Category: Politics-Korea

I hope President Yoon is ready for disappointment because North Korea is not going to denuclearize. Why would they? The best he can hope for is that North Korea pretends to denuclearize in return for economic incentives:

President Yoon Suk-yeol took the oath of office Tuesday, vowing to rebuild the nation on the foundation of a liberal democracy and market economy and offering to revive North Korea’s economy with an “audacious plan” should it take steps to denuclearize.

In his inauguration address at the National Assembly Plaza, Yoon outlined various challenges facing the country and the world from pandemics and rearrangements in global supply chains to record-low growth and rising unemployment. (….)

“While North Korea’s nuclear weapon programs are a threat not only to our security and that of Northeast Asia, the door to dialogue will remain open so that we can peacefully resolve this threat,” Yoon said in his inaugural speech.

“If North Korea genuinely embarks on a process to complete denuclearization, we are prepared to work with the international community to present an audacious plan that will vastly strengthen North Korea’s economy and improve the quality of life for its people,” he said.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

The new ROK President has been inaugurated and as promised has begun his term by moving the presidential office to Yongsan:

President Yoon Suk-yeol will start his first day at the top job of the government very differently from that of his predecessors: his office is no longer in the secluded foothills of Mount Bugak. Instead, it’s at the center of Seoul’s crowded downtown Yongsan District near Samgakji subway station, an election promise emphasizing his willingness to make himself and his office open to the public.

With the start of his term at the former headquarters of the national defense ministry in the bustling district, Cheong Wa Dae, which has been the office and residence of the country’s presidents since 1948, becomes a public venue for tourists.

The Era of Yongsan begins at midnight on Monday with Yoon receiving a phone briefing from the Joint Chiefs of Staff as the commander-in-chief at an underground bunker beneath his office building. The briefing signals the transfer of the country’s military command from former president Moon Jae-in to Yoon. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

It looks like Lee Jae-myung and Ahn Cheol-soo are going to keep themselves relevant in South Korea’s politics by running for office again in the National Assembly:

Former presidential candidates Lee Jae-myung and Ahn Cheol-soo declared their bids, Sunday, for parliamentary seats in the June 1 by-elections, transforming the event to one of potentially high political stakes. 

Lee of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) is the former Gyeonggi Province governor who lost the March 9 presidential election to President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol by a razor-thin margin, while Ahn Cheol-soo, the head of Yoon’s transition committee, also ran for president and merged his campaign with Yoon’s days prior to the election.

Lee will run for the seat representing Incheon’s Gyeyang-B district, which has been vacant since former DPK Chairman Rep. Song Young-gil resigned to run in the Seoul mayoral election in April, while Ahn will run for seat representing Bundang-A district of Seongnam City, Gyeonggi Province, left by the Kim Eun-hye of the People Power Party (PPP), the former presidential transition committee spokesperson who is now running for the Gyeonggi provincial governor post. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

None of this is actually surprising to people who have been paying attention:

The incoming Yoon Suk-yeol administration finds itself in hot water over its policy roadmap for the next five years, as some of his key election pledges ― disbanding the gender equality ministry, raising soldiers’ salaries and deploying additional U.S. missile systems in South Korea ― have been missing from a list of key tasks.

Those pledges were used as catchy slogans throughout Yoon’s presidential election campaign, after his Facebook postings that promoted such ideas grabbed voters’ attention despite their low feasibility. As the pledges were exempt from the roadmap, however, the Yoon administration faces growing criticism for backing down from its pledges. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but the Gender Ministry is not going any where because Yoon’s party does not control the National Assembly to actual make its abolishment law. As we have discussed before here on the ROK Drop the Yoon administration had talked of purchasing a THAAD battery. However, this is not something you just go to a car dealership and buy. This is a multi-year long process to purchase, build the battery, and train personnel for billions of dollars. As far as paying troops more that is a huge bill that means money needs to be taken from so where else when the current Moon administration is already running huge deficits.

These are all things that cannot immediately be implemented and thus focusing on more realizable short term goals initially is probably prudent for the Yoon administration.

