency report published Sunday.

Kim said Pyongyang will abandon its efforts to reunify the peninsula because of Seoul’s insistence on the “collapse of the [North Korean] regime” and “absorbing” the North, KCNA reported.

North Korean media frequently claim that efforts to peacefully reunite the peninsula following the 1950-53 Korean War is stymied by U.S.-South Korean military drills and economic sanctions.

“It is not suitable to … [North Korea] to discuss the issue of reunification with the strange clan, who is no more than a colonial stooge of the [United States],” the report said.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

You have to be an idiot if you think the ROK Defense Minister’s prior Facebook posting in anyway supports Japan’s claim to Dokdo. However, there are parliamentary elections in April in South Korea so expect a lot of stupid stuff like this to get brought up:

Defense Minister Shin Won-sik is facing criticism for his past remarks describing the nation’s easternmost islets of Dokdo as “disputed territory,” which critics claim reflects a distorted view of history.

“It is true that there are ongoing historical disputes, and territorial disputes regarding sovereignty over Dokdo between Korea and Japan,” Shin wrote in a Facebook post dated March 23, 2023, when he was a ruling People Power Party (PPP) lawmaker.

This view contradicts the official stance of the Korean government that the nation has long maintained effective territorial control of Dokdo – which Japan claims is its own territory – and therefore, there is no territorial dispute over the islets.

Shin further criticized liberal politicians for fueling anti-Japanese sentiment based on “outdated animosity towards the long-gone Imperial Japanese militarism.”

The Facebook post is currently hidden following several media reports about it.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

Considering how little time the Soldiers are given to use their phones during boot camp extending this program shouldn’t cause any issues with training:

Soldiers use mobile phones on an Army base in Gapyeong, 50 kilometers northeast of Seoul, Jan. 31, 2019. Yonhap

The military has extended a trial program for new military conscripts at boot camps to use mobile phones for one hour on weekends and holidays, the defense ministry said Wednesday.

In July, the ministry introduced the six-month trial program as part of efforts to allow conscripts to use mobile phones during their mandatory military service to help them better connect with family members and friends.

The ministry said the program has been extended until it decides on a new policy on mobile phone use after analyzing the program’s results and considering measures to address possible security issues and impact on operations.

Conscripts used to be barred from carrying mobile phones for security reasons, but the troops — except for fresh recruits — can now use and possess phones from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays and from 8:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekends.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

Even this recent deadly earthquake in Japan cannot stop the Dokdo madness:

Seoul’s foreign ministry expressed a strong protest against Tokyo on Tuesday as Japan’s weather agency included South Korea’s easternmost islets of Dokdo in a tsunami advisory issued after a 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck Japan.

In a map showing tsunami alerts on the Japan Meteorological Agency’s website, the rocky islets were highlighted in yellow, along with other regions on Japan’s west coast, indicating tsunami advisories were issued for the areas. 

The powerful quake struck the Noto Peninsula and surrounding areas in Japan’s Ishikawa Prefecture on New Year’s Day, reportedly killing several people and causing tsunamis on South Korea’s east coast.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but this is really an issue that President Yoon needs to work with Japan to resolve to further improve bilateral relations.

It is amazing that the crew was able to evacuate so many people from this burning aircraft. Unfortunatley 5 Japanese Coast Guard personnel in the other aircraft involved in the accident died:

All 379 passengers and crew of a Japan Airlines plane miraculously escaped from a fire following a collision with a Coast Guard aircraft at Tokyo’s Haneda airport on Tuesday, but local media said most of the coast guard plane crew had died.

The Coast Guard said the collision involved one of its planes that was headed to Niigata airport on Japan’s west coast to deliver aid to those caught up in a powerful earthquake that struck on New Year’s Day, killing at least 48 people.

Five of the six crew of the coast guard aircraft have died, public broadcaster NHK reported. A coast guard spokesperson earlier said five of the crew were unaccounted for but that the captain had escaped.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

It looks like Lee Jae-myung will be fine after having successful surgery after being stabbed in the neck. The would eneded up only being one centimeter so that shouldn’t have been too hard to stich up and repair. What everyone is waiting to find out is why did the attacker stab Lee?:

Police identified the suspect as a man born in 1957 and surnamed Kim. He used an 18-centimeter-long knife purchased online for the attack, police said.

The Busan Metropolitan Police Agency said it plans to charge Kim with attempted murder, as he has confessed to intending to kill Lee.

“An investigation is under way for matters such as the exact motive,” Soh Je-han, an officer at the agency, told a press briefing.

Police said they are currently investigating whether Kim is a member of any political party.

The suspect was also found to have been around the site of an event Lee attended in Busan last month.

Video footage uploaded on YouTube shows the suspect waiting for Lee in the crowd but being unable to make close contact. The suspect was wearing the same paper crown with the words “I’m Lee Jae-myung” as he did Tuesday.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but the last case of political violence liked this was against the DPK head who was campaigning for Lee back in 2022 when he was running for President. Song Young-gil was attacked by a leftist anti-US whacko with hammer. The guy later committed suicide in prison after the attack. If the guy that stabbed Lee ends up being another leftist whacko you will hear little more about this attack, however if he ends up being a right wing whacko expect the DPK and the media to blame President Yoon for the attack.