Tag: South Korea

It does seem like every few years we hear about a movie studio theme park coming to South Korea that never materializes.  Maybe someone in the ROK should pursue a K-drama theme park instead of waiting to partner with a major Hollywood studio to make one?:

Is Korea a burial ground for movie studio theme parks? Every attempt to attract amusement parks by major U.S. film studios has failed in the past decade.

A huge plot of land in Songdo, Incheon, has remained idle for the last seven years. In the midst of tall weeds is a worn down sign that reads in Korean, “Paramount movie park Korea construction site.” In 2008, the site was chosen to be home to a Paramount theme park. The park was supposed to turn the area into a global tourist attraction by offering Asia’s first destination linked to Paramount, a studio famous for blockbuster films like the Indiana Jones and Mission Impossible franchises.

The project never went through because the Korean company driving it, Daewoo Motor Sales, was financially strapped due to the global financial meltdown in late 2008.
“This used to be a neighborhood that couples frequently visited but it has been empty for a long time,” said a 58-year-old realtor. “The damage caused by the cancellation of the project on the region’s commercial businesses has been huge.”

Since 2007, plans for four U.S. movie theme parks were announced but none were ever built. Analysts say the 2008 financial crisis was one cause, followed by friction between the studios and Korean project-operators.
The situation was similar when the South Gyeongsang government tried building a global theme park in the Busan-Jinhae Free Economic Zone. The local government and Fox Studios signed a memorandum of understanding in 2014, but the project never materialized.   [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link.

From the US perspective assuring the ROK that America will full support them against a nuclear North Korea and that they have no need to pursue their own nuclear weapons program makes sense for near term regionally stability.  However, since the Chinese government are the one’s enabling the Kim regime to move forward with their nuclear weapons program, it may take a shock like South Korea and Japan taking concrete actions to move forward with their own nuclear weapons program to get China to take real action against North Korea:

“President Obama reaffirmed the unshakeable U.S. commitment to the security of the [South], and the two leaders agreed to work together to forge a united and strong international response to North Korea’s latest reckless behavior,” the White House said.

The U.S. assurance to defend its ally from escalating North Korean threats came as conservatives in the South started demanding that the country arm itself with nuclear weapons. At a Supreme Council meeting of the ruling Saenuri Party, several leaders publicly stressed the need for defensive nuclear armaments.

“The time has come for the South to have a peaceful nuclear program for the sake of self-defense to counter the North’s fearful, destructive nuclear weapons,” said Rep. Won Yoo-chul, floor leader of the Saenuri Party. “The North is aiming at our head with nuclear weapons, and it is frustrating for us to just respond with sanctions.”

Won, a former chairman of the National Assembly’s Defense Committee, had previously commented that the South should become a nuclear state, but this was the first time he voiced the opinion as the ruling party’s floor leader.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link.

A man bows toward the statue of independence fighter Lee Bong-chang at Hyochang Park in Seoul’s Yongsan Ward on Jan. 8, 2016, to mark the 84th anniversary of Lee’s patriotic actions against Japanese imperialism. In 1932, Lee threw a grenade toward Japanese Emperor Hirohito in a failed assassination attempt in Tokyo before being captured and hanged the same year. The Korean Peninsula was under Japanese colonial rule from 1910 to 1945. (Yonhap)

The article doesn’t say if the person was a government civilian or contractor, but regardless he has been fired for having ecstasy pills mailed to him in South Korea:

An American civilian who worked at the U.S. military in South Korea has been indicted on charges of trafficking drugs to Yongsan Garrison in central Seoul, prosecutors said Friday.

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said the 35-year-old, identified only by his initial J, is suspected of receiving 35 pills of MDMA, better known as “ecstasy,” and 20.5 grams of hemp from an unidentified seller last year.

Still, the suspect was not taken into custody.

The drugs were sent from the Netherlands and went through the distribution center for military posts at Incheon International Airport, Seoul’s main gateway, before arriving at the military base, prosecutors said.

The suspect, who worked with the 8th U.S. Army, was fired in September after being caught by South Korean police who received a tip from the U.S. military’s criminal investigation division.  [Yonhap]

A customer shops for Lotte Chilsung Beverage Co.’s soju, a distilled beverage made of ethanol and water, at a giant retailer in Seoul on Jan. 4, 2016. Lotte, the maker of one of the top soju brands in the country, raised the price of its soju by an average 5.54 percent starting on the day, following suit of its rival Hite Jinro. With the hike, the factory price of the liquor passed the 1,000 won level per a bottle of 360 milliliters. (Yonhap)

I would think the Kim regime would have expected this to happen, so it will be interesting to see what their response will be.  Would they try and shoot at one of the loudspeakers again in response to further heighten tensions?:

In response to North Korea’s latest nuclear test, South Korea on Thursday announced it would resume cross-border propaganda broadcasts that Pyongyang considers an act of war. Seoul also began talks with Washington that could see the arrival of nuclear-powered U.S. submarines and warplanes to the Korean Peninsula.

