I am sure if the ROK government funnels enough cash to Kim Jong-un then the decision to have a joint team can be expedited, that is what this current posturing is all about:
Chang Ung (R), an International Olympic Committee (IOC) member from North Korea, shakes hands with fellow IOC member Wu Ching-Kuo of Chinese Taipei (L) during the opening ceremony of the World Taekwondo Federation (WTF) World Taekwondo Championships at Taekwondowon’s T1 Arena in Muju, North Jeolla Province, on June 24, 2017. (Yonhap)
A veteran North Korean sports administrator visiting South Korea has expressed his misgivings about forming a joint Korean team for next year’s Winter Olympics south of the border due to the time crunch.
Chang Ung, the North’s lone member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), is in South Korea for the World Taekwondo Federation (WTF) World Taekwondo Championships, which opened in Muju, 240 kilometers south of Seoul, on Saturday. He traveled with a delegation from the North Korea-led International Taekwondo Federation (ITF), whose demonstration team performed at the WTF event’s opening ceremony.
Chang crossed the tense border just days after South Korea’s new sports minister, Do Jong-hwan, proposed forming a joint women’s hockey team and holding skiing events at North Korea’s Masikyrong resort during the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics.
As an IOC member, Chang has been peppered with questions about Do’s ideas. According to an official with the WTF competition, Chang spoke of his doubts about the South Korean minister’s suggestions. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but according to the article the North Koreans may not have anyone even qualify for the Winter Olympics to have a joint team with. Another thing to keep in mind is that the Kim regime had previously wanted to host some of the Winter Olympics events at their new ski resort. I wonder if this is something else that the current ROK government may try to pursue?
Just another example of how the Olympics has become a professional sports league which even has its own free agency period:
Canadian-born ice hockey player Brock Radunske, second from right, speaks with his teammates in the national team in this file photo taken March 27, 2013 at the ice rink of the National Training Center in Seoul. / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-cheol
Since the Canadian-born ice hockey player Brock Radunske joined Anyang Halla to become the first naturalized Korean athlete, five more foreign-born players have migrated to Korea. Matt Dalton, Eric Reagan, Brian Young and Michael Swift are all from Canada and Mike Testwuide is American-born.
The six foreign-born athletes are now playing for Korea’s national team, making the once homogeneous team diverse. Foreign-born athletes account for nearly 25 percent of the 25-member men’s hockey team.
Jim Paek, the national hockey team manager, said diversity has made the men’s ice hockey team stronger. [Korea Times]
It is pretty clear that the Olympics have turned into a professional sports league considering how it has its own free agency period now for countries to recruit athletes from other countries:
South Korea’s figure skating pair Min Yu-ra (R) and Alexander Gamelin wait for their score in the ice dance free dance program after performing at the ISU Four Continents Figure Skating Championships in Gangneung, Gangwon Province, on Feb. 17, 2017. (Yonhap)
After a solid performance at an International Skating Union (ISU) competition here, South Korea’s figure skating pair Min Yu-ra and Alexander Gamelin said Friday they really want to compete in front of home crowds at the Winter Olympics next year.
Min and Gamelin, who have been skating together since 2015, finished eighth among 16 ice dance teams at the ISU Four Continents Figure Skating Championships in Gangneung, Gangwon Province, some 230 kilometers east of Seoul. The ISU competition, open to non-Europeans, is one of the test events for the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics.
“We received a lot of energy from home crowds even when our names were announced,” Min said. “Since the PyeongChang Olympics is going to be here, we expect lots of support from fans. We’re so excited.”
Min and Gamelin were also eighth last year, but this time they had a better score, improving 6.27 points from 2016 to finish with 144.69 points Friday.
“Last year, we didn’t have enough preparations because we had little time skating together,” Min said. “But this year, we prepared well. We wanted to get a better result than last year, but other teams skated better this time. We’re satisfied with the result today.”
Gamelin is an American citizen, but is seeking naturalization to compete at the PyeongChang Winter Olympics next year with Min.
At ISU competitions, as long as one member of a tandem is South Korean, that duo can compete under the South Korean flag. At the Olympics, however, both members of a team must be South Korean citizens to represent the country. [Yonhap]
This photo, provided by the organizing committee for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics on Feb. 10, 2017, shows the Alpine Center for the international winter event in Jeongseon, 214 kilometers east of Seoul. (Yonhap)
Via a reader tip comes the latest slogan disaster from South Korea, this time from the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics:
“It’s you, PyeongChang.”
It makes sense grammatically, but what does it mean?
Many foreigners scratched their heads after reading the sentence featuring in an advertisement in major newspapers on Monday meant to promote the nation’s first winter Olympics in the mountain city of PyeongChang in February 2018.
