Korea:1,040 buried corpses are uncovered in land owned by a cult

Park's approval rating crashes to record-low 5%
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_217523.html

President Park Geun-hye saw her approval rating crash to 5 percent, the lowest for sitting South Korean presidents, as an influence-peddling scandal involving her longtime friend rattled her presidency, data showed Friday,

>>81989
Location
The Seokguram Grotto is a hermitage and part of the Bulguksa temple complex. It lies four kilometers east of the temple on Mt. Tohamsan, in Gyeongju, South Korea. It is classified as National Treasure No. 24 by the South Korean government and is located at 994, Jinhyeon-dong, Gyeongju-si, Gyeongsanbuk-do. The grotto overlooks the East Sea (동해) and rests 750 meters above sea level. In 1962, it was designated the 24th national treasure of Korea. In 1995, Seokguram was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List together with the Bulguksa Temple. It exemplifies some of the best Buddhist sculptures in the world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seokguram

>Seokguram was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List together with the Bulguksa Temple.

>>81989
Cult leader's daughter jailed as scandal threatens S. Korean leader
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/south-korea-president-park-geun-hye-friend-choi-soon-sil-arrested-scandal/

South Korean President Park: 'All of this ... is my fault'
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/03/asia/south-korea-president-park-apology/

South Korean president says she is not part of religious cult and shamanistic rituals
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/south-korean-president-says-she-not-part-religious-cult-shamanistic-rituals-1589823

South Korea's Park Geun-hye says 'heart is breaking' over political scandal
http://indianexpress.com/article/world/world-news/south-koreas-park-geun-hye-says-heart-is-breaking-over-political-scandal-3736462/

>>81990
On Thursday, a new Gallup poll in South Korea found Park's approval rating was just 5%, with 89% having a negative opinion of her performance.

Among people aged less than 40, her approval was 1%. It was above 30%, overall, before the scandal

>Among people aged less than 40, her approval was 1%
>her approval was 1%
>1%

>President Park's approval rating was just 2% in Seoul, the capital of South Korea

>President Park's approval rating was just 0% in Gwangju City
(Gwangju City is the sixth largest city in South Korea)
>approval rating 0%
>0%

>>81989
>Hanjin
>Samsung
>Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympic games

Was Choi behind resignation of Hanjin chairman from PyeongChang Olympics post?
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161103000552

Prosecutors look into suspected Samsung payments to Choi Soon-sil
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161102000754

Korea:Is arrested Choi Soon-sil,the puppet master of President of S.Korea, 'bogus'?
*The Korea Times
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_217530.html

South Korean shipper's bankruptcy crisis could affect U.S. holiday sales
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2016/09/07/hanjin-shipping-seeks-us-bankruptcy-protection/89948440/

Hanjin bankruptcy filing causes global shipping crisis, retail fears

Ships from Canada to China found themselves refused permission to load and unload
http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/hanjin-shipping-financial-trouble-1.3746049

Former Pyeongchang 2018 President admits he was pressured to quit, reports claim
http://www.insidethegames.biz/index.php/articles/1043334/former-pyeongchang-2018-president-admits-he-was-pressured-to-quit-reports-claim
Former Pyeongchang 2018 President Cho Yang-ho has "admitted" that he was put under pressure to step down before his dramatic resignation from the role in May, reports have claimed.

we already have like 5 threads about this, please delete this and repost in one of the other threads

>>81989
Park Geun Hey,The president of South Korea, is planning the special pardon of the her friends(her masters) by the executive order

>the special pardon

pardon
A pardon is a government decision to allow a person who has been convicted of a crime, to be free and absolved of that conviction, as if never convicted.

Today, pardons are granted in many countries when individuals have demonstrated that they have fulfilled their debt to society, or are otherwise considered to be deserving. Pardons are sometimes offered to persons who are wrongfully convicted or who claim they have been wrongfully convicted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pardon

>>81989
팩트TV KOREA LIVE 2016.11.05 (생) 광화문광장 - #내려와라 박근혜! 2차 범국민행동
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4lFo-XL02A

Anti-Park Geun Hye protest demonstration Now

>>81989
LIVE: Rally against President Park in South Korea
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXm5hYXGmZY

>>82014
>Korea:Is arrested Choi Soon-sil,the puppet master of President of S.Korea, 'bogus'?

Supreme Prosectors' Office of South Korea declared
"Choi Sun Sil, puppet master of President of S.Korea, being arrested by Korea Police to be surely Choi Sun Sil. The woman being arrest is actually Choi Sun Sil"

Why did Supreme Prosectors' Office of South Korea do this?

"Choi Sun Lee as known as the woman being arrested by the police is not true Choi Sun Lee, she is a proxy"

this story is deep-rooted in Korean society and some korean people strongly believes the woman is a proxy not her

>>82073
President of S.Korea Park's friend being already arrested who criticizes the Supreme Prosecutors' Office of South Korea

according to the friend's statement
Prosecution of S.Korea identified facts only depending on the President and her friend statements

>>82073
>>82074
the South Korea's Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office was attacked by the man

The South Korean man attacks the office with using heavy machinery.

The Korean guy,45years old, shouts
"Choi Sun Sil !!!!(Puppet master of President of Korea)
"I came here the Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office to #### Choi Sun Sil !!!!"

대검찰청 청사에 포클레인 돌진…40대 남성 현행범 체포
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kFt03HgDhw&feature=youtu.be&t=15

>>82064
>>82065
>LIVE: Rally against President Park in South Korea

S. Korea political scandal: Thousands protesters gather in Seoul calling Park to resign
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HKhIpC5Dtg

South Koreans are protesting in front of U.S. Embassy

what is this? Harassment?

wow!

>>81989
Atheist Park may have advantages
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/09/116_118974.html

Rep. Park Geun-hye, the ruling Saenuri Party presidential candidate, sought to curry favor with religious leaders during courtesy calls on the heads of Buddhist, Protestant and Catholic church groups Monday.

Ven. Jaseung of the Jogye Order was one of the leaders Rep. Park met during her "tour."

This stirred speculation on whether she will get along with Buddhists or not, as her ruling party predecessors had a hard time maintaining a good working relationship with them.

Some analysts predict that unlike her predecessors, the leading candidate may be able to avoid clashes with Buddhists because of her background.

Although she received a baptismal name while she attended Sogang University in Seoul several decades ago, her aides said she does not attend Sunday services.

They said the daughter of the late President Park Chung-hee has a strong bond with Buddhists due to the influence of her late mother, Yook Young-soo, who was a pious Buddhist. The aides added that she is also close to several prominent Protestants.

Because of this background, some analysts say Park is de facto affiliated with the three key religions and this would help her relationship with Buddhists during her presidential campaigns.

According to a 2005 survey, Buddhists make up 22.8 percent of the population, followed by Protestants with 18.3 percent and Catholics with 10.9 percent.

Incumbent President Lee Myung-bak, former President Kim Young-sam and Lee Hoi-chang, who ran unsuccessfully in presidential elections on the Grand National Party (now the Saenuri Party) ticket twice in 1997 and 2002, had difficulty in handling a backlash from Buddhists.

>>82128
They alleged that the two Protestant Presidents chose Cabinet ministers based on religion, saying those who attended Protestant churches were favored in reshuffles. Both Lee and Kim denied the allegation, saying nominations for key government posts were made based on merit.

In a Korea Institute for Religious Freedom survey in 2007, former President Kim was depicted as the most biased leader.

Lee Hoi-chang, who attended a Catholic church, also faced criticism from Buddhists during the presidential campaigns.

In September 1997, Lee drew the ire of Buddhists for his remarks that the rule of holding state exams on Sunday made it difficult for Protestant or Catholic applicants to take the test as they had to miss their Sunday worship. He vowed to reconsider the policy, if elected president.

Buddhists said changing the state-exam rule to favor Christians was discrimination against people having different religions such as Buddhists, urging Lee to offer an apology for his remarks.

Unlike them, the late former President Kim Dae-jung had no major problems with Buddhists during the presidential campaign as well as in office.

Some alleged the late Kim's family's unique religious background could have helped him avoid any major clashes during his political career.

Kim was a Protestant, his wife Lee Hee-ho attended a Catholic church, while his eldest son is a Buddhist.

>>81989
[Interview] Park Geun-hye believed in Choi Tae-min after he predicted her father’s death
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/768958.html

>Minister who was close to Pres. Park’s spiritual mentor explains the origins of her relationship with Choi Sun-sil’s father

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2016/1107/147838421748_20161107.JPG
>Former President Park Chung-hee visits a free hospital of Korean medicine for the elderly, established by the National Salvation Army of the Cross in 1976, talking with honorary President Park Geun-hye and Choi Tae-min. (Yonhap News)

“On the day of [former President] Park Chung-hee’s death [on Oct. 26, 1979], Choi Tae-min wrote to Miss Park Geun-hye that she should ‘make a lunch appointment with the president today and send off all the people around him.’ At around 12:50 pm that day, Miss Park Geun-hye apparently called Choi Tae-min and said, ‘I asked my father, and he said he can’t do it today, but in three days he’ll send everyone off.’ Choi Tae-min had predicted Park Chung-hee’s death. That’s why Miss Park Geun-hye came to believe in him. All of this was told to me by Choi Tae-min.”
Minister Jeon Ki-young, known as a close associate of Choi Tae-min, shared this recollection with a Hankyoreh reporter on Nov. 4 at Fidelity Church in the Ohak village of Seosan’s Haemi township in South Chungcheong Province. Choi was the father of Choi Sun-sil, the central figure in the current government interference scandal swirling around the Blue House. Jeon, 79, serves as head of the general assembly for the Presbyterian Church of Korea, which in the 1970s conferred the title of “minister” on Choi Tae-min.

