Here is the latest on the U.S. Army NCO jailed in Russia:
A U.S. soldier, stationed in South Korea but detained in Russia on suspicion of stealing from his girlfriend and threatening to kill her, went on trial on Thursday, the state news agency RIA reported. Gordon Black was detained on May 2 in Vladivostok in Russia’s far east on suspicion of stealing from his Russian girlfriend.
Citing local prosecutors, Russian independent media reported he had also subsequently been charged with threatening to kill her. Black, a U.S. Army staff sergeant posted at Camp Humphreys outside Seoul, pleaded guilty to theft in May, RIA reported at the time, citing interior ministry officials.
Here is also more details on what he is alleged to have done:
Prosecutors said the couple had quarrelled and the American had subsequently “forcibly grabbed the girl by the neck, which she perceived as a real threat to her life.” Black is then alleged to have stolen 10,000 roubles ($110) from her purse and fled their shared apartment, according to media reports. He was later arrested at a local hotel, where he had purchased plane tickets and intended to fly back to the U.S.
You can read more at the link, but the more I read about this case the more likely to me that this was not some kid of honey trap and instead this guy just being an idiot and now facing the consequences of his actions.
It looks like South Korea is back on Putin’s good graces again:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday he highly appreciates South Korea’s position not to directly supply weapons to Ukraine, and that Moscow is ready to restore relations with Seoul.
Putin made the remark during a meeting with representatives of leading international news agencies, including Yonhap News Agency, which was held on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.
The remark drew attention in that Putin, who began his fifth term as president last month, showed a positive attitude toward South Korea and openly talked about the possibility of improving relations with Seoul.
I don’t know why anyone would want to visit North Korea other than for morbid curiosity. Ever dollar spent there is helping to fund the regime:
Russian President Vladimir Putin has been briefed on tourist exchanges between Moscow and Pyongyang and preparations for his visit to North Korea are underway, the Kremlin has said.
The Russian news agency TASS on Saturday (local time) quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying, “Preparations for the visit are proceeding at their own pace.”
Putin has not visited North Korea since July 2000.
TASS also reported that Alexander Kozlov, the environment minister for Moscow, who is leading an intergovernmental commission on cooperation with North Korea, touted the growing popularity of tourist exchanges between the two countries during his meeting with Putin earlier Saturday.
This is an area where South Korea has decided to break away from many western countries and attend Czar President Putin’s inauguration ceremony:
South Korean Ambassador to Russia Lee Do-hoon attended the inauguration ceremony of its leader Vladimir Putin, who began his fifth term as president on Tuesday (local time), Seoul officials said.
Lee’s attendance at the event held at the Kremlin came in contrast to counterparts from South Korea’s ally, the United States, and many Western countries that boycotted the event over its war in Ukraine. European Union nations were also divided over sending delegations to the inauguration, according to news reports.
The decision was made after careful consideration of various pending bilateral issues and the need to manage bilateral relations with Moscow, a source with knowledge of the matter said.
Here is another weird story of a stupid Soldier getting himself in significant trouble:
A U.S. Army staff sergeant who was visiting his girlfriend in Russia was arrested and remains in custody on charges he stole from her, U.S. officials said. Staff Sgt. Gordon Black, 34, was detained Thursday in Vladivostok, a military and commercial port in the Pacific, and is in a pre-trial detention facility, Army spokeswoman Cynthia Smith said Tuesday in a statement. Black was assigned to Eighth Army, U.S. Forces Korea at Camp Humphreys in South Korea and was scheduled to move to Fort Cavazos, Texas, Smith said. Instead, Black, who is married, traveled to Russia to see a longtime girlfriend, according to officials who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel details.
His arrest further complicates U.S. relations with Russia, which have grown increasingly tense over the war in Ukraine. “Instead of returning to the continental United States, Black flew from Incheon, Republic of Korea, through China to Vladivostok, Russia, for personal reasons,” Smith said. “Black did not request official clearance, and [the Defense Department] did not authorize his travel to China and Russia. There is no evidence Black intended to remain in Russia after his [permanent change of station] leave period ended.”