The Gangwon Province government that created the ad said “It’s you, PyeongChang” was intended to promote that every member of the global village, Koreans and non-Koreans alike, has a role to make the event a success.
Yet few seemed to have found the message from it.
“The phrase doesn’t reach me in anyway,” said Celeste Kriel, a South African living in Seoul. “It can be interpreted in so many ways that it’s hard to grasp the message.”
An American teacher in Seoul said, “It sounds like they are really missing PyongChang… Maybe PyongChang is their long lost lover?”
Several other foreigners told The Korea Times that the message “unclear” and bewildering. [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but I wonder how much money they paid for some PR firm to come up with this slogan. Should have just asked us here at the ROK Drop to come up with slogans. Does anyone have any slogan suggestions they want to share?
South Korea is far from being the first country to naturalize foreign born athletes to bolster their Olympic teams:
From left, Eric Regan, Matt Dalton, Anna Frolina and Alexander Starodubets
Naturalized citizens will represent Korea at the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Games.
Two Canadian-born ice hockey players, Matt Dalton and Eric Regan, and two Russian-born biathletes, Alexander Starodubets and Anna Frolina, have acquired Korean citizenship, the Justice Ministry said on Thursday.
The Korean nationality law allows people with special talents in specific areas such as science, culture and sports to be fast-tracked to citizenship.
Dalton, 30, and Regan, 28, who play for Korean ice hockey club Anyang Halla, previously made names for themselves playing in Europe. Their addition to the team means there are now six naturalized players on the national ice hockey squad.
Starodubets and Frolina will be the first naturalized Koreans to represent the country in the biathlon. Starodubets, who was a member of the Russian junior national team, chose to represent Korea because it would give him more opportunities to compete. [Chosun Ilbo]
Nothing is going to stop the ROK government from putting on the best Winter Olympics that they possibly can, not even 500 year old trees:
Campaigners in South Korea have accused organisers of the 2018 winter Olympics of destroying a “sacred” forest to make room for a ski slope, and dismissed official assurances that the site will be restored to its original state after the Games.
Environment groups say the recently-completed removal of tens of thousands of trees from the slopes of Mount Gariwang, including ancient and rare species, amounts to an ecological disaster.
The site in the country’s north-east will host several days of Alpine skiing events during the Games in Pyeongchang, which will become only the third place in Asia to host the winter Olympics after Sapporo and Nagano in Japan.
The row between environmentalists and the Olympic organisers centres on a 500-year-old mountain forest that some South Koreans consider sacred due to its connections to the Chosun ruling dynasty.
Green Korea United claims that the removal of tens of thousands of trees will inflict irreparable damage on the area’s delicate ecosystem. [The Guardian]
You can read the rest at the link, but since Green Korea United is involved in this I would take their claims with a grain of salt since they were involved in the bogus USFK water dumping scandal. Additionally it was alleged that environmental groups like Green Korea had ties to North Korea back during the Il Shim Hue spy scandal a few years ago.
Gunilla Lindberg, chairwoman of the IOC Coordination Commission, tours the construction site of the Ice Arena, the venue for the short track and figure skating competitions for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, in Gangneung, Gangwon Province, on Jan. 15, 2015. (Yonhap)
There has been funding battles going on between the national and provincials governments in Korea in regards to the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics. The IOC has now stepped in to recommend that Korea try and share the 2018 Games with Japan to reduce costs. It appears the suggestion of sharing the games with their rival Japan has gotten the attention of Korea:
The 2018 PyeongChang Olympic Games chief organizer confirmed Friday “there is no possibility” events will be shared with cities outside of Korea.
“Construction for all the venues for the PyeongChang Games has begun. At this juncture, it is difficult to adopt the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) reform package,” the PyeongChang Organizing Committee for the 2018 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (POCOG) President and CEO Cho Yang-ho said in a statement.
He said he “highly appreciates” the IOC’s initiative for the reforms because it will be very effective for the Olympic Movement down the road, but insists all events in 2018 will be staged in the counties of PyeongChang and Jeongseon, and the city of Gangneung.
The IOC Monday unanimously approved President Thomas Bach’s 40-point “Olympic Agenda 2020” reform package, which includes recommendations allowing cities to stage some events in different countries to cut costs.
The IOC is worried that a new sliding venue under construction in Gangwon Province may have little use after the Games and wants the POCOG to move sliding events to countries that already have venues, such as Japan. But, local governments and interested parties have insisted they have no intention of splitting the host role with other countries. [Korea Times]
So the bottom line is that all the venues that will have no use after the Olympics will be built.
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