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2016/1107/147838421704_20161107.JPG
Jeon Ki-young, a minister known to be close to Choi Tae-min

>>82139
On Nov. 4, Jeon shared with the Hankyoreh remarks that Choi Tae-min had made about his relationship with Park Geun-hye. “Don’t talk about physical matters. We’re a spiritual family; we’re like a married couple,” Jeon quoted Choi as saying. “My god told me to help this woman, and the spirit of Yuk Young-soo [Park’s mother] told me to help her. That’s why I’m helping her, and we don’t have some kind of depraved physical relationship.”
After watching Park’s second public apology on the morning of Nov. 4, Jeon suggested that instead of calling for Park to step down or be impeached, people should try to help Park with the harm caused by the spells cast on her so that she can protect the nation’s security.
What follows is a transcript of our interview with Jeon. To aid readers’ understanding, Jeon’s words are presented almost entirely as he said them.

>>82139
>>82140
Hankyoreh (Hani): What kind of person was Choi Tae-min?
Jeon Ki-young (Jeon): Choi was a spiritualist, a sorcerer. He was the child of independence fighters. To acquire information about the Japanese police’s attempts to suppress the independence movement, Choi got a job as an errand boy at the police station in Anak County, Hwanghae Province. Choi was a talented writer and was very knowledgeable. When he wrote a letter to the chief prosecutor, the prosecutor was impressed with Choi’s writing ability and his knowledge. Cho Hyeon-jong graduated from a law school in Japan and was appointed to a senior position at the police station. The chief prosecutor asked Cho to treat Choi, the errand boy, as a brother. That was when Choi apparently was given a special opportunity to join the police force.
According to the July and Aug. 1984 issues of “Dark Green Pastoral Work”, Rev. Cho Hyeon-jong, an aide of Choi Tae-min, graduated from Pierson Bible School and the religious department of a Japanese law school in 1938. After Korea was liberated from Japanese rule, Cho returned to the peninsula and served as a senior official in the police before being transferred to the military police with the rank of major, the journal said. In 1969, Cho was ordained as a minister with the Seoul Presbytery of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Korea (GAPCK), and he was selected to be the organization’s second secretary-general in 1970.

>>82139
>>82140
>>82141
Hani: How did Choi Tae-min say he got to know Park Geun-hye?
Jeon: After liberation, Cho Hyeon-jong and Choi Tae-min moved to South Korea. Cho joined the military police in the South Korean army, but Choi had nothing to do. For this reason, he went into the mountains and undertook a program of spiritual training. One day while Choi was praying in a cave, a young man who had been bringing food for Choi [Choi apparently believed the man was a mountain spirit] came by one day and told Choi that the country was in mourning [Aug. 15, 1974] because of the assassination of Yuk Young-soo, wife of then president Park Chung-hee. The young man said, “Yuk is over there waiting to meet you,” and when Choi went outside, Yuk was sitting on a boulder with her skirt spread out as the morning sunlight streamed down. Choi said that Yuk looked extremely lifelike. Choi pinched himself to make sure he wasn’t dreaming, and it hurt [implying that it wasn’t a dream].
Choi said that Yuk told him that her daughter Geun-hye had been in trouble since her death and that there was a secret that only she and her daughter knew. Yuk told Choi that if he sent Geun-hye a letter containing this secret, she would ask to meet him. Yuk asked Choi to help her daughter when he met her. Choi ended up writing the letter and mailed it at the post office in Gwanghwamun, Seoul. After that, Choi said he got a phone call from the Blue House in his house in the Yongsan [neighborhood of Seoul] asking him to come [to the Blue House] in a black car that would be sent to pick him up. When Choi met Park Geun-hye and told her the secret about her mother, Park fainted. This was what Christians call a trance, a state of mind that you can enter like a dream. In the trance, Park met her mother, who apparently told her she had sent Choi Tae-min to help her out. Since that time, Park completely trusted Choi.

>>82139
>>82140
>>82141
>>82142
Hani: Was Choi a real minister?
Jeon: After Cho left the military police, he served as the secretary-general of the GAPCK. Once Choi had gained more influence over Park, Cho told Choi about the section in the Book of Numbers in the Bible where King Balak uses Balaam the diviner. Cho told Choi to stop being a sorcerer and to start being a minister. Back then, there weren’t that many Christians, so people in the GAPCK would be chosen to become ministers even when they hadn’t studied theology. It was a time of confusion for the Korean church. That’s how Choi received the title of “minister.”
Hani: How did Choi create the National Salvation Army of the Cross?

>>82140
>>82139
>>82141
>>82142
>>82143
Jeon: After President Park Chung-hee adopted the Yushin Constitution in Oct. 1972, the Christian church became an opposing force. Park told Choi that since he was a minister now he should create an organization that could obstruct the existing Christian groups. The group that was subsequently formed was the National Salvation Army of the Cross. After setting up that group, he established branches around the country, from Seoul to Jeju Island. On top of that, he chose Rev. Kang Shin-myeong to be the president of the group. The [other Christian] groups couldn’t stand up to even one of the leaders of the regional branches.
That was when Choi chose Park Geun-hye to be the honorary president of the National Salvation Army of the Cross. They bought the site of the Holiness Church in Seodaemun, Seoul, for 900 million won [US$787 million today] and spent 300 million won building the Free Hospital of Korean Medicine for the Elderly. [Doctors] from the Korean Medical Association were put on rotation to work at the hospital. Choi said that national health care originated at the Free Hospital of Korean Medicine for the Elderly. Cho urged Choi to serve as the secretary-general [of the GAPCK] because he had a lot of money. From that time, the National Salvation Army of the Cross was affiliated with the GAPCK. Cho became the president in charge of recruitment [for the National Salvation Army of the Cross]. There were three presidents: Cho Hyeon-jong, Choi Tae-min and Park Geun-hye.

>>82139
>>82140
>>82141
>>82142
>>82143
>>82144

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2016/1107/147838421736_20161107.JPG
Park Geun-hye, who was First Lady at the time, and Choi Tae-min (left) participate in a ceremony at Baejae High School for the National Salvation Army of the Cross, June 21, 1975. (Yonhap News)

Hani: What kind of relationship did Choi have with Park Geun-hye at the time?
Jeon: Rumor had it that Choi and Park would go into a room and stay there all day long. With all this salacious gossip going around, Kim Jae-gyu, director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA), filed intelligence reports, and Park Chung-hee questioned the two of them himself. Park Geun-hye firmly defended Choi, while Choi said, “Don’t talk about physical matters. We’re a spiritual family; we’re like a married couple.” When Park Chung-hee heard this, he understood, and he told Kim Jae-gyu to get the facts straight before filing reports. Choi Tae-min treated Park Geun-hye like a goddess and respected her immensely. There wasn’t any funny business going on.
Hani: Do you remember anything happening between Park Geun-hye and Choi Tae-min?
Jeon: On the day that Park Chung-hee died [Oct. 26, 1979], Choi told Park Geun-hye to make a lunch appointment with her father and to send away everyone who was with him. At 12:50 pm on that day, I was told, Choi got a phone call from Park Geun-hye. Park told Choi that she had asked her father to send everyone away, but he told her he wouldn’t do so that day but three days later. Choi Tae-min had foreseen the death of Park Chung-hee. That made Park Geun-hye trust him even more. I was told all of this by Choi.
Hani: What was Choi Tae-min doing in the 1980s?

>>82139
>>82140
>>82141
>>82142
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>>82145
Jeon: After Park Chung-hee died, Choi disappeared for a couple of years. I met him for the first time after Park’s death, in the early 1980s. When he was secretary-general [of the GAPCK] in the 1980s, I served as deputy secretary-general. There was a research institute for Park Chung-hee in Gangnam, Seoul, that became the office of the GAPCK. We built the Church of Meeting on 660 square meters in Gangnam and ran a volunteer program and university classes for the elderly. We put up a sign for the Geunhwa Volunteer Group in Children’s Grand Park [in Seoul], and on the weekends we would hold meetings of the Geunhwa Church there.
Since I was so young when I became deputy secretary-general, there was a lot of envy and jealousy. Choi had a rough way of speaking. He would call the other pastors “a bunch of assholes.” “How can you assholes call yourself ministers when you don’t even have a shaman’s spirit? You’re just pathetic. I’m taking care of this guy because his spirit is more advanced than mine,” he said. Choi never used the low form of speech with me. He said he wanted to have a word with me and said, “I’ll be counting on you in the future.” Then he had a woman secretary bring over an envelope full of money and gave it to me. When I got home and looked inside, there was 6 million won there. At the time, 6 million won was enough to buy two apartments. Choi really liked spending time with me. He would tell me to come out if I didn’t show up, and he treated me with great kindness.
Hani: What happened to Choi Tae-min after that?

