One option being floated is expanding Korea’s anti-piracy mission in the Gulf of Aden:

“It is important that the Cheonghae Unit remains under independent Korean command and focuses on protecting Korean vessels and nationals, rather than becoming involved in combat operations,” said Cho Yong-geun, a professor of military studies at Kyungnam University.

He added that “if it is after the war ends, there would be no problem” with expanding the unit’s operations toward the strait.

The professor’s remarks came as Seoul faces continued pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump to contribute to efforts to secure freedom of navigation through the strait amid the months-long war with Iran.

Trump has repeatedly called on allies to play a greater role, with no allies so far committing to direct military involvement.

At a press conference Friday, Lee drew a clear line at combat involvement, saying Korea would not send troops to “participate or intervene in the war,” while leaving room for other military activities to protect Korean vessels, crude oil transportation routes and citizens.

You can read more over at the Korea Times. So basically this professor is advocating for appearing to do something to help the U.S. without actually doing anything.

Now if the Korean Navy protects international shipping from Houthi attacks then that would be a significant contribution. I guess we will see what happens.

It is arguable that Trump got what he wanted again though the media will never admit it:

Under the deal — which reaffirmed “the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Denmark” and recognised Greenland’s “right to self-determination” — Washington will establish military bases in Narsarsuaq in the south of the island and Mestersvig in the east, in addition to the Pituffik base it already operates in the north.

In a section aimed at barring U.S. adversaries China and Russia from gaining a foothold in the Arctic, the agreement blocks non-NATO, non-EU countries from strategic sectors in Greenland.

“The Parties agree that states or investors from a state that is not a member of NATO, a NATO partner, or an EU member state shall not be allowed to have control, significant influence, or access to non-public information that may constitute a threat to national security or public order within particularly sensitive sectors or activities in the territory of Greenland (including the Territorial Waters), unless agreed between the Parties that the activities of such states or investors would not constitute a threat to national security or public order,” the agreement says.

The agreement also stipulates that Greenland, home to 57,000 inhabitants, must continue to abide by the agreement even if it obtains independence from Denmark, and must remain in or join NATO “if necessary”.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but this is another example of Trump making what appears to be outrageous demands and settling on what he really wanted while the media calls him stupid.

It appears the educational related suicide epidemic in Korea has even spread to foreign students:

About one in five international students who died in Korea over the past six years took their own lives, fueling calls for stronger mental health support as their numbers in the country continue to grow.

According to data the Ministry of Education submitted to Rep. Kim Moon-soo on Monday after surveying some 350 universities nationwide, 84 international students at Korean universities died between 2021 and this year. 

Accidents, including traffic accidents, caused the most deaths at 34 cases, followed by illness at 23, suicide at 15, undetermined causes at seven and other causes at five.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

This a horrible likely accident in Anseong if it is true this guy simply lost control of his truck:

A tragedy struck at the site of a flea market in Anseong, Gyeonggi Province, Saturday, as a small truck killed two volunteer workers and injured five others.

The victims were preparing for the event at a neighborhood park, when the vehicle ran them over at around 11:18 a.m. The two people who died were a woman in her 40s and her son, who was in middle school.

The five injured include a woman in her 20s who sustained fractures on both her legs.

Police are conducting interviews of the driver and eyewitnesses, while checking the surveillance footage to determine the cause of the accident, which occurred in an area normally not accessible to vehicles.

Investigators believe that the driver, in his 60s, lost control of the vehicle as he was entering the park.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

If immigrants are withdrawing from public assistance to make them eligible for green cards why were they on it in the first place because clearly they did not need it?:

Immigrants applying to live permanently in the United States can be rejected if they receive public benefits, beginning this week.

Use of Medicaid, food stamps, tuition assistance and free school lunch programs, among other government assistance, could all be grounds for denying a green-card application.

The policy from President Donald Trump’s administration, which took effect Friday, marks a dramatic change to a long-standing federal policy consistent with the president’s efforts to restrict legal immigration pathways.

The rule could reduce federal and state payments by $13 billion a year, by persuading some 950,000 people to disenroll from or avoid federal safety net programs, according to estimates from the Department of Homeland Security. The agency said that the rule aligns with Congress’s intent that noncitizens “in the United States be self-sufficient and not dependent on taxpayer-funded government benefits.”

“Aliens in the United States should be self-reliant,” a DHS policy document for the rule states, “and government benefits should not incentivize immigration.”

Washington Post

You can read more at the link, but of course the Democrat states are suing to keep these people dependent on welfare so they keep voting Democrat. .

I think the moral of this story is that the analyst was incompetent to solely trust an AI chatbot and not independently verify information this important. Hopefully the analyst was fired to set an example to other analysts using chatbots:

The intelligence report, circulated across the US military this spring in the midst of the war with Iran, immediately set off alarm bells: A Chinese ship in the Middle East was transporting components of a nuclear weapons program.

The US military swung into action with plans to intercept the vessel, according to four sources familiar with the episode. According to two of the sources, armed members of the US military were preparing to board the ship. Military planes were in the air, one of those sources and another source familiar with the incident said.

It was only just before the planned operation that officials dug deeper into the report put together by a special operations command analyst and found it had been generated with the help of artificial intelligence (AI) — and that a chatbot the analyst had used inaccurately identified the material the ship was carrying. CNN was not able to learn what the misidentified cargo was.

CNN

You can read more at the link.