This piece originally appeared on September 2, 2022, in The Korea Daily. SPENCER H. KIM WRITES – President Yoon Suk-yeol has presented an “audacious” plan in which South Korea will “significantly improve North Korea’s economy and its people’s livelihoods in stages if the North ceases the development of its nuclear…
VALERIA GURROLA WRITES – Nuclear Orientalism deeply permeates US media. In December 2019, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned the US of a “Christmas gift” dependent on the outcome of nuclear negotiations with the Trump administration. Days after the announcement, satellite images uncovered new activity at the previously dormant Sohae…
MOON CHUNG-IN WRITES — While it doesn’t appear that the Joe Biden administration has completed its review of North Korea policy yet, the outlines of that policy seem to be slowly taking shape. Ned Price, a spokesperson for the US State Department, said on Feb. 12 that the North Korean…
COURTESY OF THE PACIFIC CENTURY INSTITUTE — We are pleased to share PCI board member Dr. Chung-in Moon’s recent interview in a South Korean TV news special on “North Korean Killing of a South Korean Government Worker at Sea: Getting to the Bottom of the Truth with Moon Chung-in” that…
TOM PLATE WRITES — The way it is going now, I might have been wrong. The professor had written a good book but (in my mind) smudged it with an ethically snarky title: Destined for War. A few critics (okay, mainly me) pointed out that the addition of a simple question mark (Destined for…
TRISHA CURRY WRITES – An increasingly asked question these days: Whom do economic sanctions hurt the most? Take the case of North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea – DPRK). This troubled nation of 25 million is dangerously close to a return to its dismal economic status of 1997 – one of…
TOM PLATE WRITES – With friends like China and the United States, it might seem that North and South Korea would have no need for enemies; but then again, of course, they also have each other, and then again it might be said that each is its own worst enemy.…
SPENCER KIM WRITES (courtesy of the Korea Times) — Change is a constant of the human experience. It is coming to the Korean peninsula, brought by three political change agents, Kim Jong-un, Moon Jae-in, and Donald Trump. The status quo ― frozen in time since 1953 ― is melting. It will…
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST COLUMNIST TOM PLATE WRITES – To appreciate the sageuk drama unfolding on the Korean Peninsula, understand that not just two Korean entities have starring roles in history’s cast but three. The first is the Republic of Korea of the south – developmentally accomplished, politically volatile. The…
JINGFEI CHEN WRITES – According to all news reports, North Korean President Kim Jong-Un and his wife Ri Sol Ju listened happily to a K-Pop concert performed by a group of South Korean singers in Pyongyang. The concert lasted more than two hours, after which time Kim Jong-Un enthusiastically applauded…
TRUMAN DALY WRITES – Following months of tension on the Korean Peninsula, President Donald Trump has accepted an offer from Kim Jong-un to discuss denuclearization in North Korea. Despite rapid escalation of North Korean missile testing and development over the past few months, South Korean officials announced that Kim expressed…
DIANA JABLONSKI WRITES – Malaysia’s high-profile trial on the murder of Kim Jong Nam, half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, has resumed. Two women, 25-year-old Indonesian Siti Aisyah and 29-year-old Vietnamese Doan Thi Huong, were charged with the alleged murder, caused by a chemical substance known as the…
TOM PLATE WRITES IN THE KOREA TIMES OF SEOUL – The need for China and the United States to come together in a persistently adult geopolitical two-some has never been more urgent. Gamesmanship must be minimized. Statesmanship must be maximized. Just ask Mr. Ban Ki-moon, career diplomat. The other night…
MARY GRACE COSTA WRITES – It’s all fun and games until you’re charged with accessory to murder. A woman allegedly involved in the assassination of Kim Jong-Nam claims that she thought she was carrying out a harmless prank rather than someone’s deadly political agenda. On February 13, local South Korean…
GUEST CONTRIBUTOR CHUNG-IN MOON WRITES — Unsettling shadows descended on the Korean Peninsula at the end of 2016. A security threat on top of domestic troubles with the South Korean president under impeachment proceedings, politics swept up in turmoil, candlelight vigils likely to stretch into next year, and depressing economic…
SABRINA VERDUZCO WRITES – When that uptight next-door-neighbor yells at you about your music, sometimes the solution is to turn it up. South Korea took this advice to heart in response to North Korea’s most recent hydrogen bomb stunt in early January, countering the North’s explosive behavior by blasting K-pop…