>>82139
>>82140
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Jeon: I saw Choi in 1993 after he suggested we meet up. He was going around with six bodyguards -- big guys, which some people said looked like thugs. Choi told me that Park Geun-hye would become president and asked me to help with her campaign. He said that her election campaign should be staffed by the 700,000 members of the Geunhwa Volunteer Group around the country, and he wanted me to be in charge. He told me there was a balance of 1.3 billion won at the Anguk branch of Chohung Bank and that there was 90 million won left in interest.
Christians talk about having the “eyes of the spirit.” When I looked at Choi with the eyes of the spirit, I saw that his eyes were black and hollow, and he looked like he was possessed. Just then, I said to Choi, “Hey, you freak, what are you really? I’m a servant of the Lord!” Then his face twisted and contorted. His eyes went bloodshot, and his body trembled. I still remember vividly how he looked at that time. Choi looked like he was going to faint, so I got out of there. That was Oct. 1993.
Hani: Was there anything memorable about Choi?

>>82139
>>82140
>>82141
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>>82148
Jeon: Choi did make a lot of accurate predictions about things to come, about the future. When I asked him how intimate his relationship with Park Geun-hye was, he became very serious and said, “My god told me to help this woman, and the spirit of Yuk Young-soo [Park’s mother] told me to help her. That’s why I’m helping her, and we don’t have some kind of depraved physical relationship.” When Choi spoke of Park, you could tell he regarded her as a holy being. Choi was not an eloquent speaker, and he mostly said stuff that sounded completely crazy, spiritual things. When I listen to what President Park says these days, I hear a lot of the spiritual stuff that Choi used to say.
In an interview with another newspaper, Jeon said that some of Park Geun-hye’s remarks (“If you don’t learn history properly, your spirit will become abnormal” and “If you want something fervently, the universe will come forward to help you”) had reminded him of Choi Tae-min.
Hani: Choi Tae-min’s family members, including Choi Sun-sil, have a considerable amount of wealth today.
Jeon: At first, Choi family wasn’t well off. Choi said that when he was doing his spiritual training, he didn’t have anything to eat, so he had to depend on handouts. But when he got close to the president, he was given all kinds of things. Companies would give him money, and people would pay him to appoint them as leaders in the National Salvation Army of the Cross. He said he got the 1.3 billion won from [redacted].
Hani: Park Geun-hye made another public apology.

>>82139
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>>82149
Jeon: Park has finally come to her senses. If you tie her hands at this point, there won’t be anyone to control the South Korean military in the event of war. This isn’t the time to be calling for her impeachment. Christians are to blame for their failure to lift the spell from Park. Exorcism isn’t everything; if Park is hurt, we ought to take better care of her. The fact is that I cried while I was watching her apology today. What a frail woman, what a lonely woman she is! If she’s under a spell, human strength alone is not enough. Now that she’s free from that, the Christians who have caused her so much harm need to pray for Park to be given strength.
By Choi Ye-rin, staff reporter

>>81989
Jesus is KOREAN---- The Real Story of Jesus
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHtJ8pzz27Y

Korean invented airplane
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nX_g0I1Pyk

Korea is origin of modern technology
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksct0zqEyWo

The True Origins of Pizza
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiLA6Bk_ivs

Learning history from Korea
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iugsAkysb8g

Korean invented bicycle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bC5hsdT5L60

Was Manchuria Korean territory?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=je4nAgEhDec

Was America Korean territory?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2r6dQpINnk

South Korea issues arrest warrants for two ex-presidential aides
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-politics-idUSKBN13101D

>>81989
>>82128
>Atheist Park may have advantages http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/09/116_118974.html

>[Special Feature] Park Geun-hye’s past and future
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/542885.html

Hankyoreh reporters uncover private documents to establish a link between Park’s personal and political worlds


By Song Ho-kyun and Ko Na-mu, Hankyoreh 21 staff reporters

Park Geun-hye, 60, officially threw her hat in the ring for the presidency in an announcement on July 10. It has been fifteen years since she entered politics, but questions still linger about her leadership abilities. Park herself has been quiet. Leadership ability has a major impact on a president’s capacity to run a country. This is why Hankyoreh 21 cautiously ventured to break through the wall of silence and find the real person inside, and to establish a link between Park’s past and present.
Reporters drew on Park’s autobiography and six essays she wrote between her father’s assassination on Oct. 26, 1979, and her own entry into politics in 1997. It was a period that saw citizen Park mixed with Park the prospective politician. Through her words and speech during that time, the Hankyoreh 21 pieced together what she said about politics. These were then compared with her words and deeds since entering the political arena in 1997. Caution was taken against any preconceptions about what Park Chung-hee’s daughter would be like.
Four main themes were identified. Hopefully, they will be keys in unlocking the screen of mystery that covers Park the politician.

>>82357
>Theme 1: Betrayal

The first thing that comes into view under the thick shell over Park’s feelings is her sense of betrayal. The roots of this can be found in her experience seeing politicians from her father’s Democratic Republican Party criticize the Yushin government after Park Chung-hee’s 1979 assassination. Her journal entry from Sept. 30, 1981, reads, “The punishment of a betrayer, more than anything else, is the fact that you have destroyed a vital fortress in your own heart. By committing one act of betrayal, your resistance against committing betrayal gradually weakens, and that second and third betrayals become that much easier.”
Park was born on Feb. 2, 1952. She left the Blue House in early November 1979 after a nine-day funeral observance for her father. She went back to the house in Seoul’s Sindang neighborhood where the family had lived before the 1961 coup that put her father in power. The harsh Chun Doo-hwan administration soon came to power in 1980. During the brief interim, however, there had been much debate and criticism over Park Chung-hee and the era he represented.
Some of the critics were members of the old Democratic Republican Party, most prominently former Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil. There was some reason for this. As president, Park had been very alarmed about the clever young officer who had drafted the initial revolutionary pledge and choreographed his own actions in the coup. After he opposed a third-term amendment of Constitution in 1969, then-prime minister Kim was no longer family to Park, but a political rival. Even after Kim reversed his position on the amendment, the Korean Central Intelligence Agency continued monitoring his home over the next decade. Some of the Democratic Republic figures, however, were denouncing the Yushin government in an attempt to stay alive under Chun. To the then-29-year-old Park Geun-hye, the whole controversy came as an affront.

>>82358
In a piece for the Jan. 1989 edition of the Women’s Dong-A, a monthly magazine for women, she wrote, “If you look at the politicians who previously held important positions in the Yushin era, you’ll often see, and this may be because of the current landscape that views Yushin as a sin, but a number of them are insisting, ‘Oh, I was opposed to it back then. I didn’t have the power then to fight it.’ To those people, I would like to ask why they did not give up their positions, if they really thought it was a bad regime. If someone’s judgment changes and becomes clouded with by contemporary context, then such a person should never again hold public office.”
The sense of betrayal stayed with her. On May 19, 1989, she gave an interview on the MBC show “Current Affairs Discussion with Park Gyeong-jae” where she asked why Kim, former Democratic Justice Party (formerly the Democratic Republican Party) chairman Park Joon-kyu, and former National Assembly speaker Kim Jae-sun were not defending the system. “During the Yushin era, when my father was still alive, they were going around saying, ‘Yushin is the our only path to survival!’ Their refusal to defend Yushin after he died - well, we can turn that around and say that the reason they were advocating Yushin back then is not because they actually believed in it, but because it was the only way they could hold high positions…. ”

>>82359
In 2007, Park was already a ten-year veteran of politics. The theme of betrayal surfaced again in her autobiography that year. “It was quite a shock to me,” she wrote, “to see the transformation [after the assassination] even in the people who had been closest to my father, the way they became so cold. It was like a dam bursting: the ‘secret stories’ were all over the newspapers and magazines. So many times they gave these accounts anonymously, as ‘Mr. L,’ ‘Mr. K,’ ‘Mr. P,’ and so on. . . . People without any clear sense of conviction were going back and forth, here and there, in their search for power.“
Astonishingly, the ten-year veteran went on to quote a diary entry from when she was twenty-nine: ”There may be nothing sadder and more awful than one person betraying another. Once you’ve betrayed another’s trust and loyalty, the next betrayal becomes that much easier, until finally you’re living your whole life as someone who is not honorable to themselves.“
The betrayal then gives way to her characteristic strategy in choosing people to work with. Park is not one for close company. Since 2004, she has never had any "second-in-command." Former Environment Minister Yoon Yeo-joon, who took part in that year’s general elections alongside Park, also noted the connection between the sense of betrayal and the personnel strategy. "She seems to be making a lot of visible effort, but the problem is still there," he said. "The Blue House had suddenly found itself in pandemonium. To have the mental stretch to overcome that politically is something fearsome. She also worked to get where she is now. If you consider that process, it’s likely that she put on layers of [psychological] armor. She feels like there’s no one in the world she can trust in. And you can understand why she would think that. But she needs to take the armor off now that she‘s a popular politician, and she still can’t do it."

>>82360
What kind of effect would that psychological armor have on a President Park Geun-hye? "It affects everything, including the personnel strategy," Yoon said. "What we’re seeing now will only be intensified [if she is elected]. Korea is developing toward social and economic democracy. But what Park has been doing recently bucks that trend. We keep seeing the undemocratic aspects of her leadership. She has been pretty authoritarian, after all. She’s been closed-off and vertically oriented. She doesn’t open up to or communicate with anyone. She’s neither hot nor cold. She’s just cool, all the time. You can’t have that. You need to be hot when the moment calls for it, and cold when that’s appropriate. Leaders in particular need to be like that. It’s the only way you have people warming to you. But Park Geun-hye keeps the same distance from everyone. That’s her hallmark.“
At the same time, Yoon added that if she did shed the psychological armor, she would be a politician of awesome power.

