Members of conservative youth groups stage a performance lampooning North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on a street in central Seoul on July 14, 2016, to back a recent decision to deploy an advanced U.S. missile defense system in South Korea. North Korea has warned of “physical action” against the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) aimed at countering the North’s missile threats. (Yonhap)
A group of residents from Goseong near South Korea’s eastern front line with North Korea rallies in front of the government complex in Seoul on July 11, 2016, to urge the government to come up with measures to support them as they have been financially hurt by the 2008 suspension of an inter-Korean tour program to Mount Kumgang on the North’s eastern coast. The tour program, in which South Koreans visited the scenic mountain resort via an overland route in the Goseong region across the Demilitarized Zone, was abruptly halted in July 2008 after a female South Korean tourist was shot to death by a North Korean soldier. (Yonhap)
It looks like the “Not In My Backyard” crowd has already started protesting the deployment of the THAAD missile defense system to South Korea:
The official announcement of deployment of an advanced U.S. missile defense system in Korea is bringing a huge backlash from residents of areas which are rumored to be candidate sites for the system.
People in the regions claim the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) will pose serious health risks to them and environmental damage due to strong electromagnetic waves.
Immediately after the announcement Friday, residents in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, and Waegwan of Chilgok County in North Gyeongsang Province, the two key candidate locations, expressed vehement opposition.
A coalition of 25 civic groups in Pyeongtaek, where the United States Forces Korea (USKF) headquarters will be moved, said they will hold a press conference on July 19 to announce their protest plans to block the possible deployment there.
“The noise and electromagnetic waves emanating from THAAD radar will pose grave health threats to residents here,” the coalition said in a statement. [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but like most Korean protests these people are blatantly lying to get public sentiment behind them. Anyone can Google and find out the safe keep out zones for the THAAD radar. In fact it is published in the draft Environmental Assessment document for the THAAD unit on Guam that can be downloaded at this link. Here is an excerpt from the document that discusses the safe keep out zones for the radar:
Operation of the THAAD battery requires the following exclusion zones along +/- 90 degrees of the axis of orientation of the THAAD radar system to avoid injury to personnel and damage to equipment from electromagnetic radiation (EMR) emitted from that radar: 328 feet (100 meters) for personnel, 1,640 feet (500 meters) for equipment, and 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) for aircraft. An earthen berm in front of the radar further reduces the ground-level EMR exposure risks. For aircraft, a Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) was established for the THAAD expeditionary mission starting in April 2013. The airspace coordination procedures for this flight restriction were documented in a Letter of Agreement between the Army, USAF, FAA, and Guam Air Route Traffic Control Center. Under Alternative 1, the TFR would continue to be used during THAAD radar operations.
So unless the THAAD radar is sitting 100 meters directly in front of someones house they will not be exposed to harmful EMR. Aircraft will need to stay 5.5 kilometers away from the radar which as the document shows on Guam they put restricted airspace measures over the radar site. These same safety measures will have to be done in Korea which I am sure USFK planners will do.
Members of a local environmental group hold a street campaign in central Seoul on July 4, 2016, to discourage the use of plastic bags for carrying items purchased at stores. The event took place one day after International Plastic Bag Free Day dedicated to heightening awareness about the problem of plastic waste, which takes a long time to degrade and contributes to air, water and soil pollution. (Yonhap)
Members of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), South Korea’s second-largest umbrella labor union, hold a rally in front of the Seoul Central District Court in southern Seoul on July 4, 2016, calling for the release of its jailed leader. In a high-profile ruling the same day, the court sentenced KCTU leader Han Sang-gyun to five years in jail for leading last year’s violent rallies in downtown Seoul. (Yonhap)
Hwang In-cheol holds up a sign saying “North Korea…Be Free My Father” at an event to send a letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in the border city Paju, north of Seoul, on June 17, 2016. His father Hwang Won has been in captivity since December 1969, when a South Korean plane carrying Hwang, a radio producer, and 50 other crew members and passengers was hijacked by a North Korean agent on its way from the eastern South Korean city of Gangneung to Seoul. (Yonhap)
For those interested the story of how Mr. Hwang’s dad was taken hostage can be read at the below link:
This is yet another example that Okinawa has turned into South Korea circa 2002:
An overflow crowd of some 65,000 people packed a sports stadium Sunday to demand that U.S. forces leave Okinawa and drop a plan to move Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to a more remote area on the island.
