Is anyone surprised that Cho Kuk lied about his daughter’s academic fraud:
Justice Minister Cho Kuk, right, makes a courtesy call on Lee Hae-chan, left, chairman of the ruling Democratic Party, at the National Assembly in western Seoul on Tuesday. [YONHAP]
Justice Minister Cho Kuk’s daughter did take credit for a controversial medical research paper in her application to Korea University in 2010, the JoongAng Ilbo reported Tuesday – which Cho himself denied in his confirmation hearing on Sept. 6.
The research paper from Dankook University’s Medical Science Research Institute credited Cho’s daughter as first author even though she was just a high school intern.
“During a raid of Korea University, the prosecution seized records concerning the 2010 admission process, including a list of materials that Cho’s daughter had submitted as a part of her application,” a university official told the JoongAng Ilbo.
Although the application itself and other submitted materials were discarded because the five-year mandatory archive period had passed, the list of materials she submitted remained, the official said.
You can read more at the link, but you would think the university’s his daughter applied to would find it odd that a high school student was the lead author of a medical research paper.
Security official meets USFK chief Kim Hyun-chong (L), deputy chief of South Korea’s National Security Office, shakes hands with U.S. Forces Korea Commander Gen. Robert Abrams during their breakfast meeting on Sept. 19, 2019, in this photo tweeted by Kim. They discussed the South Korea-U.S. alliance and issues of regional security, Kim said. (Yonhap)
The Moon administration is sending their Foreign Minister to try and lobby the USFK commander on the USFK cost sharing issue:
Kang Kyung-hwa
Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha will meet with United States Forces Korea (USFK) commander Robert Abrams, Friday, at the new USFK headquarters in Camp Humphreys, to discuss pending security affairs here.
Kang’s visit to Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, located about 70 kilometers south of Seoul, is the first since 2017. The visit to the U.S. military base comes at a crucial time when the allies are on the verge of starting their defense cost-sharing negotiations, known as the Special Measures Agreement (SMA).
The top story in Korea that is headlining all its news outlets is the announcement that the Hwaseong Serial Killer has been identified after all these years:
This file photo shows a wanted leaflet containing a composite sketch of the suspect for a serial murder case that took place in Hwaseong, south of Seoul, in the 1980s. (Yonhap)
Police may have solved one of the Korea’s most mysterious cold cases: the serial rapes and murders of nine women in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi, in the late 1980s.
According to Ban Ki-soo, a chief investigator at the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency on Thursday, newly analyzed DNA evidence from three of the nine cases matched the DNA of a 56-year-old convict surnamed Lee currently serving a life sentence in Busan for a different murder he committed in 1994.
This discovery could very well bring a resolution to one of the most notorious serial rape and murder sprees in Korean criminal history, which terrified Korea from 1986 to 1991 and remained unsolved for three decades.
Yet the suspect, who was in his 20s at the time of the killings, can no longer be charged for any of those crimes since the statute of limitations for the last of the murders expired in April 2006. He has denied responsibility for all nine murders, police said.
Lee is serving a life sentence in the Busan Penitentiary for raping and murdering his wife’s sister, aged 20 at his home in Cheongju, North Chungcheong, in January 1994. According to press reports, he is a model prisoner with a taciturn personality who is eligible for parole.
A 10-victim rape and murder spree of the late 1980s and early 1990s terrified the nation — particularly due to the authorities’ inability to find a culprit — and was compared to the so-called Zodiac killings in California in the late 1960s. The killings gave rise to copycat crimes and inspired one of the most iconic blockbusters of Korean cinema, “Memories of Murder.”
You can read more at the link, but here is a video report of the announcement from Arirang News:
The suspect could have likely been identified sooner if the investigators back when the crimes happened did not discard so much evidence such as cigarette butts found at the scene that would have much DNA evidence. Instead modern day forensic scientists using new technology were able to extract DNA from the victim’s clothes that were saved as evidence to make this DNA match.
For those that haven’t I highly recommend watching the Korean movie, Memories of Murder which uses a dramatized account of the investigation to show how incompetent it was and the killer’s impact on Korean society back then.
What I have not been able to find out is if the identified killer was even a suspect during the time of the killings? The police back then had many suspects that they were trying to pin the murder on, so it would be interesting to see if this guy was even on the police’s radar back then.
The South Korean government really wants people to get used to shopping with reusable bags:
Environment Minister Cho Myung-rae (3rd from L) poses with major retailer executives after they signed an agreement on reducing platic waste and encouraging reusable bag usage on Aug. 29, 2019. (Yonhap)
Plastic waste is a nagging headache for Asia’s fourth-largest economy. After banning plastic cups and bags, the government is now moving to ban paper boxes and packaging tapes.
Starting November, supermarkets will stop providing paper boxes and tape that shoppers can use to carry their groceries home, a move meant to encourage shoppers to use reusable shopping bags and reduce the plastic tape and string used for packing boxes, according to the environment ministry.
You can read more at the link, but the supermarkets must love the fact they can increase profits by selling the reusable bags all the while claiming they care about the environment.
#MoonJaein again says "south side," instead of #SouthKorea. He used the same term when he went to Pyongyang. This time, it's on TV during Korean Thanksgiving day. Is he ashamed of South Korea?https://t.co/6nXmRRef4R
Another infectious disease has come into South Korea likely from North Korea:
South Korea was on alert Tuesday to prevent the spread of African swine fever after the first case of the animal disease was confirmed near the border with North Korea.
The agriculture ministry announced the beginning of operations to slaughter some 4,000 pigs as a precautionary step.
Kim Hyeon-soo, minister of agriculture, food and rural affairs, said quarantine officials are set to complete the culling of the pigs at three farms, including the one where the disease was detected, in Paju, just south of the inter-Korean border, by Tuesday.
Via a reader tip comes news that the Russians are holding 80 North Koreans for illegal fishing in Russian waters:
Russia says the ships were engaged in illegal fishing off its coast, and that one of the vessels launched an “armed attack”.
Three Russian border guards were reportedly wounded in a clash.
North Korea has yet to comment on the incident, but Russia’s Foreign Ministry has expressed “serious concern” and summoned the country’s top diplomat.
A spokesperson for the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said the two schooners were accompanied by 11 motorboats and were spotted poaching near the Yamato Bank, which lies between the Korean Peninsula, Russia and Japan.
Russia says they were caught in its Exclusive Economic Zone, which extends 200 nautical miles (370km) from its coast.
