Home  >  South Korea  >  Korean Politics

Category: Korean Politics

November 27, 2006

Name of Blue House Secretary Found in N. Korean Spy’s Documents

Just when I thought that the Il Shim Hue story had been successfully buried by a quick switcheroo of NIS chiefs, we have this intriguing report from the Donga Ilbo: It was confirmed on November 26 that among the documents found at Jang Min-ho’s residence, the name of a Cheong Wa Dae secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and National Security, was brought up several times. Jang, the key member of the “Ilsimhoe” spy case, was arrested by the...

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
November 26, 2006

Dreaming of Kwangju

Writing in the International Herald Tribune last March, Choe Sang Hun observed that both  the number of protests in South Korea and the violence of those protests is rising: “from 6,857 in 1995 to an average 11,000 a year in the past five years. The number of police officers hurt by demonstrators increased from 331 in 2,000 to 893 last year.” You would not expect this explosion of grievance under a government that pursues redistribution and appeasement all the way  to...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
November 20, 2006

Kumgang Revenues Continue to Decline

Whether it’s because of  the diminishing  appeal of tyranny tourism or North Korea’s sheer belligerence, South Koreans have never been less enthusiastic about the Kumgang tourist resort: Tour organizer Hyundai Asan on Sunday said fewer than 300 tourists now visit Mt. Kumgang over the weekend. During the same period last year, weekend visitors to Mt. Kumgang numbered 400-500. The number of ordinary tourists has dwindled to fewer than 2,000 bookings for December tours, but activist groups have booked the tours...

Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Korean Politics/NK Economics
November 20, 2006

‘Unlike in the past, it is absurd to call a person unqualified because he was a pro-North leftist.”‘

This is the statement attributed to ruling  Uri Party lawmaker Im Jong-Seok during the confirmation hearing for Lee Jae-Joung, South Korea’s next Minister of Appeasement Unification.  Fine, then.  Is it equally absurd for a civilized democracy to question the fitness of a pro-fascist rightist  for a senior cabinet position?  Does Korea’s left hereby waive all grievances against Park Chung-Hee for his collaboration with Imperial Japan, along with any hereditary claims against his daughter, just in time for next year’s election? ...

Categories Appeasement/Human Rights/Korean Politics/Korean Society
November 16, 2006

Il Shim Hue Member Planned Violent Attacks

A member of the Democratic Labor Party who was arrested Oct. 24 on charges of spying for North Korea reportedly told investigators he drew up plans for terror attacks against conservatives and influential government figures in the 1990s. What the report doesn’t clarify is just what methods were put into those plans, although investigators claim that the suspect, a DLP member named Park, tried to buy a gun. Any plan involving a deadly weapon would clearly be terrorism. MBN-TV reports...

Categories Korean Law/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
November 6, 2006

A (Blue) House Divided Against Itself

Kim Jong Il can count dividing the U.S.-Korea alliance as one of his recent successes, but in the process, he’s also divided his friends in South Korea. The left finds itself split among accomodators, appeasers, and outright agents, and those factions are going into an election year at war with each other. One of the most divisive of the internecine struggles is Seoul’s to-join-or-not-to-join agony over the Proliferation Security Initiative. Today, Yonhap has a long story on the subject. President...

Categories "United" Nations/An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea/WMD
November 6, 2006

New Human Rights Chair: ‘I Can No Longer Remain Silent’ on N. Korean Abuses

Bloggers are moths to the flame of irony, and South Korea’s National Human Rights Commission has  been  a reliable beacon for  K-bloggers in need of prime material.  For at least the last two years, we’ve  cringed and laughed our way through its pickayune inquiries into adolescent  hairstyles and dairies while 23 million other Korean citizens’ mass starvation, suffocating oppression, and mass enslavement went pretty much unmentioned.  The HRC is nominally independent of the elected goverment, but pretty clearly, politics was...

Categories Human Rights/Korean Law/Korean Politics
November 6, 2006

Hereinafter, Democratic Peoples’ Labor Party

What’s a little spy scandal to kill the spirit of Mangyondae? The Democratic Labor Party’s delegation, led by its chairman Moon Sung-hyun, arrived at Pyongyang on Tuesday.  That day, the South Koreans visited Mangyongdae, the birthplace of Kim Il Sung. However, the Democratic Labor Party made no mention of the stop when it briefed journalists the next day about the delegates’ activities. Illustrating why it’s hard to be North Korea’s friend, the North Koreans thanked their guests by  replaying the...