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2012/0718/134250075534_20120718.JPG
Books by Park Geun-hye

>>82361
>Theme 2: A conservative messiah?
Park Geun-hye doesn’t allow her close associates to act independently- she alone makes all important decisions. Since 2004, when Park appeared at the forefront of South Korean politics, she has been a kind of messiah for conservatives. It is not a coincidence that she has been using some religious terms such as summon, destiny, nirvana or liberation in her writings.
Park has been interested in religion from her days in the Blue House. She graduated from Sacred Heart Girl’s High School and Sogang University, operated by the Catholic Church. She was baptized under the name Juliana.
Since Park acted as the First Lady of the Blue House, she has kept a special relationship with pastor Choi Tae-min, who is a controversial figure in religious circles. Choi married 5 times and has pretended to be a monk, principal, and pastor at different times under different names. Jeong Yun-hoe, a son-in-law of Choi, was suspected to have unofficially led Park’s campaign for the 2007 Grand National Party presidential nomination. (The Grand National Party was renamed the New Frontier Party in February.)
Park’s mother Yuk Young-soo was a devout Buddhist. Park was influenced by Buddhist doctrines as well as by Catholicism. In 2005 she was given a Buddhist name from Donghwa Temple in Daegu. The given name ‘Seondeokhwa’ followed the same meaning of the Queen Seondeok of the Silla dynasty.
After Park left the Blue House, she devoured various kinds of religious books. She wrote in her diary on May 31, 1982, “Nirvana is when one’s emotional flames are completely extinguished.”

>>82362
Park is the one who has tried to depict herself as a messiah. On her diaries in the late 80s and early 90s, she even tended to identify herself with Jesus or Buddha.
In an entry on Nov. 5, 1989, she said, “Christianity was able to spread because of religious persecution. The difficulties that I face make me broaden boundaries like Jesus did.”
On August 21, 1991 she wrote, “Last night I read the rebellion part of Devadatta. I felt kind of a comfort that even Buddha suffered from betrayal. Humans have always undergone an ordeal without exception.” Devadatta was Buddha’s cousin and a student, but is said to have parted from the Buddha and gone against him. It’s also said that he even tried to kill Buddha.
The New York Times reported on April 20 that Park Geun-hye’s followers regard Park as a saint who lost her parents and gave up marriage and childbirth.
The saint woman vested holiness for herself, which was accepted as she followed heaven’s calling. On her essay ‘Words of my spirit’ published in 1995, she said, “The ultimate life we pursue will be accomplished when we live according to the word from heaven, participate in God’s business and do his work.” She added, “Only God’s business is valuable, meaningful, and eternal among all other things happening in the world.”
On her diary on Sep. 2, 1990, she wrote, “Power is like a sword. If someone has more power, it means he has sharper sword. No one can manage huge power if he doesn’t cultivate himself with a firm philosophical view, or he is not protected by heaven.”

>>82363
For someone who believes they are on a mission from heaven, there is no room for free communication and horizontal talk. Even Park’s close associates find her to be unapproachable, feeling they are facing a heavy wall in front of her.
On the other hand, some people give positive evaluations for her. They think Park’s such values let her to have a virtue of preceding private obligations with public affairs.
“It is Park’s merit that she puts public obligations ahead of private affairs,” said former Environment Minister Yoon Yeo-joon. “But people need to watch closely to figure out if she means a nationalist public or a democratic public.”

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2012/0718/134250075551_20120718.JPG
Park Geun-hye listens to a question from a student in Chungjoo Ilshin Girl’s High School, July 11. (by Kang Chang-kwang, staff photographer)

>>82364
>Theme 3: Her father’s advocate

Park Geun-hye is often called the incarnation of endurance. In February 2007, Park, her entourage and reporters visited the U.S. They arrived at the airport and passed through the immigration checkpoint. When Park went through a metal detector at security, the alarm rang. She passed through several times without any of her belongings but the alarm didn’t stop. Security guards took her to a separate room to search her.
“Her entourage was complaining that the security measures were too much. Park is an influential figure in Korean politics but they treated her with disregard. It turned out that a hairpin caused the alarm. But Park finished all the procedures without any complaint. She said instead, ‘If that’s a rule, I have to follow it,’” a source from Park’s camp explained.
In every election, Park has written a new success story. She toured the country, relying on brief naps and meals while on the go. Supreme councilor Lee Hye-hoon from the New Frontier Party said, “Even if there was only one staff with Park, she never loosened herself but straightened her pose all the time.”
If her hand was aching after shaking countless hands, she bandaged it or used her left hand. Her bandaged hand was her trademark for every election season. Since failing to earn the Grand National Party’s presidential nomination in 2007, Park has been head of an opposition camp within the ruling party.

>>82365
After her father Park Chung-hee was assassinated in 1979, Park experienced intense physiological shock. All of a sudden, she got unidentified spots on her entire body. She went to see a doctor, but no one could find the cause.
“I guess her great sense of loss was expressed through an extraordinary physical reaction,” said one of her close associates. “When I hear people saying Park never underwent hardship in her life, I can help but laugh because it’s so not true.”
Park wrote in her diary on June 10, 1981, “Pain is a human attribute. It might be proof of being alive.” The spots on her body are now gone, but the bitterness has not yet left her mind.
Park didn’t get along with her sisters. Her brother was criticized for having a drug problem. She wrote in her diary, “The agony is the entrance for seeking the truth.”
Her diary on May 21 1992, reads, “If I had to live that kind of life again, I would choose death instead. I have lived the past years, only because I was born, and I had a sense of duty. So far, I have not much of feeling that I‘m so satisfied with my life. Why was I born? It would have been much better if I had not been born.”

http://img.hani.co.kr/imgdb/resize/2012/0718/134250075566_20120718.JPG

>>82367
>Theme 4: Oh! My father
Park’s pain was the prime mover for her political life, but she had kept silent about the other pains caused by her father and the Yushin regime he led. For 18 years, from Park’s departure from the Blue House until she entered politics in 1997, her activities have focused on the restoration of her father’s image.
She wrote on her Oct. 17, 1988 diary, “Someone who died for the nation regarded the nation as himself. He is a master of the country, like he is a master of himself.”
From the beginning of the Roh Tae-woo government, Park could speak up more freely. She published several books, and appeared regularly in the media. On MBC’s ‘Park Kyeong-jae’s current affairs discussion’ on May 19, 1989, she argued in favor of the Yushin regime for 2 hours. The interviewer pestered her with persistent questions. Now Democratic United Party lawmaker Park Young-sun drafted the questions that Park would be asked.
Park argued that the [Park Chung-hee’s coup d‘etat of] May 16 [1961] was a revolution to save the nation. She said, “Around then the communists were about to attack South Korea. Fortunately, the May 16 revolution occurred first and saved the nation.”
Park added, “I think the May 16 revolution followed the meaning of April 19 revolution in 1960, in terms of saving the nation. The deaths of April revolution victims were not in vain thanks to the May 16 revolution. If communism conquered South Korea after the April 19 revolution, the sacrifice would not be worth it at all.”
In the interview with the Women’s Dong-A Women on December 1988, Park mentioned some people who served hard time in prison, saying it was not actually her father’s intention.

>>82369
“I heard that a lawmaker from the opposition party insulted my father while they were dining together, and he was taken to the KCIA and interrogated. When I reported this to my father, he ordered, ‘It’s their job to speak bad about someone else. Why do they have to get interrogated? Release them all.’ We can assume with this example that there were some investigations not intended by my father. As his daughter, I feel sorry for some people who suffered from these kinds of affairs.”
Reporter Park Young-sun who wrote the questions for the 1989 interview, interviewed Park Geun-hye again in 1994 and 2001. Interview on 1994 took place in the Secret Garden, not open to the public. Park suggested the interview place first. The Secret garden was in the Changdeok Palace, where the royal family of the Chosun Dynasty used to spend their free time. The May 2001 interview was at the National Assembly Member’s Office Building. At that time, Park was wearing her mother Yuk Young-soo’s dress.
So long as Park identifies with her parents, the structure of her reasoning will never change. In 2007, she emphasized again that the May 16 revolution was meant to save the nation. Over 20 years she has been repeating the same responses, ‘It was unintentional’, and ‘I feel sorry for them.’
There are some emotionally intense expressions on her writings. “They held a national funeral for the president and then they denounced him for 10 years? I just cannot believe that. Now people throw firebombs outside and they look down upon seniors. Morality, orders and values are all in a muddle. Nowadays disorders are all the older generation’s fault who distorted history.”
Her idea has not changed. It is no accident that Professor Park Hyo-jong from Seoul National University, who once praised Yushin regime, has now joined Park Geun-hye’s campaign for the presidency.

