Search Results for: confession

I can’t quite figure what to make of this: A three-month investigation by China of accusations that North Korea used a Macau bank to launder gains from currency forgery has confirmed the suspicions, Korean diplomatic sources said Wednesday. The revelation comes amid reports that North Korean leader Kim Jong-il is on a spur-of-the-moment trip to China, which some speculate may be linked to the finding. . . . . [Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister] Wu [Dawei] also met with his North...

The Chosun Ilbo reports today on an issue that I expect we’ll be hearing much more about–an upcoming strike by the Korean Teachers’ Union, a/k/a the Korean Teachers’ and Educational Workers’ Union, which is affiliated with one of the two major labor groups in Korea, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions. One glance at the KTU’s Web site shows that education is clearly the last thing on its mind. It’s reasonable to ask whether these people are really qualified to...

I wonder what Glenn Kessler and Dafna Lizner will say about this: President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan said yesterday that he believed that a Pakistani nuclear expert who ran the world’s largest proliferation ring exported “probably a dozen” centrifuges to North Korea to produce nuclear weapons fuel. But no bomb designs, as far as we know. Yes, fine. So can we now let go of the fiction that NK isn’t enriching uranium, a fiction that’s even impervious to confession? The...

North Korea is reportedly taking out its irritation on South Korean visitors in the Kumgang Mountains. “Tourists who were a little noisy as they were touring the mountains were forced by the guides to write a confession,” says one who recently returned. “Isn’t that too much?” As a public service to anyone stupid enough to ever pay good money for this, I present a photo gallery of Thailand . . . the Land of Smiles!

Update 9/16/05: We have solved the mystery of where Park gets his MacArthur quote–a history textbook from North Korea whose poisonous content found a willing host in the radical politics of South Korea. Must read to believe. _______________ Park Seong-Hwan, the epic poet who (may or may not have*) brought us “Fucking USA“* has penned a new ditty that will soon hit Korea’s Top 40, and it’s a real piece of historical scholarship: Between verses two and three, Park adds...

Idiocy: The industrialized world’s worst judicial system makes its home in Korea. It places great emphasis on the extraction of confessions, which are a great short-cut to the truth for lazy jurists who’d rather jail the occasional innocent than hit the ground, investigate the facts, or perform a competent cross-examination. Its main truth-engine is a prosecutorial investigative service with powers of lengthy pre-trial detention without habeas corpus (and a few cattle prods, should the need arise). It tends to compensate...

Idiocy: The industrialized world’s worst judicial system makes its home in Korea. It places great emphasis on the extraction of confessions, which are a great short-cut to the truth for lazy jurists who’d rather jail the occasional innocent than hit the ground, investigate the facts, or perform a competent cross-examination. Its main truth-engine is a prosecutorial investigative service with powers of lengthy pre-trial detention without habeas corpus (and a few cattle prods, should the need arise). It tends to compensate...

Recent events in the Middle East are melting my pessimism and cynicism about the region. Events that I had thought would take decades seem to be emerging in months. The news from Iraq recently is downright encouraging: Iraqi citizens are taking up arms against the terrorists. In three different cities across Iraq, the people have also engaged in apparently spontaneous demonstrations against terrorists, extremists, and the government of Jordan, which Iraqis belive has tacticly tolerated support and sanctuary for them....

Recent events in the Middle East are melting my pessimism and cynicism about the region. Events that I had thought would take decades seem to be emerging in months. The news from Iraq recently is downright encouraging: Iraqi citizens are taking up arms against the terrorists. In three different cities across Iraq, the people have also engaged in apparently spontaneous demonstrations against terrorists, extremists, and the government of Jordan, which Iraqis belive has tacticly tolerated support and sanctuary for them....

South Korea’s Anti-Unification Ministry has recently flailed to portray its new anti-defector policy as a politically neutral effort against human smuggling and asylum fraud, and some of the media seem willing to buy that line. The Minister must now wish he had chosen his words more carefully in this recent OhMyNews interview and not issued that now-withdrawn set of proposed regulations, which clearly show that his intent is to keep out virtually all defectors, and keep in all NGO reps...

South Korea’s Anti-Unification Ministry has recently flailed to portray its new anti-defector policy as a politically neutral effort against human smuggling and asylum fraud, and some of the media seem willing to buy that line. The Minister must now wish he had chosen his words more carefully in this recent OhMyNews interview and not issued that now-withdrawn set of proposed regulations, which clearly show that his intent is to keep out virtually all defectors, and keep in all NGO reps...