If the ROK government provides legal status to the babies of illegal immigrants they will create further incentive for illegal immigrants to come to South Korea. They only have to look at what happened in the U.S. to see what will happen in the ROK:

Multiple bills aimed at establishing a birth registration system for undocumented migrant children born in South Korea remain pending in the National Assembly, leaving thousands of children without legal recognition and access to basic services, despite growing calls for legislative action.

At least two proposals pending in the parliament seek to create a legal framework allowing the registration, certification and amendment of birth records for non-Korean children, who are currently excluded from the country’s family registry system. No law has yet been enacted.

Under existing rules, children born to foreign parents cannot be formally registered at birth even if they are born in South Korea, as the family registry system applies only to Korean nationals. Without a resident registration number, many face difficulties accessing health care, education, child care and social protection.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

 I definitely think of better place to spend Lunar New Year’s than in North Korea:

China’s Ambassador to North Korea Wang Yajun and other embassy officials have visited a beach resort area in North Korea on the occasion of the Lunar New Year, state media reported Sunday, raising views on whether Pyongyang is seeking to attract Chinese tourists.

Wang and other members of the Chinese Embassy in North Korea attended the friendly meeting that took place at the Wonsan-Kalma beach resort area the previous day, also attended by the North’s Vice Foreign Minister Pak Myong-ho, according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

Pyongyang’s foreign ministry hosted a banquet to mark the Lunar New Year at a landmark hotel in the coastal tourist district, the KCNA said.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Be safe out there this Friday the 13th. Please leave anything you want to discuss in the comments section.

Jongno-gu in central Seoul is blanketed in fine and ultrafine dust on Thursday. (Yonhap)

If you wondering why Google doesn’t have a robust Google Maps service in Korea, according to this article it has more to do about taxes than national security:

Yoo Ki-yoon, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Seoul National University and former director of Korea’s National Geographic Information Institute, poses at the university’s department library. (Courtesy of Yoo Ki-yoon)

For 19 years, Google has been asking South Korea for permission to take the country’s detailed 1:5000 map data overseas. For 19 years, Seoul has said no. The conventional explanation is national security: Korea is technically still at war, and precise maps in foreign hands pose a risk.

But last week, Google submitted a revised proposal that effectively undermined that narrative. It now meets virtually every security condition the government had set.

The one thing it refused to include was a plan to build a data center in Korea.

For Yoo Ki-yoon, former director of the National Geographic Information Institute, the government agency that produces Korea’s base maps, framing this as a regulatory or server location dispute misses the point.

“If the economics justify it, Google will come in, pay taxes and compete. That’s what happened in Japan recently,” Yoo, a professor of geospatial engineering at Seoul National University, said in an interview with The Korea Herald. “The reason Google hasn’t done so in Korea is not that it’s being blocked. It’s simply that the company has decided the returns don’t yet justify the cost.”

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

Congratulations to Brig. Gen. Moon on her leadership appointment in the 2nd Infantry Division:

A South Korean brigadier general has become the first South Korean woman to serve as a deputy commander of the 2nd Infantry Division, the only U.S. Army division that integrates troops from another country into its ranks. Brig. Gen. Moon Han-ok assumed the post — one of three deputy commanders and the only South Korean — during a Feb. 4 ceremony at Camp Humphreys as the allies prepare for the eventual transfer of wartime operational control to Seoul.

“I believe this case will have positive influence on service women in the combat branch and bring hopeful messages to them,” Moon said in a statement provided to Stars and Stripes on Tuesday by a South Korean spokesman for the division. Before Moon, the last woman to serve as a 2nd ID deputy commander was Brig. Gen. Lori Robinson, who held that role until February 2023, when she was named commandant of cadets for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

It looks like more American coal could soon be heading to South Korea:

US President Donald Trump said Wednesday his administration has clinched “historic” trade agreements with South Korea, Japan, India and other countries to boost US coal exports “dramatically.”

Trump made the remarks during the “champion of coal” event, underlining his support for coal mining.

“In just the past few months, we’ve made historic trade deals with Japan, Korea, India and others to increase our coal exports dramatically,” he said at the White House event. “We are now exporting coal to all over the world.”

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

Eric Trump (C), executive vice president of The Trump Organization, is briefed by Hanam Mayor Lee Hyun-jae (R) during his visit to the city, just east of Seoul, to tour development projects, in this photo provided by the municipal government on Feb. 11, 2026. (Yonhap)