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Category: Korean Politics

January 16, 2007

Eum, Yang, and Korean Diplomatic Courtesy

A few days ago, Occidentalism posted this absolutely priceless flowchart that is too telling by half about how some Koreans tend to scapegoat their way through real problems. I suppose the temptation to pin blame on others is human nature; that temptation is at its greatest when a solution to the underlying problem seems beyond reach. Witness the finger-pointing that followed last October’s nuke test (and the notable absence of constructive proposals accompanying it). I shouldn’t miss this opportunity to...

Categories Anti-Americanism/China & Korea/Diplomacy/History/Japan & Korea/Korean Politics/Korean Society/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
January 16, 2007

Segye Ilbo: Goh Kun Will Not Run

At a press conference tomorrow, Goh will supposedly make it official.  [Update:  he made it official.] First, Goh was Korea’s too-short vacation in what seemed a lot like reality.  Later, for exactly 15 minutes, Goh was the Paris Hilton of Korean politics:  arousing to a desperate, lonely few, whose adoration couldn’t quite mask the fact that he was just more of the same talentless, plasticky pap  we’ve seen so many times before.  As with Hilton, a merciful God will allow...

Categories Korean Politics
January 10, 2007

Gov’t Investigates Misuse of Funds It Gave to ‘Civic’ Groups

I’ve previously written about the South Korean government’s provision of $5.2  billion in state funds to 149 different  hippie communes, drum circles,  and commie spy cells “civic” groups, only to have it revealed that some of those groups had a history of organized political violence.  The worst offender was South Korea’s largest labor organization, the ardently pro-North Korean and anti-American Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, and the worst of the violence was over the government’s  costly failure  to negotiate a...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Law/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
January 7, 2007

August Statesmanship, Uri Style

Satan: I thought I killed you! Saddam Hussein: Well, where was I gonna go? Detroit? The Uri Party continues to breathe with the assistance of an iron lung and a feeding tube. In that interminable moment after the first mortar round hits the chicken farm, its members are smacking into each other as they all rush for different exits. Thus we have rebellions breaking out within the larger rebellion, led by the incumbent ruling party chair, Kim Geun-Tae. And it’s...

Categories Korean Politics
January 6, 2007

KCTU Thugs May Have to Switch to PVC Pipe

When I testified before the House International Relations Committee last September, one of the issues I raised was a report that the South Korean government was funding “civic groups” that habitually engaged in violence (see page 18), including the protests at Camp Humphreys last year. More recently, some of the leaders of those protests, and other violent anti-American protests, have been exposed and indicted as North Korean agents. This should not have surprised anyone.

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Democracy/Korean Law/Korean Politics/Korean Society/The Fifth Column/U.S. & Korea
January 2, 2007

Comrade Chung Picks Up Kim Jong Il’s Endorsement

In a uniform editorial in three newspapers representing the North’s party, military and youth militia, North Korea has urged South Koreans to prevent the opposition Grand National Party and conservatives from taking power by any means at their disposal. Commenting on South Korea’s presidential election scheduled on Dec. 19, 2007, the editorial said South Koreans from all walks of life should form an anti-conservative grand coalition and take the presidential election as an opportunity to throw out “conservative, pro-American power.” ...

Categories Korean Politics
January 1, 2007

2007 Portends a Leaner, Meaner Left

As foreshadowed here previously, the Uri death watch is over. Uri Party chairman Kim Geun-tae and former chairman Chung Dong-young in an emergency meeting on Thursday agreed to create a new party, to be called the People’s Party. In a thinly veiled warning to President Roh to keep his hands off, the two said it will be “autonomous and independent from outside political influence. That finalizes the two ex-Cabinet minister’s break with their former boss. Uri will continue to exist,...

Categories Korean Politics/Korean Society
December 28, 2006

Mercurial Politics Watch: Light Entertainment for a Long Year

I didn’t bother fisking  President Roh’s latest attack of the vapors, because I didn’t  have to.  “It’s evident that any missiles North Korea fires won’t target South Korea. So why should the government step forward and tell people to stock up on instant noodles and buy gas masks in preparation for missile attacks from the North?” Referring to parliamentary confirmation hearings of ministers-designate who were asked what caused the Korean War, he complained that lawmakers evidently take him for a...

Categories Korean Politics
December 22, 2006

Roh Learns Bitter Lesson About the Futility of Appeasing Implacable Foes

… inside his own party. The president also laid into three aspiring candidates in next year’s presidential election, describing his appointment of the moderate Goh Kun as his first prime minister as “a failure. “I chose Goh in the hope that he would become a bridge bringing me closer to conservatives, but it alienated me and the government from them instead,” Roh said. His decision to appoint Uri Party hopefuls Kim Geun-tae and Chung Dong-young as health and unification ministers...