You can read more at the link, but the Soldier’s mom believes the Russian girlfriend was a spy that lured him to Russia. Here is what else his mom had to say to ABC News:
Upon arrival in Russia, Jones said Black told her he was questioned by authorities at the airport for “nine hours.”
“He said he was when he got off the plane, that he was pulled to the back in this room for nine hours and questioned why he was there,” Jones said.
Jones said she did not know if her son had a visa to visit Russia.
Jones was critical of her son’s girlfriend, whom she says he met at a club in South Korea over a year ago. Jones claims her son told her the girlfriend was deported to Russia from South Korea after she and Black allegedly got into a dispute in the fall of 2023.
“I knew something was going to happen,” Jones said.
Considering they questioned him for nine hours, that leads me to believe the girlfriend was not a spy. Instead Russian intelligence probably could not believe their good fortune and needed nine hours to figure out what to do with him. It looks like SSG Gordon has been lying to his family as well:
“There was some woman involved… He had been seeing her for a good while. Apparently she was living in South Korea until she was deported,” he said. “I have a feeling that she had a lot to do with it,” Jones said, adding that he learned of the arrest last Thursday.
According to Black’s stepfather, Jones had left the U.S. for South Korea two and a half years ago, “and the army kept extending him there. He was only supposed to have been there for a year.”
The Army did not involuntary extend him in South Korea for an additonal 1.5 years. He very likely volunteered to extend so he could spend more time with his Russian girlfriend. Notice he decided to go back to the U.S. after the Russian girlfriend was deported. This is what happened that caused her to get deported once again from The Daily Beast article:
The channel also claims Black has a history of beating Vashchuk, who is said to have called the police on him over an incident in South Korea. He’s charged with “theft causing significant damage to a citizen,” which carries a maximum penalty of five years behind bars.
Unnamed U.S. officials told the AP that Black and his Russian girlfriend had gotten into a “domestic dispute” last fall while they were in South Korea and she left the country shortly after.
The domestic dispute probably caused South Korean authorities to check her immigration status which led to her getting deported is my guess. So this guy gets into a domestic dispute with her that causes her deportation, I doubt she was very happy to see him turn up in Russia looking for her. Anyway this is what the Russian news media has been reporting that SSG Black did that got him arrested:
Russian news Telegram channels including Baza reported that Black had been serving in the South Korean port of Pyeongtaek when he met a Russian woman, who moved back to Vladivostok. Black visited the woman recently, during which time they argued. Gordon is accused of attacking the woman and stealing 200,000 rubles; around $2,200.
Radio Free Europe was able to track down the Russian girlfriend’s TikTok trail to provide further information about her:
U.S. Staff Sergeant Gordon Black (left) and his Russian wife, Aleksandra Vashchuk
RFE/RL found a TikTok account of Black’s romantic partner, Vladivostok native Aleksandra Vashchuk, who posted numerous videos of the couple together in South Korea, including at least one showing Black in his U.S. Army fatigues.
Among the hundreds of often profanity-laced TikTok videos posted by Vashchuk, 31, are several in which she refers to Black as her “husband” and affectionately as “pindos,” a Russian slang word for Americans that roughly translates to “Yankee punk.”
Most of the videos of the couple together in 2022 and 2023 appear to have been shot in South Korea, where Vashchuk says on TikTok that she had lived for more than five years. (…..)
In one of the videos posted to Vashchuk’s TikTok account, which she closed to the public on May 7, Black is seen in his U.S. military fatigues with his name clearly visible on his uniform.
In one video, Vashchuk asks Black to comment on U.S.-Russian relations for her followers. He echoes several talking points frequently used by the Kremlin to justify the February 2022 invasion, calling NATO “pretty aggressive.”
