• The Flying Yangban has lots of good stuff up today. If you’re in or near Seoul and aren’t working with LiNK yet, they’re holding another meeting Saturday afternoon.
  • Andy also links to an analysis from the International Crisis Group, giving the encouraging conclusion that the U.S. will never allow anything made in Kaesong to be included in a free-trade agreement. He also informs us of the latest machinations in South Korean politics.
  • Yet more calls for America to disengage from a soured relationship with a former ally that wandered into the fever swamps of anti-Americanism. This time, not Korea, but Turkey. The dynamics are different, of course. Unlike Korea, Turkey’s security situation really did change dramatically for the better at the end of the Cold War, and with the defeat of the PKK. The United States can also count on a long list of new allies in that region. Another interesting (but not surprising) aspect of Turkey’s psychotic episode is how much two American actors did to help inspire it.
  • A multiple choice test: who said this, and why?

    “If this report turns out to be real, I won’t be able to contain my rage.”

    Choose one:

    a. North Korea reacts to a statement by Amb. John Bolton that the U.S. will not cease its law enforcement countermeasures against North Korea for such activities as printing fake C-notes.
    b. South Korea’s Finance Ministry reacts to my proposed compromise.
    c. Roh Moo Hyun reacts to a report that North Korea sent the bones of one of its abducted citizens to Japan.
    d. Ban Ki Moon reacts to a leaked Japanese government report accusing South Korea of exploiting the Tokdo situation for crass political purposes. (More, more)

    You’re right, of course.

  • 2 Responses

    1. I asked this over at Flying Yangbans too.

      Do you have any idea if these groups, like those doing the conference in Europe, have put any serious thought into video on the internet?

      I repeat everything I said about the Seoul NK Human Rights Conference — in short version…

      It is so easy to record these conferences (and do things like interviews with refugees or people who work with them in China and elsewhere).

      It is not difficult to do basic edits of these videos on a home computer.

      And it is both easy and cheap to store them at a place like Yahoo or elsewhere

      for everybody in the world who has access to the internet to view.

      The audience is huge.

      The effort is small.

      I did the stuff on the fly with the Seoul conference in part hoping it would give them an idea of the potential and the ease. (I emailed the links to most of the groups involved).

      It would have been great if both the Seoul and now this new conference were available to anybody who searched through google…….

      After awhile, it becomes inexcusable that none of these groups are taking advantage of multi media on the internet……