Tag: South Korea

How can the KCTU claim to represent the best interests of Korean workers if they are advocating for foreign illegal immigrants who broke the law to take jobs from Koreans?:

The Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), one of the country’s two major umbrella labor unions with more than 1 million members, is moving to embrace undocumented foreigners here in an attempt to broaden its coalition, labor officials said.

During an event hosted by the KCTU at its headquarters in Seoul on July 25, senior officials discussed ways to strengthen the rights of “all migrant workers.” They said there should be a fundamental reform of the government system of handling the migrant laborers who work here without valid visas. Abolishing the deportation policy targeting such people and giving them the right to stay were among the ideas suggested and advocated at the event.

Korea Times

Here is twisted logic on this from the KCTU:

The spokesman’s comment comes after Udaya Rai, head of a migrant workers’ union under the KCTU, said at the KCTU event that the government should abandon its policy of cracking down on undocumented migrant workers.

“The policy of cracking down on and deporting undocumented immigrants begets countless of human rights violations and stirs up anxiety and fear,” he said. “Exploitation and violence are justified just because they are undocumented. There should be a policy to give them the right to stay in order to end this vicious circle.”

You can read more at the link, but should authorities not arrest bank robbers because it stirs “anxiety and fear” in these criminals as well? If you commit criminal activity you should be arrested and illegal immigration is a crime. If the KCTU doesn’t like the fact it is a crime then change the law to have open borders where anyone can come in and take Korean jobs. Good luck with getting the Korean public to support that.

It is kind of surprising that Kakao is not able to dominate the younger social media market in South Korea:

Instagram has emerged as the social media app South Korea’s teens spend the most time on, outpacing KakaoTalk by more than double, data showed Monday.

According to data from mobile marketing and data analysis company IGAWorks, Korea’s smartphone users under 20 spent a total of 94.1 million hours scrolling on Instagram in June, making the app the leading social media platform in popularity for the age group. This figure was nearly double the time they spent on the next most popular app, mobile messenger KakaoTalk, with 48.2 million hours.

Instagram’s popularity is particularly salient in the under-20 age group, given that KakaoTalk is the most used social media app among Korea’s general population.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

Another example of the growing trilateral cooperation in Northeast Asia:

The defense chiefs of South Korea, the United States and Japan signed a document on the Trilateral Security Cooperation Framework (TSCF) on Sunday , Seoul’s defense ministry said, in a move solidifying their continued commitment to three-way security cooperation against North Korean threats.

South Korean Defense Minister Shin Won-sik and his U.S. and Japanese counterparts, Lloyd Austin and Minoru Kihara, respectively, inked a Memorandum of Cooperation on the framework in Tokyo amid their deepening security cooperation in response to the North’s persistent nuclear and missile threats and growing military alignment with Russia.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This looks pretty suspicious:

South Korean police questioned three Chinese students who used a drone to record panoramic views of the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt at Busan in June, a Busan Metropolitan Police officer said Thursday. The three were suspected of illegally recording video of the carrier and South Korean Naval Operations Command on June 23 and June 25, the police officer told Stars and Stripes by phone. The students, who police described as being in their 30s or 40s, were questioned and released but remain under investigation, the officer said.

Stars and Stripes

You can read more at the link.

This seems like a fair compromise, Japan gets their UNESCO site and South Korea gets a marker explaining the history of Korean forced laborers:

South Korea has given the green light to designate Japan’s gold and silver mines on Sado Island — where an estimated over 1,500 Koreans were forced to work at the end of Japan’s colonial rule — as a UNESCO World Heritage site, the Foreign Ministry announced on Friday.

Japan’s ongoing efforts to have the Sado Island Gold Mines recognized have fueled a dispute with South Korea. The controversy revolves around Japan’s deliberate omission of its history regarding the forced mobilization of Koreans during its brutal colonial rule over the peninsula. (….)

