Tag: Korean Government

This shouldn’t be terribly surprising that the ROK President was against the deployment of USFK assets to assist with the war against Iran:

President Lee Jae Myung said Tuesday that a potential relocation of military assets owned by the U.S. military stationed in South Korea will not affect the deterrence posture against North Korea. 

Citing media reports that the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) might have recently shipped out some weapons, including an anti-missile defense system, Lee told a Cabinet meeting, “If you ask if our deterrence strategy against North Korea is severely affected (because of a possible shift of such assets), I can say absolutely not.” 

The remarks by Lee did not explicitly comment on the possible movement or repositioning of USFK’s military assets. 

However, South Korea has expressed its opposition against USFK’s possible shift of its military assets, but it is a “stark reality” that South Korea’s opinions would not be fully accepted, Lee said. 

“Our government expects the USFK to fully contribute to stability and peace on the Korean Peninsula, which I believe it has done so far,” Lee said.

“Depending on how the situation unfolds, however, the USFK may dispatch some air defense systems abroad in accordance with its own military needs. While we have expressed opposition, the reality is that we cannot fully push through our position.”

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Fortunately no one was hurt in this crash caused by the now former Forestry Service Chief driving drunk:

President Lee Jae Myung has dismissed the minister of the Korea Forest Service, Kim In-ho, after he was found to have committed an unlawful act, Lee’s office said Saturday, without further elaborating.

“We have found that the minister of the Korea Forest Service caused trouble by committing a serious violation to existing laws, and decided to dismiss him from the post,” Lee’s office said.

The presidential office did not elaborate on what specific law Kim violated but warned it will react sternly to any violations of law by high-ranking officials going forward.

Later in the day, police confirmed they have booked Kim on charges of driving under the influence.

Kim is accused of subsequently ramming into a bus and a car while drunk driving at an intersection in the Bundang district of Seongnam at around 10:50 p.m. on Monday, according to the Bundang Police Station in Gyeonggi Province, south of Seoul.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the DPK now has their kangaroo court to jail all their political enemies with:

The ruling Democratic Party on Tuesday pushed through a bill to establish special tribunals for insurrection and treason charges linked to the Dec. 3, 2024, martial law declaration, ending a daylong filibuster by the main opposition People Power Party.

Lawmakers first adopted a motion to cut off the filibuster, which passed 185-1. The Assembly then approved the bill 175-2, including two abstentions, with 179 of 298 lawmakers voting. Lawmakers from the People Power Party boycotted the vote.

The revised bill requires the Seoul Central District Court and the Seoul High Court to set up at least two dedicated panels each to handle insurrection, treason and rebellion cases tied to the martial law declaration by ousted former President Yoon Suk Yeol.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

So now it looks like any conservative that made social media comments about the failed martial law plan is now subject to arrest as well:

A special counsel team detained former Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn Wednesday on charges of inciting an insurrection following former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s imposition of martial law.

Hwang, who served under former President Park Geun-hye, made Facebook posts following the martial law imposition Dec. 3 to call for the eradication of pro-North Korea forces and those involved in alleged electoral fraud.

He also called for the arrest of National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-shik and then People Power Party leader Han Dong-hoon.

Investigators from special counsel Cho Eun-suk’s team executed a detention warrant for Hwang at his home in Seoul’s Yongsan Ward after he ignored three summonses to appear for questioning.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but Hwang was targeted by the investigation after an online news outlet highlighted his X post. There is probably a lot of conservatives scrubbing their social media accounts now that this can be used as an excuse to detain them.

The incompetent martial law attempt by former President Yoon appears now to be used as an excuse to conduct a complete purge of conservatives from the Korean government:

The government will launch a task force to investigate whether public officials were involved in illegal activities or misconduct in connection with former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s failed martial law attempt last December, the prime minister’s office said Tuesday.

Prime Minister Kim Min-seok made the proposal during a Cabinet meeting earlier in the day, stressing that the government’s top priority is to uphold the sovereignty of the people and democracy.

“We will swiftly conduct an internal investigation into public officials who participated in or cooperated with the martial law bid and secure the grounds for taking appropriate personnel measures,” Kim said in his opening remarks.

All 49 central government agencies, excluding those under the presidential office or independent bodies, will be subject to the investigation, which will run through Jan. 31.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This case has been going through the legal process for many years, but it looks like it could end soon with jail sentence:s:

This combination of file photos shows (from L to R) former National Intelligence Service Director Park Jie-won, former National Security Adviser Suh Hoon and former Defense Minister Suh Wook. (Yonhap)

 Prosecutors on Wednesday sought a four-year prison term for former National Security Adviser Suh Hoon and a two-year term for former National Intelligence Service (NIS) Director Park Jie-won over the alleged cover-up of the 2020 killing of a South Korean fisheries official at North Korea’s hands.

The sentencing requests were made during the final court hearing at the Seoul Central District Court, wrapping up a trial that began some three years ago with the indictments of five officials of former President Moon Jae-in’s administration, including Suh Hoon and former Defense Minister Suh Wook.

