Seoul is not the only Northeast Asia capitol dealing with coronavirus cluster infections, Tokyo is as well:
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government on Sunday confirmed 148 additional cases of the novel coronavirus, the second lowest daily figure recorded in the capital this month.
The single-day figure brought Tokyo’s cumulative total to over 20,700 cases. The capital hit a record 472 on Aug. 1 and has seen daily cases in triple digits for every day in August bar last Monday, when it recorded 95 new infections, its lowest figure in over a month.
Japan Times
You can read more at the link, but Tokyo has decreasing case numbers and have done it without a lockdown which is what Seoul has implemented.
This is a horrible accident and condolences to all the family members and friends impacted by this:
A crash involving a U.S. military vehicle killed four South Koreans, prompting U.S. Forces Korea to temporarily suspend training in the area, which is near the border with North Korea, officials said Monday.
An SUV carrying the four civilians rear-ended the armored personnel carrier – a tracked vehicle – at about 9:30 p.m. Sunday on a road near the Rodriguez Live Fire Complex in the city of Pocheon, local police and fire officials said.
The four civilians were pronounced dead at the scene, a fire official said. The two soldiers in the military vehicle were not seriously injured. One was taken to a nearby hospital for evaluation but was cleared and released back to his unit, according to the 2nd Infantry Division.
USFK expressed “its deepest condolences” to the families and loved ones of the deceased and said the military was fully cooperating with the South Korean police investigation into the crash.
Stars & Stripes
You can read more at the link, but I don’t think the Korean anti-U.S. leftists will be able to politicize this accident like they did with the 2002 Armored Vehicle Accident. The fact the armored vehicle was rear ended makes it harder to blame the soldiers for the accident. However, USFK will fully investigate what happened with this accident and if there was any negligence I am confident people will be held accountable.
It will be interesting to see the effect this has on case numbers:
The city of Seoul on Sunday designated this week as a “week of standstill” for nearly 10 million citizens in its latest measure to fight the spread of the new coronavirus in the capital area.
During the “10 Million Citizen Standstill Week,” which runs from Sunday to next Sunday, citizens are advised to remain at home and stay away from social gatherings as much as possible, Seo Jeong-hyup, the city’s acting mayor, said in an online press briefing.
“This is a time of burden sharing. … Over the next week starting today, I ask you to thoroughly abide by quarantine requirements with a resolution to almost sacrifice your everyday routines,” the acting mayor said.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
It looks like President Moon is cycling the Defense Minister position among all the military services:
President Moon Jae-in has nominated Army Chief of Staff Gen. Suh Wook as new defense minister, Cheong Wa Dae announced Friday.
If appointed after a National Assembly confirmation hearing, Suh would replace Jeong Kyeong-doo. If so, he would become the first defense chief with an Army background under the Moon administration.
Moon’s first defense minister was a retired Navy admiral, Song Young-moo, and Jeong is a former fighter pilot who served as Air Force chief.
Korea Times
You can read more at the link.
Here comes another typhoon heading towards South Korea:
Typhoon Maysak was churning toward the Korean Peninsula on Saturday from waters east of the Philippines and is expected to affect the Korean Peninsula in the middle of next week, weather authorities said.
The Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) said that as of 3 a.m., the season’s ninth typhoon was traveling some 950 kilometers west-northwest of Manila at a speed of 8 kilometers per hour.
It is expected to pass through 1,050 kilometers west of Japan’s Okinawa Island as of 3 a.m. Sunday.
Yonhap
The typhoon is forecast to reach waters some 210 kilometers south-southeast of Seogwipo, Jeju Island, by 3 p.m. Wednesday and then 40 kilometers away from the southern port city of Busan by 2 p.m. Thursday, the KMA said.
You can read more at the link.
North Korean spy operations have entered the 21st century:
North Korea on Saturday broadcast a series of mysterious numbers, presumed to be an encrypted message to its spies in the South, for the first time on YouTube.
A video clip was posted on the state-run Radio Pyongyang’s YouTube account, in which a female announcer read what she described as “an information technology review assignment of the remote education university for No. 719 expedition agents.”
She repeated phrases such as “No. 23 on Page 564, No. -19 on Page 479” for about one minute in the posting, which had been viewed 2,500 times as of 11 a.m. The numbers were not broadcast on the radio.
North Korea has broadcast such seemingly random numbers via radio since the Cold War era, as recently as March 7 and 13.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