Categories Korean Law/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
November 2, 2006

The Song Min-Soon Dossier (The Death of an Alliance, Part 59)

We all know that Song Min-Soon is going to be South Korea’s next Minister of Foreign Affairs and trade, but if you think that a man who talks this kind of trash  about his friends couldn’t possibly be a career diplomat, think again. [ ]Mr Song, 58, is a 30-year career diplomat who served as ambassador to Poland while Christopher Hill was US ambassador there. The two then became their respective countries’ chief negotiators in the six-party talks on North...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/Diplomacy/Korean Politics
November 2, 2006

Next UniFiction Minister Was Convicted in 2002 Bribery Scheme; Still Under Suspended Prison Sentence Later Pardoned by Roh

Update:   According to this, Roh pardoned  Lee last year —  which, of course, changes everything except the appeanance of cronyism, whitewashing, back-scratching, and corruption. Funny, I don’t recall anyone mentioning that Lee Jae-Joung is a con. Lee taught at the Sung Kong Hoe University in Seoul and served as the university president from 1994 to 2000 when he joined the then-ruling Millennium Democratic Party to become a member of the 16th National Assembly. He helped found the governing Uri...

Categories Appeasement/Korean Law/Korean Politics
November 1, 2006

Roh’s New Cabinet Appointments Eschew Experience for Ideology

The Blue House has announced the new appointments for the Foreign, Defense, and UniFiction ministries, plus the new head of the National Intelligence Service. With the exception of Defense — to be filled by the Army Chief of Staff — the appointees look like a bunch of political hacks. I’ll update as I find out more. This post is adapted and updated from previous posts, including the scorecard I presented the other day. UniFiction

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
October 31, 2006

DLP Head Returns Kim Jong Il’s Jacket; Dispute Between Ex-NIS Chief and Blue House Widens

I know I speak for everyone when I say just how thankful I am that the Democratic Labor Party’s head  defied the wishes of the National Intelligence Service and the Ministry of Justice (both overruled by the UniFiction Ministry) to go to Pyongyang while his party’s leadership is under investigation for spying for North Korea.   True to  the DLP’s  promise, the North Koreans have put the issue to rest.  They call it “false and a  scheme of the U.S. and...

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
October 30, 2006

As Roh Prepares to Name a New Cabinet, New Calls to Reboot Uri

After the local elections, I had blogged about the rift in the Uri Party about merging with other parties on the left.  In the wake of Uri’s beating in the last round of elections, it’s painfully obvious that the left is weak and fragmented and only stands a chance if it unites.  Note, for example, how Uri can’t win in South Jeolla province because other lef-wing parties win instead.  In that spirit, a former Justice Minister and Uri founder has...

Categories Diplomacy/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea
October 30, 2006

Ex-NIS Chief Hints of Political Pressure in Il Shim Hue Investigation

The Chosun Ilbo spoke with  Kim Seong-Kew, who  just resigned as Chief of the National Intelligence Service. Read this and see what you make of it: Asked who will succeed him, Kim told the Chosun Ilbo it was “very important” who becomes the next NIS chief. “Some of the candidates are unsuitable due to concerns that they tend to do what [politicians] want them to do. Considering the presidential election next year and the operations of the NIS, the right...

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
October 28, 2006

How North Korea Tried to Pick the Mayor of Seoul

[Previous posts on the Il Shim Hue  cell here, here, and here]   A new report, not yet available in English, claims that North Korea used the Fifth Columnists of the “Il Shim Hue” to help the ruling leftist Uri Party in local elections last May.  The report, based on leaks from South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, claims that North Korea used Il Shim Hue (rough translation:  The One-Minded Hundred) to  direct the Democratic Labor Party throw its votes and...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Politics/The Fifth Column/WMD
October 27, 2006

S. Korean Spymaster Resigns; Fifth Column Scandal Widens

Here, as foreshadowed in Update 6 to this post.   Like Lee, NIS  Chief Kim Seung-Kyu  must be  resigning to celebrate the success of his tenure. Following Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon, who expressed his wish to quit in mid-November to prepare for his new job as the U.N. secretary-general, Defense Minister Yoon Kwang-ung and Unification Minister Lee Jong-seok offered to resign earlier this week, holding themselves responsible for “confused” policies on the North Korean nuclear crisis and the Seoul-Washington military alliance....

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column
October 26, 2006

Police Suspect Ex-DLP Leader of Being a N. Korean Intel Asset

More linkage between South Korea’s radical left and North Korean intelligence. Police raided the homes and offices of three activists, seized electronic files and photos, and obtained arrest warrants. One of those arrested is Lee Jung-Hoon, 42, a former leader of the far-left Democratic Labor Party. That’s not all he was the leader of, apparently: Lee was a leader of Sammint’u, or the Struggle Committee for Liberation of the Masses, Attainment of Democracy and Unification of the Nation, and was...

Categories Korean Politics/The Fifth Column