Articles by Choi Si-young
Choi Si-young
siyoungchoi@heraldcorp.com-
Yoon honors freedom fighters, vows to protect freedoms
President Yoon Suk Yeol said Wednesday his administration will work to realize the ideals of liberal democracy, at an annual ceremony marking the April 19 Revolution, a movement against election fraud that brought down South Korea’s first president, Syngman Rhee, in 1960. “The spirit of the revolution is written into our Constitution. That we cannot overlook freedoms of any single individual is what we must uphold as we run government. I will personally make sure we internalize tha
Politics April 19, 2023
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Images show North running inter-Korean factories
Infrared thermal cameras picked up signs that North Korea could have been unilaterally resuming factory operations at the suspended inter-Korean industrial park, a breach of an agreement that South Korea says will have consequences. At least four factories in the Kaeseong Industrial Complex seem to be in operation, according to Radio Free Asia. It said Tuesday that factory activity at one of those plants, which makes rice cookers, looks exceptionally high, citing an expert on satellite images. T
North Korea April 18, 2023
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Yoon’s approval rating dips to 6-month low
President Yoon Suk Yeol’s approval rating fell to 33.6 percent last week, a six-month low largely prompted by a skeptical public urging the president to confront the US over its recent leak of secret intelligence reports suggesting Washington may have been spying on Seoul. Yoon’s first deputy national security adviser brushed off the damaging leak that made headlines two weeks ago, saying the US seems to have had “no malicious intent,” without offering any concrete eviden
Politics April 17, 2023
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S. Korea fires warning shots over North border
South Korea fired warning shots at a North Korean patrol boat that crossed the maritime border in the West Sea on Saturday, amid escalating tension prompted by the North’s latest missile test Thursday. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said Sunday that it fired the shots after the North had not responded to warnings, pushing the boat back to the North from the de facto sea boundary known as the Northern Limit Line. The NLL, disputed by Pyongyang since 1953 when it was drawn up foll
North Korea April 16, 2023
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First lady calls for joint work on animal rights
First lady Kim Keon Hee said Saturday she hopes to see South Korea and France working together on strengthening animal rights, a topic Kim has been pushing for wider debate as part of efforts to deliver on President Yoon Suk Yeol’s pledge to ban dog meat consumption. At a meeting with French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna, Kim referred to a French animal rights law taking effect next year. The law bans pet stores from selling pets unless they are stray animals. Colonna said respect for
Politics April 16, 2023
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S. Korea starts paying Japan’s labor victims
Ten out of the 15 South Korean victims, all entitled to compensation from Japanese companies as per a 2018 Korean court ruling holding the firms liable for damages for colonial forced labor, will receive their payments from a state-run fund, the Foreign Ministry in Seoul said Thursday. The decision is the latest follow-up on a March 6 initiative that Seoul proposed to move past the historical dispute amid Tokyo’s refusal to recognize the ruling. Japan says a 1965 treaty that normalized tie
Foreign Affairs April 13, 2023
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S. Korea brushes off concerns about US intel leak
President Yoon Suk Yeol’s first deputy national security adviser dismissed the diplomatic fallout from the recent leak of highly classified US intelligence reports suggesting it might have been spying on South Korea, saying Washington, Seoul’s biggest ally, seems to have “no malicious intent.” The remarks made Tuesday to reporters in Washington by Kim Tae-hyo -- the adviser who left Seoul that day to discuss Yoon’s state visit in late April -- underscore the Yoon ad
Politics April 12, 2023
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Details in US intel leak ‘altered’: Yoon’s office
President Yoon Suk Yeol’s first deputy national security adviser has played down the significance of the recent leak of highly classified US intelligence documents involving South Korea, shortly before boarding a plane to the US to discuss a Seoul-Washington summit scheduled for late April. Kim Tae-hyo, the adviser, told reporters Tuesday at Incheon International Airport that most of the information released online “was altered” and that this conclusion is shared by both Korean
Politics April 11, 2023
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Seoul-Tokyo tensions heat up again over Dokdo report
South Korea on Tuesday strongly denounced Japan’s latest claims to the Dokdo islets, calling in Tokyo’s deputy envoy in Seoul, as tensions reignite ahead of a potential summit to be held on the sidelines of the Group of Seven meeting in Japan in May. “The Japanese blue book is repeating its unreasonable claims to Dokdo -- the islets that clearly belong to us, historically, geographically and legally speaking,” the Foreign Ministry in Seoul said in a statement, referring t
Foreign Affairs April 11, 2023
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Inter-Korean hotlines go dead amid tensions
North Korea did not answer the daily routine calls South Korea makes using its military and nonmilitary hotlines -- another sign that inter-Korean tensions have been escalating quickly as the North accuses the South and its biggest ally, the US, of ramping up tensions with their annual military drills. The Unification Ministry in Seoul, which handles the nonmilitary lines, confirmed Friday that Pyongyang had not picked up the calls, made once each in the morning and afternoon, saying assessment
North Korea April 7, 2023
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Yoon reshuffles senior security officials ahead of US summit
President Yoon Suk Yeol reshuffled senior security officials Friday, bringing in the current ambassador to Russia to replace the Foreign Ministry’s first vice minister and sending the current first vice foreign minister to the US as head of mission. The move to reallocate key security roles ahead of Yoon’s state visit to the US in late April is the latest fallout from the discord within the administration over deciding on a to-do list at the summit. Last week, Yoon essentially fired
Foreign Affairs April 7, 2023
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Nuclear envoys urge repatriation of NK workers abroad
The chief nuclear envoys from South Korea, the US and Japan called on the international community and countries employing North Korean workers to help repatriate them as per United Nations Security Council resolutions preventing their overseas income from bankrolling the North’s nuclear and missile programs. At a regular meeting held in person in Seoul on Friday, South Korean chief nuclear negotiator Kim Gunn, his US counterpart Sung Kim and Japanese counterpart Takehiro Funakoshi undersco
North Korea April 7, 2023
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Cables show NK tried to undermine US amid efforts for Korean peace
North Korea had sought to undermine the US-led United Nations Command and joint military exercises between US and South Korea, the two biggest deterrents preventing the North’s potential attacks, amid efforts for peace on the Korean Peninsula, according to the latest diplomatic cables released Thursday. The declassified papers made public by the Foreign Ministry in Seoul to update the public on events dating to 30 years ago showed the North had asked US allies and partners to remove their
North Korea April 6, 2023
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S. Korea, US, Japan nuclear envoys to discuss N. Korea
The chief nuclear envoys from South Korea, the US and Japan will discuss North Korea on Friday at a regular in-person meeting to adjust their policy on denuclearization, amid the North’s repeated rejection of peace efforts by the three-way coalition. The gathering in Seoul, usually held every three months on a rotational basis from Tokyo to Jakarta, is expected to present a more united front as Pyongyang continues to threaten to use nuclear weapons as long as South Korea and its biggest al
North Korea April 4, 2023
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N. Korea repeats nuclear threat as S. Korea steps up joint drills
North Korea reiterated Sunday that it was serious about its warning that it would use nuclear weapons against South Korea if its annual military exercises with the US continued, calling them “provocations” warranting countermeasures. In a dispatch by the North’s official Rodong Sinmun, North Korea blamed higher inter-Korean tension on an “obsession with war” that is now close to a climax as the two allies stage their largest amphibious landing drills in years. The
North Korea April 2, 2023
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