US-KOREA alliance stays strong: White House
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/120_217599.html

White House: US-S. Korea Alliance Remains Strong Despite Scandal
http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/news_In_detail.htm?No=123033

Samsung involved in Choi Sun-sil's German corporation
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/768638.html

>>81989
>Atheist Park may have advantages
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/09/116_118974.html

http://img.koreatimes.co.kr/upload/news/120903_p02_atheist.jpg
>Rep. Park Geun-hye, the ruling Saenuri Party presidential candidate, right, meets with Ven. Jaseung of the Jogye Order yesterday.
/ Korea Times photo by Oh Dae-geun

Korea.net:Official website of Rpublic of Korea(South Korea)
>Pope Francis: ‘All Koreans are brothers and sisters’
http://www.korea.net/NewsFocus/Society/view?articleId=121254

http://www.korea.net/upload/content/editImage/Pope_Mass_Myeongdong_Cathedral_07.jpg
>Pope Francis meets with leaders from 12 leading religious orders shortly before the Mass for peace and reconciliation at the Myeongdong Cathedral in Seoul on August 18. (photo: Yonhap News)

Shortly before the Mass, the pontiff had time to briefly meet leaders from 12 leading religious orders, including the Ven. Jaseung, head of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddism, the Rev. Kim Yeong-ju, head of the National Council of Churches in Korea, and the Ven. Kyungsan, the head Dharma Master of Won-Buddhism.

>>81989
Korea CBS News
http://www.nocutnews.co.kr/news/4679484

>>82075
South Korea political crisis: Man rams prosecutor's office with digger in apparent bid to kill president's 'Rasputin
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/11/01/south-korea-political-crisis-man-rams-prosecutors-office-with-di/

Angry South Korean man offers to help embattled Park confidante 'die', crashes large excavator into building
http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/east-asia/article/2041920/angry-south-korean-man-offers-help-embattled-park-confidante-die

Round-up of Choi Soon-sil scandal
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_217460.html

1. Former presidential aide confesses ‘President ordered all'

http://img.koreatimes.co.kr/upload/newsV2/images/Y2016110204304-200.jpg
An Chong-bum, former senior presidential secretary for policy coordination

A former senior presidential secretary for policy coordination, who turned himself in to prosecutors on Wednesday, said President Park Geun-hye ordered the establishment of non-profit foundations and advised conglomerates to donate funds to help nurture the nation's cultural and arts fields.

With An Chong-bum's revelation at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office in Seocho-gu, southern Seoul, the investigation will focus on how deeply President Park was involved in establishing the Mir and K-Sports foundations, which Choi Soon-sil, the central figure in the snowballing influence-peddling scandal, allegedly used as personal banks.

Prosecutors pointed to what President Park said at a Cheong Wa Dae luncheon in February 2015, to which conglomerates' CEOs were invited. She had advised the CEOs to "expand their investment and support for Korea's cultural, arts fields." Prosecutors suspect that her comment is linked to the establishment of the Mir and K-Sports foundations.

Prosecutors will investigate whether the President pushed An to establish the foundations or he voluntarily noted her comment from the luncheon and acted on his own to establish the foundations.

>>82543
2. Ruling party advises Park to face justice

Ruling party lawmakers have joined opposition lawmakers in demanding that President Park face justice amid the scandal.

Saenuri Party Rep. Kim Jae-kyung said at the party's meeting on Wednesday what former senior presidential secretary for policy coordination An Chong-bum said during a prosecutors' questioning ― that the President ordered An to push forward with establishing the controversial Mir and K-Sports foundations.

"The first thing needed right now to quench the public rage and disappointment is for the President to come out and say ‘investigate me,'" Rep. Kim said.

Other Saenuri Party lawmakers known as "non-Park-friendly" joined Rep. Kim's call.

The Constitution states that Korean presidents have veto rights over prosecutors' investigations of them.

Despite the statute, opposition parties have demanded that the President must allow herself to be investigated, saying: "There is no sanctuary before investigation."

>>82544
3. K-Sports demanded W8 bil. from Booyoung

The K-Sports Foundation, allegedly set up by Choi Soon-sil to use as her personal bank with funds squeezed from conglomerates, approached Booyoung Group and demanded 8 billion won ($7 million).

In a meeting at Lotte Hotel Seoul in February, K-Sports' former secretary general, Jung Hyun-sik, asked Booyoung President Lee Joong-keun for financial support for one of the foundation's five future strategic strongholds, according to a memorandum of the meeting obtained by online news outlet NoCut News.

Lee, agreeing to Jung's request, asked if his conglomerate could be "well covered" in a coming tax audit.

Choi Soon-sil, according to the memorandum, later heard the meeting's result from Jung but ordered him not to accept Booyoung's money.

The memorandum also said that former senior residential secretary for policy coordination An Chong-bum and two officials each from K-Sports and Booyoung were at the meeting.

Booyoung has denied that it solicited a tax audit favor and said it rejected K-Sports' request for money.

>>82545
4. Mir, K-Sports fund-givers to be questioned

Fifty-three companies that allegedly funded the controversial Mir and K-Sports foundations, which Choi Soon-sil set up and allegedly used as personal banks, are in line for investigation by prosecutors.

A special prosecutors' team has been established and it started questioning company officials Thursday. The team is focusing on how deeply Cheong Wa Dae is involved in making the companies give money to the two non-profit foundations.

Prosecutors confirmed that Samsung Electronics funneled about 2.8 million euros ($3.1 million) to Widec Sports, which Choi set up in Korea and Germany allegedly to divert money from the foundations.

Other conglomerates that prosecutors say funded the foundations include Hyundai Motor Group with 12.8 billion won ($11.2 million), SK 11.1 billion won, LG 7.8 billion won, POSCO 4.9 billion won, Lotte 4.5 billion won, GS 4.2 billion won and Hanwha 2.5 billion won. The funds total 48.6 billion won for Mir and 28.8 billion won for K-Sports.

5. ‘Shadow president's' lawyer resigns

Law Firm Somang's Lee Jin-woong, one of two lawyers for Choi Soon-sil amid her influence-peddling scandal involving President Park Geun-hye, has resigned.

Lee, 47, filed a letter of resignation to the Seoul Central Prosecutor's Office on Wednesday.

Lee Kyung-jae, Choi's other lawyer, had persuaded Lee Jin-woong to work with him.

"I will now act as a lone general on a horse fighting enemies by myself," Lee Kyung-jae said. "But it is hard being alone while facing the prosecutors' investigation. I will welcome whoever can help me."

>>82546
6. President's former secretary: ‘I never heard of Choi Soon-sil'

Cho Yun-sun, President Park Geun-hye's former secretary for political affairs, said at the National Assembly that she never knew about Choi Soon-sil while serving in the post.

Cho served from June 2014 to last May. She said at a meeting of the Education, Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee on Tuesday that she never had a chance to talk to President Park in person during the time. She said she only talked to Park on the phone or in a group in her office.

Main opposition Democratic Party of Korea Rep. Ahn Min-seok criticized Cho: "If you really never knew about Choi while serving in the post, you would be the most incompetent secretary for political affairs in the history."

Cho replied: "Even if you say so, I have nothing to say."

7. Choi's daughter had DNA test to quell rumor


Chung Yoo-ra
Choi Soon-sil's daughter Chung Yoo-ra had a DNA test to quell a rumor that she is President Park Geun-hye's daughter, according to testimony by one of Choi's relatives.

The informant is the son of the fourth wife of Choi Tae-min, father of Choi Soon-sil and the President's late mentor who is believed to be the founder of a fringe religious group called Yongsaenggyo, or the Church of Eternal Life.

"Because of the rumor, she went through the test at a young age (of 20)," the informant said, according to JoongAng Ilbo on Thursday.

Chung, a dressage competitor, allegedly received favors in admission and grading at Ewha Womans University. She once said on social media: "If you are not rich, blame your parents. Money is competency."

>>82547
Chung Yoo-ra
Choi Soon-sil's daughter Chung Yoo-ra had a DNA test to quell a rumor that she is President Park Geun-hye's daughter, according to testimony by one of Choi's relatives.

> "If you are not rich, blame your parents. Money is competency."

>>82014

>>82548
Chung Yoo-ra
Choi Soon-sil's daughter Chung Yoo-ra had a DNA test to quell a rumor that she is President Park Geun-hye's daughter, according to testimony by one of Choi's relatives

>> "If you are not rich, blame your parents. Money is competency."

A Serious Man - Clive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC8Vh76vy0w

The Choi Soon-sil Gate: The Saddest Political Drama Ever Told
http://www.koreaexpose.com/voices/choi-soon-sil-gate-sad-political-drama/

Pres. Park chafes under association with Choi Sun-sil’s “cult”
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/768469.html

OP, check out this little leaked lump of a letter found in the file 23 Podesta Leaks last week.

http://imgur.com/gallery/tmWWe

totally don't know how this got overlooked. HRC is in a cult!!!!

>>81989
Is this thread just a bot fest? It looks like the Subject said Korea so now all this shit is being posted incoherently.

>Park won't attend APEC summit this month: foreign ministry
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161108000833

Diplomacy in Disarray Amid Crony Scandal
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2016/11/08/2016110801617.html

No more shamanistic diplomacy
-Korea Times
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2016/11/198_217767.html

>>82633
>>Park won't attend APEC summit this month: foreign ministry

>“Given the severity of the security situation on the Korean Peninsula, including North Korea's latest fifth nuclear test, a decision was made in September that the president would not attend this year's APEC summit meeting," Cho said.

>a decision was made in September
what is this? damage control or fake story?

>>81989
Cha Eun-taek a puppet master of the puppet master of President of South Korea was arrested

Prosecutors Raid Park Aide's Home
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2016/11/11/2016111101346.html

http://english.chosun.com/site/data/img_dir/2016/11/11/2016111101299_0.jpg
A conspicuously bald Cha Eun-taek (right) enters the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office in Seoul on Thursday.