From Seoul to Washington, Beijing to the United Nations, world powers are looking at ways to punish Pyongyang for the test of what it called a new and powerful hydrogen bomb.

The loudspeaker broadcasts, which will start Friday, believed to be the birthday of young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, are certain to infuriate authoritarian Pyongyang because they are meant to raise questions in North Korean minds about the infallibility of the ruling Kim family. South Korea stopped earlier broadcasts after it agreed with Pyongyang in late August on a package of measures aimed at easing animosities that had the rivals threatening war.

Experts, meanwhile, are trying to uncover more details about the detonation that drew worldwide skepticism and condemnation.  [Associated Press]

You can read the rest at the link.

I just can’t believe they actually had to do research to figure this out.  Maybe I should start my own “ROK Drop Institute of Common Sense” and get in on some these research dollars?:

A state-run research agency says the more affluent and intimate married couples are, the more likely it is for them to have a second child.

The Korea Institute of Child Care and Education under the Prime Minister’s Office released the conclusion in a report after analyzing the 2012 Panel Study on Korean Children conducted on around 400 couples with a single child.

According to the analysis, the higher the income of the couple, the more likely they planned to have a second baby.

Other factors raising the likelihood of having a second child were a high level of marital satisfaction on the part of the wife and a good relationship between the spouses. [KBS Global]

You can read more at the link.

You would think this is something that the Japanese government would try and do on the down low sometime in the future because trying to move this statue now would be political suicide for the ROK government:

Amid an ongoing debate about relocating the statue of a young girl that symbolizes the comfort women – women forced to serve as sex slaves for the Imperial Japanese Army – from in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul, there are indications that the South Korean government is shifting to a stricter legal stance on the issue.This appears to be motivated by concerns about criticism from the South Korean public, which has been increasing since the governments of South Korea and Japan reached an agreement about the comfort women on Dec. 28, as well as by a string of remarks by Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs Fumio Kishida that treat the removal of the statue as an established fact.

This is likely to provoke further conflict between the governments of South Korea and Japan.“Let me make this clear: The statue of the young girl was set up by private citizens, and there is nothing that the government can do about it,” South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Cho June-hyuk told domestic reporters and foreign correspondents at the regular press briefing on the afternoon of Jan. 5.  [Hankyoreh]

You can read the rest at the link.

It is amazing how over the past two decades coffee has become such a staple of Korean culture.  It is good to see that the convenience stores are now also offering quality brewed coffee considering how expensive most of the coffee shops are:

Koreans love their coffee – but they’re loving it in different ways.

The market was once dominated by franchise coffee shops like Starbucks and the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, but more people are heading to convenience stores, especially since they started selling quality coffee at low prices.

Local convenience stores such as CU, GS25 and 7-Eleven are aggressively expanding their offerings of brewed coffee. Korean adults consumed an average of 341 cups of coffee in 2014, up 14.4 percent from the previous year, according to Statistics Korea. To put that into perspective, the average Korean consumed seven bowls of rice a week, 11.8 portions of kimchi – and 12.8 cups of coffee. Coffee has arguably become more important than kimchi.

Industry insiders believe that the coffee market was worth about 6 trillion won ($5.06 billion) last year and that it has been growing 10 percent per year. Convenience stores’ coffee sales accounted for about 40 billion won last year, but that is expected to grow to 100 billion won this year.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

This is pretty predictable that the political opposition in South Korea would twist anyway that it could the comfort women agreement between the ROK and Japan to its political advantage:

The main opposition party on Tuesday called on the Seoul government to renegotiate last month’s agreement with Tokyo to settle Japan’s wartime sexual enslavement of Korean women and apologize to victims for the “unilateral” deal.

Four senior lawmakers of the Minjoo Party of Korea including its floor leader Rep. Lee Jong-kul made the demands during their hour-long talks with Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se at his office in Seoul.

The lawmakers also said that Seoul should not accept Tokyo’s contribution of 1 billion yen ($8.38 million) to form a foundation to support the victims, and that the foundation should be funded with civilian donations.

Under the agreement struck on Dec. 28, Japan expressed its apology and contrition for its colonial-era atrocities, and agreed to provide 1 billion yen for the foundation to be established by the Seoul government.

Criticizing the government’s failure to secure consent from the victims for the deal, the lawmakers demanded that President Park Geun-hye and Minister Yun visit each victim and tender an apology for “unilaterally” reaching the agreement.

In response to the lawmakers’ demands, Yun said that the government does not consider any renegotiation given that the agreement was announced before the international community though it is not a formal treaty.  [Korea Herald]

You can read more at the link.