“I understand Russia’s position, obviously. They want to defend their country,” Black says in the video before Vashchuk interjects and says former U.S. President Donald Trump “is better” than current U.S. President Joe Biden.
You can read more at the link to include some of the videos that SSG Black was in. What is unclear is that media has been saying SSG Black is married. His mom claims Vashchuk is a girlfriend. If so then who is he married to? Someone back in the U.S. or is the media referring to his supposed marriage to Vashchuk? Anyway this whole situation is pretty stupid and should serve as warning to others to not travel to Russia.
Evaluation of T-80U by South Korea and Historical moment of Russian BMP-3 arriving in South Korean as part of old Soviet-Russia's debt issues. Newly formed Russia has delivered non-downgraded original T-80U and the others to South Korea shortly after USSR collapsed. According to… pic.twitter.com/CYwxknaGrB
I can’t feel sympathy from anyone from the western aligned world who gets arrested while visiting or living in Russia. It is well known the risks of becoming detained whenever Russia needs a hostage:
The detention of a South Korean national by Russian authorities on espionage allegations has emerged as a significant diplomatic challenge for Seoul, particularly against the backdrop of strained relations between the two nations.
Observers suggest that the detainee could be caught up in Russia’s hostage diplomacy tactics, and anticipate that the situation could drag on for months, if not years. Moreover, this incident could signal a shift in Russia’s stance toward North Korean defectors, particularly considering the detainee’s purported involvement in assisting North Korean workers in the far eastern region of Russia.
Earlier this week, the Russian state-owned media outlet TASS agency reported that a South Korean man named Baek Kwang-soon, aged 53, was apprehended in January on charges of espionage in Vladivostok. He was subsequently transferred to Moscow’s Lefortovo detention facility in February, typically reserved for high-profile political detainees. The Lefortovsky Court has extended his detention until June 15.
This marks the first known case of a South Korean national being arrested on espionage charges in Russia, where such offenses carry penalties of up to 20 years in prison.
It will be interesting to see how many of these refugee from Russia that South Korea ends up accepting:
A record number of Russians are seeking asylum in South Korea, according to South Korean authorities, with applications surging fivefold last year as Russians became the largest group seeking refuge in the East Asian country.
A total of 5,750 Russian nationals sought asylum in South Korea in 2023, according to a report released earlier this monthby the Korean Immigration Service. That’s five times higher than the 1,038 who sought protection in 2022 – and more than the total number of asylum applications from Russians recorded between 1994 and 2019.
Last year also marked the highest number of overall asylum applications for at least the past eight years, according to the Immigration Service. After Russians, the largest groups of asylum seekers came from Kazakhstan, China and Malaysia.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has received a Russian-made luxury car from Russian President Vladimir Putin as a gift demonstrating the special bonds between the two leaders, state media reported Tuesday.
The gift serves as a “clear demonstration of the special personal relations between the two leaders and as the best one,” according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
Russia conveyed the vehicle for Kim’s personal use Sunday to Pak Jong-chon, a secretary of the ruling Worker’s Party of Korea, and Kim Yo-jong, the sister of the North’s leader. She delivered Kim Jong-un’s thanks to Putin to the Russian side, the report said.
Now the Russians are making nuclear threats on behalf of the Kim regime:
Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, greets North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui in a meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow on Jan. 16. [AP/YONHAP]
Russia’s top envoy to Pyongyang said that North Korea may decide to conduct a seventh nuclear test if the United States continues taking “provocative steps” in the region.
“I think whether or not there will be another nuclear experiment in North Korea depends on how the military-political situation on the peninsula will unfold,” Russian Ambassador to North Korea Aleksandr Matsegora said in an interview with Russia’s state-controlled TASS news agency Wednesday.
![Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, greets North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui in a meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow on Jan. 16. [AP/YONHAP]](https://i0.wp.com/koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/02/07/d6721c02-3418-40bd-b588-96d06b1e6580.jpg?w=640&ssl=1)