It looks like a consequence of narrowing losing the ROK Presidential is that Lee Jae-myung is now open to being investigated:

Police raided Seongnam City Hall Monday over allegations that former presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung, who was mayor of Seongnam from 2010 to 2018, took donations from companies via the city’s football club, Seongnam FC.  
    
The Bundang Police Precinct announced Monday that they raided five divisions of the city government, including the planning and policy planning divisions. Lee’s home and other locations related to the case were not raided.  
   
“We cannot confirm specific investigation details such as what kind of documents were secured through the raid,” a spokesperson from the Bundang Police Precinct said. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Critics are saying that President Moon has passed this bill in order to protect himself and others in this administration from prosecution after they leave office:

President Moon Jae-in signed into law bills aimed at limiting prosecutors’ investigative powers, snubbing protests from prosecutors and the main opposition People Power Party (PPP).

During a Cabinet meeting, Tuesday, Moon approved revised bills of the Prosecutors’ Office Act and the Criminal Procedure Act, which were passed by the National Assembly on April 30 and Tuesday, respectively.

“Despite the government’s achievements to help authorities to be faithful to their roles, there are concerns about the prosecution’s political neutrality, fairness and selective justice,” Moon said during the meeting. “I believe this is why the National Assembly took a step forward to separate prosecutors’ investigative powers from their authority to indict.”

Korea Times

Here is what the critics are saying:

The main opposition PPP has condemned the prosecutorial reform bills, claiming they are aimed at protecting Moon and former officials of the Moon government from possible investigations by prosecutors. But proponents of the reform bills claim they will limit prosecutors from abusing their authority for political purposes.

“President Moon should convince the public of the reason why he seeks to pass the bills at the end of his presidency, and what are the benefits for the people,” PPP floor leader Rep. Kweon Seong-dong said during a rally in front of Cheong Wa Dae, Tuesday.

“We should think of why the DPK is striving to pass the bills despite using mean tricks. … While persuading lawmakers, a DPK member said at least 20 members of the party may go to jail (if the bills are not passed). This is the nature of the party’s effort to strip prosecutors of their investigative rights.”

To pass the bills, the DPK used the so-called “salami tactic,” which is cutting the plenary session into shorter one-day sessions. Due to this, the PPP’s efforts to stop the dominant ruling party from unilaterally passing the bills through filibusters ended in vain.

You can read more at the link.

So far North Korea has been using lofted trajectories to test their ICBMs so they land in the East Sea. However, they have fired missiles over Japan before, the most recent test in 2017. This would undoubtedly greatly increase tensions. However, they have also fired a space launch in 2016 pointing south towards the Philippines. It seems they would use this trajectory instead of firing over Japan to avoid ratcheting up tensions too much:

South Korean Defense Minister nominee Lee Jong-sup on Tuesday raised the possibility of North Korea test-firing a new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) at a standard angle to prove its atmospheric reentry technology.

In a written answer to a lawmaker’s question, Lee said that the North could conduct another test of the Hwasong-17 ICBM to verify the technology required to ensure the missile’s warhead can withstand extremely high temperatures during reentry to Earth’s atmosphere.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

I always said these two were an odd couple to be campaigning together because the only thing they could unit around was their dislike of former political rival Lee Jae-myung:

The alliance between President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol and software mogul-turned-politician Ahn Cheol-soo is crumbling.  
   
What began as a campaign alliance was supposed to lead to some form of power sharing if Yoon won the presidency.  
   
But just 36 days after that victory, the two men seem to be parting ways after Yoon ignored Ahn, chairman of his transition team, in the selection of his Cabinet.    
   
Ahn, head of the minor People’s Party, abruptly canceled his whole public schedule Thursday. He was scheduled to visit the Seoul Metropolitan Fire and Disaster Headquarters that morning. He skipped a transition committee Covid-19 response meeting later that afternoon. He also did not attend a “dosirak (packaged meal)” dinner with Yoon and other members of the transition team Wednesday evening. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.