The fisheries official, Lee Dae-jun, was fatally shot by North Korean soldiers near the de facto maritime border in the Yellow Sea on Sept. 22, 2020, a day after going missing while on duty on board a fishery inspection vessel. His body was burned by the North.

The Moon administration announced Lee sought to defect to the North in what prosecutors believe was an attempt to prevent the incident from hampering inter-Korean relations.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The DPK is looking to end the only institution that is a check on their power the Supreme Court by packing it with leftist sympathizers:

The ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK)’s recent legislative proposal to expand the number of justices on Korea’s Supreme Court from the current 14 has ignited a passionate debate. Advocates argue that reform would make the judiciary more representative, correct a long-standing conservative bias and ease the court’s workload. Critics fear the move is less about balance and more about power. Whatever one’s political sympathies, Korea would be wise to look abroad before proceeding. The experiences of Poland and the United States offer sobering warnings.

When Poland’s right-wing populist Law and Justice Party came to power in 2015 by capturing the presidency and a parliamentary majority, a wave of fear swept through Polish civic circles. The opposition worried that the judiciary remained the last check on the populists’ power, while party leaders countered that the courts were elitist, politically biased and hostile to the will of the people. On that basis, the government embarked on an ambitious project of “judicial reform.” They lowered the Supreme Court retirement age to remove senior judges, introduced a new disciplinary system that gave politicians greater power to punish or remove judges deemed disloyal, and expanded certain courts to stack them with loyalists — pejoratively dubbed “neo-judges.”

Defended as technical fixes, in practice these changes enabled the ruling party to increasingly capture the judiciary. Judges who resisted were harassed, sidelined or disciplined. Trust in the impartiality of Poland’s judiciary collapsed. The European Union condemned the reforms as violations of democratic norms and launched infringement proceedings. Nearly a decade later, after the populists’ fall from power, Poland’s Supreme Court now has competing chambers that issue contradictory rulings, deepening uncertainty and further eroding public trust — a clear illustration of how such reforms, even if well-meaning, can breed dysfunction.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

It looks like South Korea will be teaming up with Elon Musk’s arch enemy Sam Altman in order to push its goal of becoming the AI hub of Asia:

President Lee Jae Myung met OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, the US entrepreneur behind the AI-powered chatbot ChatGPT, as the latter visited Seoul on Wednesday. The two reached tentative agreements to set up two new data centers needed to meet Korea’s growing artificial intelligence demands.

At the meeting held at the presidential office in Seoul, Lee and Altman exchanged their views on South Korea’s ambition to become an AI hub for the Asia-Pacific region. Also attending the meeting were Lee Jae-yong, executive chair of chipmaker Samsung Electronics, and Chey Tae-won, chair of SK Group, the parent company of chipmaker SK hynix.

Revealing that he was one of Korea’s many ChatGPT subscribers, Lee said Altman “opened up a whole new world, which could be either delightful or dangerous,” and asked that Altman make a world that is the former. ChatGPT’s popularity has recently grown sharply in Korea, where its monthly active users exceeded 20 million in August.

Altman responded that he was excited to support South Korea’s AI ambitions and needs, and to develop AI to its full potential to bring it to the world.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

What a disaster this has turned into. Why were such sensitive data servers located near lithium ion batteries known to cause fires? Hopefully other governments and businesses are looking at where their cloud based storage is located at in order to prevent something like this from happening again:

The government’s official document storage system has been destroyed in last week’s fire at the state data management agency, wiping out work documents of the nation’s 750,000 civil servants, the interior ministry said Wednesday.

The cloud-based repository, known as G Drive, was among the 96 systems that burned down in Friday’s fire at the National Information Resources Service (NIRS) in Daejeon, about 140 kilometers south of Seoul, according to the ministry.

As the system is not backed up externally, all documents stored on the repository have been lost. Government employees have been advised to save all work-related documents on G Drive since 2018, rather than on their computers.

Government branches that have exclusively used the system to store work documents are expected to experience significant disruptions to operations.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Lithium ion batteries continue to be a major fire risk:

Burned lithium-ion batteries sit in a water tank after a fire at the National Information Resources Service in Daejeon. Friday’s blaze in an uninterruptible power supply room at the government data center disrupted hundreds of public services. Yonhap

Hundreds of government and financial services across Korea remain offline after a fire at a key national data center, disrupting citizens’ daily routines and causing frustration. Officials warned it could take up to two weeks before operations return to normal, affecting everything from housing applications to moving contracts.

The blaze broke out Friday evening at the National Information Resources Service (NIRS) headquarters in Daejeon, the “nerve center” of Korea’s e-government infrastructure. Officials said 13 workers had been replacing lithium-ion batteries when sparks from one battery are believed to have ignited the fire, which spread across the fifth-floor server room. About 100 people evacuated safely, and one worker suffered minor burns. Firefighters brought the fire under control after 10 hours, but it took nearly 22 hours to completely extinguish it.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.