An inscription on the World Heritage list typically requires a two-thirds majority vote from the WHC member states. However, it has become customary for the final decision to be reached through consensus, ensuring broader agreement and cooperation among the committee members.

The South Korean Foreign Ministry’s confirmation came hours after Japan’s Asahi Shimbun reported that a preliminary agreement had been reached. Under the agreement, Japan will display the history of Korean forced laborers at the site in exchange for South Korea’s consent to the inscription of the Sado Mine complex as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

This just shows how little people in the west know about South Korea to confuse its flag and athletes with North Korea:

The South Korean sports ministry said Saturday it is seeking a meeting with International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach over a gaffe during the opening ceremony for the Paris Olympics in which South Korea was incorrectly introduced as North Korea during the parade of athletes.

In a statement, the ministry said Jang Mi-ran, the second vice minister of sports who attended the ceremony in the French capital Friday, has asked the IOC to arrange a meeting with Bach over the incident, and asked the country’s chef de mission, or the top delegate, Jeong Gang-sun, to demand a quick response from the IOC and the local organizing committee.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

South Korea best be careful on what foreigners it embraces. It needs foreigners that learn to speak Korean and understands Korean culture and history. If not the country could become less Korean and look more like this and this:

President Yoon Suk Yeol said Thursday that local governments’ cooperation with the state was crucial in encouraging foreign residents to settle here to address the population crisis in South Korea.

At a meeting held in Hongseong-gun, South Chungcheong Province, Yoon, who presided over a meeting with heads of the autonomous governments, said the central and local governments should take preemptive actions to support foreign nationals to settle and work in Korean society, as the country faces a growing shortage in its working-age population.

“We must take preemptive action on the labor shortage in the wake of the fast aging of the population coupled with the low birth rate,” Yoon said before some 100 participants. “The low birth rate issue and the foreign worker issue must be seriously addressed through the collaboration of central and local governments.”

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

It is expected that if Kamala Harris wins the U.S. presidency she will continue to emphasize a strong U.S.-ROK alliance and push for the fairy tale of a denuclearized North Korea:

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, right, stands at a military observation post as she visits the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas, in Panmunjeom in South Korea on Sept. 29, 2022. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

Kamala Harris, endorsed by Biden on Sunday as his successor as the Democratic presidential candidate, is anticipated to continue the Biden administration’s emphasis on alliances if the U.S. vice president wins the upcoming presidential election against Trump, according to analysts. She could become the first Black woman and first Asian American to lead the ticket of a major U.S. political party. 
  
As a senator during Trump’s presidency, Harris criticized Trump’s conciliatory approach toward North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, arguing that Trump was not responding strongly enough to North Korea’s nuclear threats. 
  
“Let me start by saying this: I guarantee you I won’t be exchanging love letters with Kim Jong-un,” Harris said in August 2019 in response to the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)’s question to Democratic presidential candidates whether they would agree to partial sanctions relief in exchange for the partial dismantling of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. “President Trump has handed Kim one PR victory after the next, all without securing any real concessions, so the next president will have serious work to do. 
  
“Ultimately, we can’t accept North Korea as a nuclear weapons state,” she added. “But it’s clear that simply demanding complete denuclearization is a recipe for failure; we must work closely with our allies to contain and reverse the short-term threats posed by Pyongyang as we work toward that long-term goal.” 
  
This contrasts with Trump, who boasted of his friendship with Kim, saying the North Korean leader “misses” him and “would like to see [him] back” in a speech to the Republican National Convention on July 18. 
  
During an appearance on CBS in September last year, Harris said, “We are all absolutely clear and unequivocal about our goal of the complete denuclearization of North Korea.”

Though not directly involved with Korean affairs and having limited exposure to the Korean public, Harris visited South Korea in September 2022, where she stressed the “ironclad” nature of the U.S. commitment to the defense of the Republic of Korea.  

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but according to the article Harris has approximately 8 hours of experience visiting South Korea back in 2022.