Psy,the man of Gangnam Style, abruptly cancels TV appearance, raises suspicion
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/culture/2016/11/201_217896.html

>PSY is not directly involved with Choi, President Park Geun-hye's close confidant suspected of having abused power in state affairs, his agency YG Entertainment announced last Thursday. However, YG cannot deny PSY's connection with artistic director Cha Eun-taek, another key figure in the scandal related to cultural affairs with Choi.

OPPA GANGNAM STYLE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUDlvtj03q0

>>82618
URL to mail on wikileaks.org or gtfo.

>>82631
it appears so

>Former Prime Minister says Pres. Park won’t resign “no matter what happens”
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/770386.html

Kim Jong-pil says he is planning legal action, claiming a conversation was illicitly recorded and distorted
Former Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil predicted embattled President Park Geun-hye will resist demands for her to step down.
“She’s going to keep sitting there, even if all 50 million South Koreans come at her to tell her to step down or say, ‘What kind of President are you?’” Kim said.
In a Sisa Journal interview published on Nov. 14, Kim said Park “will not resign no matter what happens.”
“There is no one out there who could break her stubbornness. She inherited only the bad traits from [her parents] President Park [Chung-hee] and First Lady Yuk Young-soo,” he added.
Kim was Prime Minister from 1971-75, then again from 1998-2000. He is the husband of Park Yeong-ok, daughter of Park Chung-hee‘s older brother Park Sang-hee, and is known to be closely familiar with the story between Park Chung-hee and Choi Tae-min (Park Geun-hye’s late mentor and Choi Sun-sil’s father) in the 1970s.

“[Park Geun-hye] was very close to Choi Tae-min. He would go into her room and they would not come out,” Kim recalled. “This happened several times. I don’t know what they were talking about or doing, but they would stay in there from morning until dark.”

>>86123
“What does it say that Park Chung-hee told [Korean Central Intelligence Agency director] Kim Jae-gyu, ‘Investigate that Choi Tae-min character and find out what he’s about‘?” Kim asked. “Kim Jae-gyu said, ‘Your father ordered me to investigate,’ and Geun-hye screamed at him, ‘Do whatever you want.’ Then she went to her father sobbing and making a scene.”
When asked if he had any advice to give President Park Geun-hye, Kim replied, “I’d rather not. If I say the wrong thing, she’ll go to her grave loathing me. She’s that bad.”
Kim also commented on the warm image of Yuk Young-soo, who was killed in 1974 during an assassination attempt on her husband.
“She affected a manner that was befitting of the name of ‘First Lady,’” he said.
After material from the interview was reported, Kim put out a press release saying he had “been visited by a hometown friend a few days ago, and we talked in jest about some of the things people are saying. He secretly recorded it and twisted and exaggerated it into a vile article.”
“I plan to take legal action,” the release continued.

>Is South Korean President considering martial law?

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218496.html

>Korean Prof at Yonsei Univ says:Pres S.Korea is developmental disorder and mental age is 17yrs old
http://www.insight.co.kr/newsRead.php?ArtNo=83102

Yonsei University
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yonsei_University

>South Korea's opposition parties move toward President Park impeachment

President of South Korea Park Geun-hye becomes The First criminal suspected President officially

Park suspected of colluding with friend, aides in corruption: prosecution
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2016/11/20/43/0301000000AEN20161120001153315F.html

President of South Korea Park Geun-hye’s approval rating is at 0%

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/769346.html

South Korean President Park Geun-hye’s approval rating is at 5%, which is lower than any previous president. On Nov. 4, polling firm Gallup Korea announced the results of its regular public opinion poll of 1,005 adult men and women from around the country that were surveyed between Nov. 1 and 3 (with a margin of error of ±3.1% and a reliability of 95%). Only 5% of all respondents thought that Park is doing a good job as president.

While a 5% approval rating is shocking enough, what is even more shocking is Park’s rating in the Honam region (Gwangju and Jeolla Province) in the southeast: 0%. Divided by region, Park received a positive job rating from 2% of respondents in Seoul, 4% in Incheon, 3% in Daejeon, Sejong and Chungcheong, 9% in Busan, Ulsan and South Gyeongsang Province and 10% in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province. This means that Park’s approval rating was below average everywhere except the Yeongnam region in the southeast. Even so, 0% is astounding.
Responding to the shocking outcome of an approval rating of 0%, internet users in South Korea offered various theories, such as that there were no respondents in the region or that a small percentage was rounded down to 0%. One user argued that Gallup Korea was trying to stir up regional sentiment by emphasizing that Park had an approval rating of 0% in Honam.

By age group, Park scored a positive approval rating with 1% of people in their 20s, 1% of people in their 30s, 3% of people in their 40s, 3% of people in their 50s and 13% of people in their 60s.

>approval rating with 1% of people in 20s and 30s
>3% of people in their 40s,50s

>>84694
>Psy,the man of Gangnam Style, abruptly cancels TV appearance, raises suspicionhttps://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/culture/2016/11/201_217896.html

>Cha Eun-taek a puppet master of the puppet master of President of South Korea was arrested
---
>China bans Korean drama dramas, movies, entertainment programs and advertisements and variety shows 'in retaliation against Thaad deployment in South Korea

China is to ban all TV content that features Korean stars including dramas, movies, entertainment programs and advertisements according to Chinese media outlets on Sunday.

The ban is viewed as retaliation against Korea's decision to deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system.

"We are to ban all Korean entertainment programs under the new guideline that came down from the government," said an ENT Group official, a Chinese Media & Entertainment company.

"However, programs that have been approved by reviews and meet the official guidelines of entertainment programs have been excluded."

Although no official document has been notarized by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television, which handles all TV programs in China, broadcast executives are seeking to deal with the ban.

With tension between Korea and China over THAAD continuing to grow, Gen. Vincent K. Brooks, the United States Forces Korea Commander, said the ground-to-air weapon system would be deployed in the next eight to 10 months.

http://www.ibtimes.sg/china-bans-korean-drama-movies-variety-shows-retaliation-against-thaad-deployment-4868

>>86123
>>86124

>Office of South Korea's flagging president admits buying 360 Viagra pills
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/23/office-of-south-koreas-flagging-president-admits-buying-360-viagra-pills

South Korea's presidential office explains Viagra purchase
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/south-korea-s-presidential-office-explains-viagra-purchase/3311870.html

Why did President Park need Viagra?
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218777.html

>>87374
>Justice minister, presidential secretary offer to resign
-The Korea Herald
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161123000606

Justice Minister Kim Hyun-woong and Senior Presidential Secretary for Civil Affairs Choi Jai-kyung offered to resign earlier this week, after President Park Geun-hye was named an accomplice in the extensive corruption scandal involving her close aide, according to Cheong Wa Dae on Wednesday.

This was the first time that a member of the Cabinet or the presidential secretariat sought to quit since the Choi Soon-sil scandal, involving the disputed friend of Park, broke out in late October.

“The justice minister and the civil affairs senior secretary offered their resignation, but it hasn’t been decided whether the president will accept (their resignation),” Blue House spokesperson Jung Youn-kuk told reporters in a text message.

His explanation came amid burgeoning reports that the two high-profile government officials had made the offer, in a gesture to take liability over the latest prosecutorial probe result.

“Under the current circumstances, it is only right that I should step down,” the ministry quoted Kim as saying upon offering his resignation Monday.

The prosecution’s unprecedented decision Sunday to include the incumbent president as a suspect in a corruption case had drawn strong resistance from Cheong Wa Dae.

The presidential house, referring to allegations against the president as mere conjecture, refused to further cooperate in the prosecutorial questioning process.

Such extreme tension between the president and the investigators has been seen as having exerted pressure upon the justice minister, who is the chief supervisor for the prosecution, as well as the civil affairs senior secretary, who is in charge of the Blue House’s legal affairs.

>>87378
But despite their call for “taking responsibility,” political observers also have suggested the two ranking officials may be attempting to shun liability amid a situation that is apparently turning worse for the president.

Adding to such perspective was the fact that presidential adviser Choi had officially been in his post for less than a week. The former prosecutor and successor to embattled predecessor Woo Byung-woo was tapped for the job on Oct. 30 and received his letter of appointment last Friday.

The fact that he did take the appointment Friday but offered to resign Monday boosted speculation that the situation over the weekend had acted as a lever.

Also, the embattled president came under fire yet again Wednesday, following a report showing that the Blue House had purchased a list of unexplained medicines, including erectile dysfunction drug Viagra.

Despite the spokesperson’s claim the disputed drug was a provision against the president’s altitude sickness during her overseas trips, the drug list continued to amplify already-extensive public distrust upon the state chief.

The president now faces an in-depth probe by an incoming independent counsel, a separate parliamentary inquiry and a highly likely impeachment to be motioned by opposition parties.