Categories An Alliance?/Korean Politics/ROK Military/U.S. Military
December 12, 2006

On Second Thought, We Can Too Remain Silent (Updated)

Update:   To extend the Marmot’s comment on this issue, sometimes it is necessary to call bullshit to cry freedom.  I thought it would be fun to contrast the South Korean Human Rights Commission’s  refusal of jurisdiction  to investigate or talk about human rights in North  Korea with its March 26,  2003  condemnation of the U.S.-coalition invasion of Iraq.  As I found this morning, the English versions of the HRC’s previous statements and annual reports  had recently and mysteriously vanished...

Categories Appeasement/Human Rights/Korean Politics/Unintended Humor/WTF?
December 9, 2006

South Korea’s Influence Machine

The Donga Ilbo has an excellent piece on how South Korea lobbies Congress.  Well worth reading in its entirety. Related:  how it tries to influence the American  press. Also related:   Felony violations  of the Foreign Agents’ Registration Act  are now classified as Specified Unlawful Activity  under 18 U.S.C. sec. 1956, meaning the transactions of unregistered agents are considered money laundering.

Categories Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea/Washington Views
December 8, 2006

Which ‘Major Government Offices’ Contained N. Korean Moles?

Update:   The Chosun Ilbo thinks the investigation’s recent lack of progress is suspicious. A court has issued five indictments, including one against U.S. citizen, former soldier, and current traitor, Jang Min Ho. In the Korean judicial system, those who are indicted are virtually always convicted, so these fellows are looking at some time. Prosecutors also said the group delivered secret information to Pyongyang under direct or e-mail directives from a North Korean spy operative. The information provided was mostly...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Korean Law/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column/U.S. & Korea
December 6, 2006

South Korea’s ‘Hostile’ Class

Leaving no stone unturned in its quest to emulate North Korean concepts of social justice, South Korea has announced the first official list of 100  Japanese collaborators whose blood, we can suppose,  will hereby stain three generations of class enemies (from way back in 1904, in some cases!).  Just to make sure the new songbun designations become nice and official, the government sent notices to  said descendants.  Depending on whose report you believe, there are either about 400, about 800,...

Categories History/Japan & Korea/Korean Law/Korean Politics/Korean Society/WTF?
December 5, 2006

The Cons Are Running the Prison: Why Is S. Korea Subsidizing Violence?

[Updated and bumped up]   To the astonishment of absolutely no one, union goons  affiliated with the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions  are (yet again)  unleashing a wave of  violence: We saw 47 arson and vandalism cases around the nation suspected to have been committed by Korea Cargo Transport Workers’ Union members,” Lee Taek-soon, head of the National Police Agency, said yesterday. “Thirteen cases were reported in North Gyeongsang province, seven in Ulsan and six in Busan.” It would surprise...

Categories Korean Law/Korean Politics/Korean Society/The Fifth Column
December 5, 2006

Kremlinology, Luxury Goods, and Stolen Rice

I don’t expect Resolution 1718’s luxury goods ban to have much of a  short-term impact on North Korea, beyond focusing attention  on all of the frivolous things Kim Jong Il would rather buy than rice.   For the longer term, however, Korea watcher Ken Gause, in what is probably the definitive work of North Korean Kremlinology (ht) did a pretty good job before-the-fact of explaining the gradual trends we seem to be hoping we can advance (Gause actually  spends almost none...

Categories Famine & Food Aid/Kim Jong Il/Korean Politics/Kremlinology
December 1, 2006

Full Court Press

Roh Moo Hyun is recruiting for a new cadre of proxy censors in his war against a critical press: Continuing his battles with the media, President Roh Moo-hyun sent an e-mail yesterday to about 500,000 government officials, encouraging them take action against any media they believe acted wrongly, including taking them to court. In principle, I’m not opposed to the government having some appropriate way to address its  grievances against inaccurate press coverage.  And this, friends, is not an appropriate...

Categories Censorship/Korean Politics/Miscellaneous
November 29, 2006

O Roh Is Me

It’s time for another installment of President Roh Moo Hyun’s whiney, self-pitying Hamlet act. “I hope I won’t be the first president to fail to complete his full term in office. Speculation about his intentions ran wild. The opposition Democratic Labor Party said the president was “threatening the public. Insiders do not rule out an extreme step, saying Roh is in a brittle psychological state. If you’re surprised by any of this, you must be a new reader.  Recall that...

Categories Appeasement/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea