The ROK should be selling their advanced weaponry to Ukraine as a major export to help drive the Korean economy. With Poland and Romania buying ROK equipment as well, Ukraine would have allies next door with compatible capabilities:
South Korean National Security Adviser Chang Ho-jin issues a statement on a treaty signed between North Korea and Russia this week during a press briefing at the presidential office on June 20, 2024. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
The South Korean government said Thursday it will reconsider its stance on arms supply to Ukraine after North Korea and Russia signed a treaty that involves a mutual pledge to provide immediate military assistance if one of them is attacked.
National Security Advisor Chang Ho-jin also condemned “the comprehensive strategic treaty” signed during the summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang on Wednesday. (…..)
Chang said any cooperation that directly or indirectly aids North Korea’s military enhancement is a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions and will be subject to international scrutiny and sanctions, and vowed to take corresponding measures.
“We plan to reconsider the issue of arms support to Ukraine,” Chang also said, suggesting a shift in South Korea’s policy of not providing lethal aid to Ukraine.
Continued Russian aggression has been good for South Korea’s defense industry:
Romania has confirmed its plan to buy South Korean K-9 self-propelled howitzers for US$920 million, the defense ministry said Wednesday, in another boost for Seoul’s drive to clinch more arms export deals.
Romanian Defense Minister Angel Tilvar announced the decision during talks in Romania with Seoul’s defense chief Shin Won-sik, who is on a weeklong trip to Eastern Europe that will also take him to Poland, according to the ministry.
Shin thanked Tilvar for the decision and anticipated the deal — the biggest in Romania’s arms acquisition over the past seven years — will further activate defense and arms cooperation between the two countries.
Protest against doctors’ walkout Members from the Federation of Korean Medical School Industry Trade Union hold a news conference in front of the National Assembly in Seoul on June 17, 2024, calling for doctors to withdraw their planned walkout in protest against a hike in the medical school enrollment. Professors at Seoul National University Medical School entered an indefinite walkout earlier in the day, and doctors across the nation are set to join an indefinite collective action organized by the Korean Medical Association. (Yonhap)
The entitled and selfish doctors in Seoul have decided to walkout and leave patients without care:
A hospital affiliated with Seoul National University Hospital remains relatively quiet on June 17, 2024, as senior doctors go on an indefinite walkout in protest against the medical school quota hike.
Patients were denied appointments and sent home without treatment as a majority of doctors at Seoul National University Hospital (SNUH) and its three affiliates went on an indefinite walkout, demanding reconsideration of the medical school quota hike.
On Monday, 529 senior doctors, or 54.7 percent of those at SNUH and its three affiliates, began an indefinite strike in protest against the government’s first increase of the nationwide medical school admission quota in 27 years, by about 1,500 slots for next year.
The walkout is set to be followed by a nationwide one-day general strike by community doctors on Tuesday, although only a fraction of them are expected to join the collective action.
Doctors at SNUH, one of the most prominent university general hospitals in South Korea, are demanding that the government cancel administrative penalties imposed on protesting trainee doctors and reconsider the 2025 medical school quota hike.
After all these months why would the government give in now to these entitled doctors? If anything the government should start making demands against the doctors saying their medical licenses will be permanently revoked for intentionally leaving their jobs and canceling appointments:
Lim Hyun-taek, chief of the Korean Medical Association, announces the association’s plan to go on strike against the government’s medical reform measures during a press conference of the organization in Seoul on June 9, 2024. (Yonhap)
The country’s biggest doctors’ group offered Sunday to hold a vote on whether to go ahead with a mass walkout this week if the government accepts three demands, including revisiting the issue of increasing medical school admissions.
The Korean Medical Association (KMA) made the offer two days before it is scheduled to launch the walkout involving medical professors at the “Big 5” hospitals in Seoul, as well as community doctors.
The walkout will be in support of trainee doctors who have remained off the job since February in protest of the government’s medical school enrollment hike plan.
The KMA said it will give the government until 11 p.m. Sunday to respond to its three demands, which also include revising and supplementing key points in the government’s policy package for the essential medical services sector and canceling all penalties against the trainee doctors.
It is amazing how little these doctors in Seoul think of the Hippocratic Oath as they let patients go without care because of their own selfishness:
Doctors at major hospitals in Seoul and its neighboring areas have decided to stage indefinite walkouts, while medical professors resolved Wednesday to join community doctors in a one-day strike next week, demanding the suspension of a medical school quota hike.
In a meeting late Wednesday, professors from the country’s 40 medical schools decided to join the one-day general strike set for next Tuesday, organized by the biggest association of community doctors.
Kim Chang-soo, head of the Medical Professors Association of Korea, told Yonhap News Agency that the association has decided to join the strike, though he said it remains unclear how many professors will actually participate in the walkout.
An official at the Korea Meteorological Administration points to the location near Buan County, North Jeolla Province, where a 4.8-magnitude earthquake struck on Wednesday morning, on a map displayed at the administration in Seoul. Yonhap
A 4.8-magnitude earthquake struck an area near the southwestern county of Buan, North Jeolla Province, on Wednesday morning, marking the strongest tremor to be detected on the Korean Peninsula and its surrounding waters so far this year.
Usually, North Jeolla Province seldom experiences earthquakes, and it was the first time that a quake with a magnitude of more than 4 has occurred in the region.
According to the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA), the epicenter of the quake was detected 4 kilometers south-southwest of Buan at 8:26 a.m., with a latitude of 35.7 degrees north, a longitude of 126.71 degrees east, and a depth of 8 kilometers.
This should be considered a good thing for South Korea as China has repeatedly shown they are willing to use economic retaliation to try and coerce policy changes where the U.S. has not:
South Korea’s exports to the United States exceeded those to China so far this year, data showed Monday, raising the possibility that the U.S. could be the top export destination for South Korea for the first time in 22 years.
Outbound shipments to the U.S. amounted to $53.3 billion from January through May 2024, compared with South Korea’s export value to China of $52.69 billion, according to the data from Statistics Korea and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.
If the current trend continues, the U.S. will be the No. 1 export destination for South Korea for the first time since 2002.
Gen Z adults in France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Japan, South Korea are more opposed to mass immigration and to multiculturalism than older adults: pic.twitter.com/7gDzBsN7pO