Similar demonstrations were also scheduled in 41 of Japan’s 47 prefectures. More than 7,000 people gathered outside the Japanese parliament building in Tokyo to join the demand for a U.S. pullout and to bash Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
A recent rash of crimes, including the slaying of a 20-year-old woman that has been linked to a U.S. civilian base worker, have tapped into Okinawa resentment over the disproportionate number of U.S. troops here, compared with the rest of Japan, and a sense of abandonment and betrayal by the central government even after it regained control of the island in 1972.
With U.S. servicemembers, family members and others with SOFA status strongly encouraged to avoid the protest area, Gov. Takeshi Onaga called for a total withdrawal of Marines.
“I will never forgive the inhumane and brutal act that trampled women’s human rights. I am indignant,” said Onaga, who won election on an anti-base platform. [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but it is interesting that the anti-US base Governor is only calling for an end to the US Marine presence on the island. It would be interesting statistic to see if the Marines really do cause more crime than the other service branches on Okinawa? It has already been shown that the US military overall commits far less crime per capita than the local population, but of course none of this matters to activists looking to use any crime they can to advance their political agenda. It is an impossibility for such a large population of US military servicemembers on Okinawa to be completely crime free which means the activists will continue to find incidents to protest.
Members of the Korean Public Service and Transport Workers’ Union form a human chain around the building housing the finance ministry in Sejong, south of Seoul, on June 3, 2016, to protest against the introduction of a performance-based pay system. The government is pushing the system as part of economic and labor reforms. (Yonhap)
Considering that the article states this group is practicing “hate speech” it looks like it is probably the Zaitokukai group that has been protesting not only North Korea, but also South Korea’s claims to Dokdo and the comfort women issue:
Riot police try to form a barrier between members of the ultraconservative anti-Korean Zaitokukai organization and a group of counterprotesters in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward in May 2013. | SATOKO KAWASAKI
The Japanese city of Kawasaki, where anti-Korean rallies are often held, has refused to allow an anti-Korean organization from using a park to hold a demonstration.
Japan’s Kyodo News reported on Tuesday that the city government decided not to allow an anti-Korean group to hold a protest on Sunday at a park in the city.
The city government’s decision marks the first such case since Japan legislated the antihate speech law aimed at preventing rallies against a specific race or country of origin.
Kyodo reported that the organization held 13 anti-Korean rallies in the city since 2013.
Kawasaki Mayor Norihiko Fukuda said that it is very regrettable that hate speech rallies have been held around the city, adding that the latest decision was made to ensure the safety of citizens who are targeted by unfair and discriminatory words and acts. [KBS World Radio]
Here is an example of what the Zaitokukai group says during their protests:
But despite their purported political nature, a “significant” number of the demonstrations in reality featured a string of derogatory invective against ethnic minorities, Maeda said.
Prominent examples of vitriolic language favored by the protesters include violent slogans such as “You should all be massacred,” phrases such as “Get the hell out of Japan,” and insults calling Koreans “cockroaches,” according to video analysis of 72 such rallies conducted by the ministry.
In the rallies, participants typically brandish placards and yell epithets while marching on the streets of neighborhoods home to large numbers of ethnic Koreans such as Shin-Okubo in Tokyo and Tsuruhashi in Osaka.
The ministry, meanwhile, attributed a recent drop in the frequency of these rallies to a 2014 Osaka High Court ruling that ordered Zaitokukai to pay about ¥12 million in damages for a series of hateful rallies it organized in front of a Kyoto-based Korean school.
The survey also followed an unprecedented move by the ministry last December to issue an official warning to Zaitokukai to halt its hateful activities. [Japan Times]
You can read more at the link, but that is pretty provocative to march down Shin-Okubo and say stuff like that. Whenever I go to Tokyo I usually find a place to stay in Shin-Okubo because it is a fairly cheap to find a place to stay there with one of the Korean owned hotels.
A crowd of protesters rally for improvements in South Korean labor law in a public demonstration organized by the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, the country’s second-largest umbrella union, in downtown Seoul on May 1, 2016. (Yonhap)