>Korea:Republic of Disappointment Why South Koreans are let down again and again by their leaders

For the second week in a row, I stood in Gwanghwamoon, Seoul’s city center, among nearly a million protesters who had gathered to demand President Park Geun-hye’s impeachment. I have seen similar scenes before in South Korea, which has a long-standing culture of protest. This time, however I was struck by sadness. There is more to the current mood than meets the eye.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2016/11/why_south_koreans_are_so_upset_about_their_president_s_bizarre_scandal.html

>>88906
I was born and raised in Seoul in the 1970s during the military dictatorship of the current president’s father, Park Jung-hee. Park Geun-hye is embroiled in a massive corruption scandal involving her longtime confidante, Choi Sun-shil, to whom she leaked classified documents and granted unseemly favors. Choi had exhorted bribes from Korea’s largest companies, including Samsung, profited from shell companies and business ventures using the presidential connection, and despite having no official position, wielded unchecked power over the inner workings of the government.
It gets stranger: Choi is the daughter of Choi Tae-min, Park’s spiritual adviser who claimed to communicate with the spirit of her dead mother (she was assassinated in 1974). It is the Confucian and Shamanistic aspect of the entire setup that remains disturbing. After all, in 2013, Park herself was elected, less because she was the first woman to run for office or a seasoned politician, but more because she was her father’s daughter, and her supporters were older voters in their 50s and 60s who felt oddly nostalgic and indebted. With the passing of time, this generation seems to have softened on the memories of Park Jung-hee’s reign of authoritarian repression and torture, remembering only the rapid economic growth that happened under his watch. There’s also residual sympathy for the daughter, as both of her parents were assassinated.

>>88907
>South Korean protests aren’t always peaceful.

It’s worth noting how sanitized and orderly the South Korean million-man march was. Imagine a 360-degree horizon completely filled with protesters, all holding up neat signs that read “Park Geun-hye, Step down” and shouting out, in unison, “Impeach Park Geun-hye” only when ordered to do so by the organizers—a private association of labor unions, student, and civic groups. There were volunteers passing out free candles, which serve as the symbol of defiance, as well as the plastic mats for those who preferred to sit so that they would not dirty their clothes. There were many mothers that brought young children, and at street corners, the citizens took on themselves to direct traffic to prevent accidents. From the stage were the musicians of democratically selected genres ranging from hip-hop to folk, and people sang along in harmony, and at some point, the scene resembled a karaoke open mic. At midnight, the protest ended, but many stayed behind to clean up and recycle garbage. Nearby, tens of thousands of riot police were stationed for emergency, but they were merely young men in their early 20s—South Korea has a 21-month-long mandatory military service—looking meek and somewhat bored.

>>88908
South Korean protests aren’t always so peaceful. In 1960, a student was killed by the police during an anti-government protest, which then caused 100,000 students to march to the Blue House to eventually bring down autocratic Lee Syng-man (also known as Syngman Rhee), the American-sponsored first president, from serving a fourth term.* In the 1980s, it was violent protests in the southern city of Gwangju as well as the later ones including the “June Struggle,” during which hundreds of students were killed, which eventually ended the dictatorship of President Park’s father. As recently as last year, an activist farmer died due to a fatal injury from a police water cannon at a protest demanding Park keep her campaign pledge to fix rice prices.


These days, public protests have become cathartic rituals. Every time the national team plays a World Cup match, millions wearing the “Red Devil” T-shirts take to the street, not exactly inspired by a soccer frenzy but rather nationalism and collectivism. These events can quickly turn political, instigated by the organizations that exploit the occasion to push their agenda.
In the early 2000s, anti-American sentiments were egged on and intensified following an incident in which American soldiers ran over two Korean schoolgirls and were acquitted. Koreans were heartbroken and came out in droves, singing Yoon Min-suk’s anthem “Fucking U.S.A.” (Most Americans probably don’t realize that Psy, the lovable showman behind the viral global hit “Gangnam Style,” was once better known for rapping a song from this era titled, “Dear America,” with lyrics including “Kill fucking Yankees ... kill them all slowly and painfully.”)

>>88909
The protests directly influenced the 2003 presidential election. Backed by the left, Roh Moo-hyun, an inexperienced former labor lawyer, won against all expectations. In 2009, millions congregated across the country after Roh committed suicide during a bribery inquiry. Swayed by the collective sadness though, people forgot about the actual scandal and its implication, and instead the protest became a massive Confucian rite where they bowed in tears to their dead former president’s photo in makeshift shrines. In 2011, I was living undercover in Pyongyang when Kim Jong-il, the Great Leader, died—and I could not help but notice how similarly North Koreans reacted to his death as they wept in groups, bowing to his photo at a shrine, as though they had just lost their parent.


Such a group sentiment reflects a 5000-year-old Korean heritage of feudalism mixed with Confucianism in which citizens show enormous deference to their leaders. Moreover, this small nation about half the size of California has always been dominated by foreign powers, historically China and Japan and in the modern era, the United States in South Korea and Russia in the North. Having always lived under threat of the big brother, Koreans are good at mobilizing in groups, but individual dissents are rare. Having been underdogs most of their history, they are also highly emotional in their reactions, which can be a strength as well as a weakness.

>>88910
So it’s not surprising that Koreans have held onto the memories of the 2014 Sewol Ferry disaster, in which over 300 high school students sat orderly in a sinking ship because they had been told by the adults to sit and wait. It is notable how the students sat so deferential to the orders of the authority, but that’s only a part of the story. The disaster has been linked to federal-level corruption involving the ferry owners, the insurance company, the Korea coast guard, and the Korean navy, none of which Park has properly addressed to the public, nor has she explained her whereabouts during the seven hours of desperation that ensued when she went missing. Rumors about what she was up to ran rampant, from a secret rendezvous with a former aide (who just happens to be Choi’s ex-husband), to Park having been indisposed at a shamanistic gut ritual, to a cosmetic surgery. That horror and sense of betrayal have stuck with the people, and now the resentment is being claimed and exploited by her opposition.

>>88911
As the protesters were marching toward the Blue House, I was reflecting on all those layers of history. Perhaps it was the way people were trying so hard to be different this time that brought back the memories of the bloody history that led to this moment. The people’s anger was real and palpable, and yet it was also vulnerable to whomever in charge. It was then that I heard the organizers over the speaker: “It wasn’t Trump that won but Hillary that lost, because the American people also won’t put up with the corruption of the elite!” and “Park should step aside for a new government who won’t threaten war with North Korea!” The speakers conveniently skipped mentioning the xenophobia at the root of the American election or the fact that Trump is also a member of the elite who manipulated the frustrated masses. Besides, the South Korean political left, whose platform is traditionally pro-engagement with North Korea, rarely acknowledges North Korea’s human rights violations.


Whoever ends up behind the steering wheel in Korea, it seems to me that the real victims are always the masses, let down time and again by their leaders. Park Geun-hye, whose approval rating among her people has sunk to 5 percent, should step down, along with many key members of her abominably corrupt conservative Saenuri Party; especially now with the United States in its own turmoil after Trump’s election, the future is uncertain. During the campaign, Trump threated to withdraw the 28,500 American troops from the Korean peninsula and casually mentioned his wish to share a hamburger with Kim Jong-un. But more importantly, it’s not clear that leaders in either Seoul or Washington can be trusted or relied upon.

>>88912
Replicating the 1960s revolution, the South Korean groups from many segments of society—ranging from lawyers and artists and farmers to professors—have now publically declared Siguksuhnun (City-state Declaration) petitioning for the resignation of President Park, who will be the first sitting president to be questioned by prosecutors.


With more than a tinge of patronizing sexism, her lawyer has asked for lenience since “before being a president, she also has a private life being a woman.” This refers to the latest revelation involving Park using a pseudonym (borrowing the name of a heroine from a recent popular soap opera) for a VIP service at a private clinic that specializes in cosmetic surgery and anti-aging treatments, which also won massive government funding and contracts. My sadness also is in recognizing this wasted opportunity of Park’s presidency, a setback for feminism in a country that the World Economic Forum ranks 115th out of 145 countries in gender equality.

>>88913
Perhaps, Park will soon be gone to open door to a new, transparent leadership, but with the way history repeats itself in Korea, I am afraid to imagine what lies ahead. More protests are on the way, both the left and the right exhorting crowds, and now the left is raising the threat of Park’s declaring martial law as her own father had done to install the reign of terror, while the right has begun its maneuvers to disavow the legal proceedings against Park to put all blames on Choi. What we are witnessing is the rotten core of the South Korean democracy, whether governed by the left or the right, at the expense of the people.


But the morning after, the South Korean streets remained empty and clean, showing no vestige of the million-man march or its anger.

>Gender Colors Outrage Over Scandal Involving South Korea’s President

SEOUL, South Korea — A popular South Korean singer, Lee Seung-chul, recently posted on Twitter what he called a sad joke that reflected public outrage over a scandal involving the country’s president, Park Geun-hye.

“If Hillary is elected, the United States will have its first female president. If Trump is elected, it will have its first crazy president,” went the joke, which was widely shared online. “South Korea got both in 2012.”

Ms. Park’s 2012 victory was hailed as a milestone for South Korea’s deeply patriarchal society. But four years later, pressure is mounting across the country and even from within her party for Ms. Park to step down or face impeachment. This week, she became South Korea’s first sitting president to be accused by prosecutors of a criminal conspiracy.

The scandal surrounding Ms. Park has left many South Korean women infuriated with the president and fearful that it could be used to argue that women are unfit to lead. They worry that the country, already among the lowest in global gender-equality rankings, could become even more resistant to elevating women to positions of power.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/22/world/asia/south-korea-park-geun-hye-women.html

>>88915
“We have had more than our share of outrageous male politicians,” said Kim Yun-jeong, 22, who had a placard that said “Park Geun-hye, OUT!” at a recent demonstration in Seoul, the capital. “But I feel men now saying, behind our back and with a smirk on their faces: ‘See! This is what we get when we have a woman president for a change.’”

