The Butcher of the Cheonan is to visit New York and meet with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It seems whenever Kim Jong-un is serious about getting something done this is the thug he sends:
Kim Yong-chol
U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed Tuesday that North Korean vice chairman Kim Yong-chol is heading to New York as part of ongoing preparations for his talks with the communist country’s leader.
“We have put a great team together for our talks with North Korea. Meetings are currently taking place concerning Summit, and more. Kim Young Chol, the Vice Chairman of North Korea, heading now to New York,” Trump said in a message posted on Twitter.
Calling the official’s visit to the U.S. a “solid response to my letter,” Trump said “thank you.”
Kim Yong-chol arrived in Beijing earlier in the day en route to the United States, with sources saying he is expected to meet with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to get prepared for the high-stakes talks between Trump and Kim Jong-un. [Yonhap]
ROK Heads may remember that when Kim Yong-chol visited South Korea protesters tried to block his entry at the DMZ, but were foiled by ROK authorities. Human Rights group should go and protest against this guy in New York.
Choo Mi-ae, leader of the ruling Democratic Party, holds the hands of a “comfort woman” statue at Museum of Korean American Heritage in New York on Nov. 17, 2017 (New York time). Comfort women refer to those who were forcibly taken to Japanese front-line military brothels during World War II. (Yonhap)
This will probably make for a good reelection campaign ad for the assemblyman who also fights crime in his neighborhood:
Purse snatchers of New York, watch out for your district assemblyman — Ron Kim (D-Flushing), the state legislature’s first-ever Korean American member, chased and caught a thief on the streets of downtown Flushing last week.
The assemblyman reportedly tackled a 25-year-old man, Daniel Fish, to the ground after hearing the young man snatched a purse from walking mother with a stroller around 1 p.m., according to the New York Police Department.
A good Samaritan got the bag back from Fish, but he fled after.
That’s when Kim — walking to his office near Main Street and 38th Street — saw the Samaritan chasing after Fish. He joined the chase, all the while calling 911.
Kim and the Samaritan had lost Fish when someone shouted, “That’s him!”
Kim tackled Fish to the ground after another foot pursuit and held him there until police got to the scene. Kim’s glasses were reportedly broken in the process. [Korea Times]
Via a reader tip comes this story of a Korean-American restaurant owner in New York who was treating his illegal immigrant employees as if they were Kaesong Industrial Complex workers:
During the busiest banquet season at Kum Gang San, a venerable 24-hour Korean restaurant in Flushing, Queens, employees said they often worked more than 16 hours, with no overtime, and earned less than the minimum wage. When times were slow, workers had to shovel snow from the owner’s driveway and move the owner’s son to a new apartment.
But the final indignity that prompted employees to file a lawsuit in 2012 came after workers were told to pick cabbage at a farm outside the city on their day off. When they refused, the workers said, they were suspended.
Last Thursday, a federal magistrate judge ruled that Kum Gang San, the owner, Ji Sung Yoo, and two restaurant managers owed the 11 employees who had filed a lawsuit claiming wage theft $2.67 million.
“I do see this as a victory because this lawsuit, yes, was about getting the money we were owed, but it was also about changing conditions,” Chul Park, 47, one of the plaintiffs, said through an interpreter on Sunday outside the restaurant. “Even though I am no longer working here, I know that this is going to impact the workers who are here now.”
The case is the latest involving an ethnic restaurant that has been found to exploit workers, many of whom are undocumented immigrants from the same country as the restaurant bosses.
A federal magistrate judge, Michael H. Dolinger, wrote in his decision that Kum Gang San not only persisted in paying employees “grossly substandard wages and diverting some of their tip income, but — in violation of statutes and regulations — they made sure to deny the workers any information that would disclose the violations of their rights.” [New York Times]
You can read more at the link, but Ji Sung Yoo has had a long history of exploiting employees so it is about time this ruling came out against him.
