Tag: Korea

Missing South Korean Teenager Likely Joined ISIS

| January 21, 2015

I am willing to bet like many foreign jihadis this teenager is probably a loser who spends a lot of time in front of his computer and feels like joining ISIS is some kind of way to feel empowered:

rok flag

A South Korean teenager who recently vanished in Turkey may have crossed the border into Syria to join the Islamic State (IS), a Seoul official said Tuesday.

The whereabouts of the 18-year-old Korean, identified only by his surname Kim, have been unknown since he arrived in Turkey on Jan. 10. A local Turkish newspaper claimed that he had exchanged e-mails with IS before traveling to the country.

Citing CCTV footage obtained by Turkish police, the ranking South Korean foreign ministry official said Kim took a van together with an unidentified man after meeting him in front of a hotel in Kilis, a city situated near the border with Syria.

Kim and the unknown man then got off near a refugee camp in Besiriye, about 18 kilometers southeast from Kilis, on that day, the official said, adding the van with a Syrian plate is an unlicensed taxi.

“Their whereabouts have not been known since they got off in Besiriye,” the official said, asking not to be named. “There are also no records showing that they crossed the border at a checkpoint.”

There has been no clear evidence so far supporting that Kim might have joined the IS group, but Seoul doesn’t exclude such a possibility, the official said.

“The government cannot presuppose a possibility (that Kim might have joined the IS), but (if it is confirmed), it is a very worrisome situation,” he said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but ultimately I am willing to bet this teenager will regret doing this.

Park Administration Proposes Inter-Korean Railway

| January 21, 2015

All I can think about when I read about this plan is a train full of potential hostages whenever the Kim regime needs to use them:

The Park Geun-hye administration unveiled Monday a series of new proposals for inter-Korean projects, including an ambitious plan to operate trains from Seoul to cities in the North this summer by linking severed railway lines.

Four government offices including the unification, foreign and defense ministries briefed Park on their proposals for unification preparation and projects they would like to push this year. The briefing was arranged after the government stated that this year should be a turning point in the unification of the two Koreas.

This year marks the 70th anniversary of Korea’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule and the subsequent national division.

“President Park declared her intention to prepare for unification at the New Year’s press conference on Jan. 12, and the ministries also agreed that the time has come to look back on seven decades of national division and prepare for unification,” a senior government official said.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

Picture of the Day: Anti-Ebola Outfit

| January 14, 2015

Anti-Ebola clothing

A suit to protect medical workers from the Ebola virus is being tested at a medical center in Daejeon, South Chungcheong Province, on Jan. 13, 2015. Last week, South Korea sent a group of five doctors and four nurses to Britain for safety training before flying to Sierra Leone on Jan. 19 for a four-week mission. Seoul plans to send a total of 30 medical staff members to Sierra Leone. The first batch of 10 health care workers has worked there since late December while the final batch of 11 workers will be sent next month. (Yonhap)

North Korea Demands that the US and South Korea Stop Military Exercises

| January 13, 2015

Remember when everyone in the media was highlighting Kim Jong-un’s offer of high level talks as some great thing?  Like I said then he was just playing the media to frame the US and the ROK as the bad guys when the North Koreans like they always do make demands to stop US-ROK military exercises:

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North Korea called on South Korea Sunday to stop all military exercises, including joint drills with the United States, if it really wants to improve inter-Korean ties.

“If the South is truly determined to improve inter-Korean relations through dialogue and negotiations … it should stop all kinds of war schemes, including reckless military exercises carried out jointly with foreign forces,” Minju Joson, North Korea’s cabinet newspaper, said. “War rehearsals and dialogues cannot coexist.”

The North Korean newspaper also warned that if Seoul sticks to the joint war rehearsals against the North, inter-Korean relations will get much worse and the South Korean government will have to take all the responsibility for it.

The Sunday warning is the latest in the North’s recent desperate efforts to stop rounds of military exercises conducted annually between South Korea and the U.S.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

Korean-American Arrested for Pro-North Korean Remarks Deported

| January 13, 2015

The Korean-American woman who went on a speaking tour in South Korea praising North Korea has now been deported:

A Korean-American woman was expelled from South Korea Saturday for making a series of pro-North Korean remarks during her on-stage talks shows in South Korea, Justice Ministry officials said.

Shin Eun-mi was put on Korean Air Flight KE011 leaving Seoul at 7:50 p.m. for Los Angeles after undergoing two hours of questioning by immigration officials. The expulsion bars her from entering South Korea for the next five years.

On Thursday, the 54-year-old was suspended of indictment after being accused of making comments sympathetic to the North Korean regime at talk shows she hosted in Seoul and other provincial cities in the past several months in violation of South Korea’s National Security Law.

The law bans any activities meant to praise, promote or propagandize North Korean ideals in the country.

“I feel like I was betrayed by my lover. It’s just like an one-sided love,” she told reporters right after receiving the expulsion order. “I leave here today, but the government cannot drive my heart loving the country out of my fatherland. I will continue to wish for peace and reunification of Korea.”

Since being sued by local conservative civic groups for alleged pro-North Korean remarks, she has said she is not a North Korean follower and her comments were all for the peaceful coexistence of the two Koreas.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but this case has drawn criticism that the National Security Law is being used to stop free speech in South Korea.  In regards to this case I disagree because foreign citizens by law are not supposed to be involved in political activity in South Korea.  So the next time she visits she should leave her politics back in California where it belongs.