Ms. Park’s troubles stem from her decades of ties to Choi Soon-sil, a daughter of Choi Tae-min, the founder of a fringe religious sect who befriended Ms. Park in the 1970s. Ms. Choi was indicted Sunday on charges of using her influence with Ms. Park to extort millions from businesses. Prosecutors said Ms. Park was an accomplice of Ms. Choi, but she is protected by the Constitution from criminal indictment.

Ms. Park has agreed to submit to an inquiry. But on Tuesday, her lawyer, Yoo Yeong-ha, tried to use Ms. Park’s gender as a shield, saying that she was “a woman before being president” and that her “privacy as a woman” should be protected from prosecutors who sought to question her.

>>88916
Women’s groups were having none of it.

“They are not investigating her privacy as a woman but her acts of destroying constitutional order as president,” a group of women’s advocacy organizations said in a joint statement. (Mr. Yoo declined to elaborate on what Ms. Park’s privacy had to do with the investigation.)

South Korea’s women have been just as loud as its men in denouncing Ms. Park. Recent polls have found her to be deeply unpopular among both men and women.

And in the huge protests that have filled central Seoul over the past four weekends, women have often led peaceful marches — an unusual sight in South Korea, where anti-government demonstrations often feature men clashing with riot police officers.

During a Nov. 12 rally that attracted one million people by some estimates, a student from the Sacred Heart Girls’ High School in Seoul, Ms. Park’s alma mater, took the podium. “You have become an object of shame for us,” the student said of Ms. Park, prompting wild cheers from the crowd. “We can no longer tolerate you representing our nation.”

Although Ms. Park is often called South Korea’s first female president, that label fails to capture the complicated ways in which people here regard her presidency.

Ms. Park has never been considered a champion of women’s rights, either as the president or as a legislator before that. According to Kim Young-soon, a leader at the Korean Women’s Associations United, gender inequality has actually worsened under Ms. Park, with sex crimes on the rise and a growing wealth gap taking a harder toll on women.
Her presidential campaign was aimed at securing the support of older conservatives who still revered her father, the military dictator Park Chung-hee, for leading the country out of poverty in the 1960s and ’70s. Many saw in Ms. Park a modern version of her charismatic father.

>>88917
South Koreans like to say that they see Ms. Park not as a female president but as Park Chung-hee’s daughter. That places her in a peculiar and precarious position in South Korea, where patriarchy rules the political and corporate worlds.

A widely shared Twitter post last year summed up the challenges Ms. Park has faced in the shadow of her father’s legacy and with the cultural misgivings over female leaders: “When President Park Geun-hye does well, she wears the clothes of Park Chung-hee. But when she does badly, she becomes a woman.”

So far, Ms. Park’s gender has not been an outright issue in the scandal, but it has colored the outrage. Older conservative men who have turned against Ms. Park since the scandal often disdainfully refer to her as an “unfilial daughter.”

Online, men have attacked Ms. Park and Ms. Choi by invoking an old Korean diatribe against assertive women: “If a hen crows, the household collapses.” (When a man used that phrase at a recent protest, it set off both cheers and boos from the crowd.)

In the local news media, photographs have emerged that show urinals painted with images of Ms. Park and Ms. Choi. People have derided Ms. Choi, who has no background in government or policy making, as an “ajumma,” or homemaker, “from Gangnam,” a Seoul district often associated with affluence and moral weakness.

“President Park is taken as evidence that women are not qualified for politics,” a feminist group said last week, protesting what it called gender prejudices tainting the campaign against Ms. Park.

>>88918
Ms. Park has seldom spoken of her gender. But she has styled herself after her mother, Yuk Young-soo, who is seen as a symbol of feminine sacrifice among older Koreans. The former first lady was fatally shot in 1974 by a pro-North Korean assassin who had targeted her husband. For decades, Ms. Park’s hairstyle has reminded people of her mother.

She has also built a muscular political reputation in what some analysts have called an attempt to dispel the notion that a female leader would be weak on security issues. She has been hawkish on North Korea, predicting its collapse and promising military retaliation if provoked. At home, she has been a disciplinarian, stressing national order and calling her critics “unclean forces.”
Her upbringing and manners have led critics to accuse her of acting with a sense of entitlement. Those accusations have carried a powerful punch in South Korea, where many have grown disillusioned with so-called imperial male leaders in politics and in the corporate world, and expected a less rigid style from the first female president. Many of the most bitter criticisms have come from other women.

Ms. Park once sat motionless in the rain, waiting for an aide to step forward and pull her hood over her head, according to the aide, Jeon Yeo-ok, who later parted ways with Ms. Park and caused a sensation when she recounted the tale. “She is the kind of woman who would wear her crown to a nightclub,” Ms. Jeon said in 2012.

It is not the only time that Ms. Park, who once named Queen Elizabeth I of Britain as her role model, has been accused of behaving like royalty.

During a presidential debate in 2012, Lee Jung-hee, the head of a small left-wing party, accused Ms. Park of trying to become “not a female president but a queen” and denounced what she called her “disconnectedness and arrogance.”

After Ms. Park came to power in early 2013, her government disbanded Ms. Lee’s party on charges of being pro-North Korea.

>>88919
Many, including members of Ms. Park’s Saenuri Party, now find Ms. Lee’s criticism to have been prescient.

“We have been living in a monarchy,” Kim Sung-tae, a Saenuri lawmaker, said during a recent party meeting. “And our party has been loyal vassals for Queen Park Geun-hye.”

Time to put the comfort woman statue where it belongs?
http://m.koreatimes.co.kr/phone/news/view.jsp?req_newsidx=206902

And in those days men looked upon women differently than they do today.

At least that’s what I thought until recently, before three things changed my mind.

One was an interview with a prominent expert on prostitution. When I asked what she thought of the comfort women issue, she asked me to put my pen down so that she could rant politically incorrectly off-the-record.

>“It’s a joke,” she said. “Pure hypocrisy.”

>comfort woman statue

=statue of Korean Shaman
Korea:1,040 buried corpses are uncovered in land owned >>81989

Office of South Korea's flagging president admits buying 360 Viagra pills
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/23/office-of-south-koreas-flagging-president-admits-buying-360-viagra-pills

South Korea's presidential office explains Viagra purchase
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/south-korea-s-presidential-office-explains-viagra-purchase/3311870.html

Why did President Park need Viagra?
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218777.html

>Korean Prof(male) at Yonsei Univ says:Pres S.Korea(female) is developmental disorder and mental age is 17yrs old
http://www.insight.co.kr/newsRead.php?ArtNo=83102

>Justice minister and a secretary of scandal-ridden Korean president offer to resign
http://pulsenews.co.kr/view.php?sc=30800022&year=2016&no=814654

>Justice minister, presidential secretary offer to resign
-The Korea Herald
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161123000606

Justice Minister, senior presidential secretary offer to quit
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218765.html

>>88922
>Office of South Korea's flagging president admits buying 360 Viagra pills
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/23/office-of-south-koreas-flagging-president-admits-buying-360-viagra-pills

South Korea's presidential office explains Viagra purchase
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/south-korea-s-presidential-office-explains-viagra-purchase/3311870.html

Why did President Park need Viagra?
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218777.html
http://www.insight.co.kr/newsRead.php?ArtNo=83102

>Viagra Pills Create New Scandal for South Korea's President Park Geun Hye

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/world/asia/viagra-south-korea-park-geun-hye.html

S. Korean leader under fire over huge Viagra order
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/south-korea-president-park-geun-hye-viagra-altitude-sickness-scandal/

South Korean leader defends purchase of 360 Viagra pills
http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/south-korean-leader-defends-purchase-of-360-viagra-pills-1.3172800

Viagra purchase for South Korean president's jet was for 'altitude sickness': Report
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/23/viagra-purchase-for-south-korea-leader-park-geun-h/

South Korea scandal: Can Viagra help with altitude sickness?
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/24/health/viagra-south-korea-altitude-sickness/

>Pills purchased for Africa trip
The Viagra pills story came to light on Wednesday after a local Korean newspaper, Munhwa Ilbo, released a list of medicine purchased by the president's office between January 2014 and September 2016.

It was requested by opposition party member Kim Sang-hee. Among the items were 364 Viagra pills, 150 placenta parental injections and medicine for chronic fatigue.

"Viagra pills were purchased in preparation for altitude sickness ahead of (President) Park's visit to African nations," South Korean Presidential spokesman Jung Youn-kuk said during a daily briefing.

"None of them were used."

>Park's secret antiaging formula?
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161124000949

South Korea's President Park Geun Hye purchase of 3 luxury beds to use in the Presidential Office Building
http://news.joins.com/article/20797396
Kenya : Why South Korean president bought 360 Viagra pills in Kenya
https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000224549/why-south-korean-president-bought-360-viagra-pills-in-kenya

>Blue pills in Blue House: S. Korea leader explains Viagra
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/south-korea-presidents-office-explains-viagra-purchase/2016/11/22/9cd3b196-b12b-11e6-bc2d-19b3d759cfe7_story.html

>Blue pilled Park literally

Office of South Korea's flagging president admits buying 360 Viagra pills
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/23/office-of-south-koreas-flagging-president-admits-buying-360-viagra-pills

South Korea's presidential office explains Viagra purchase
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/south-korea-s-presidential-office-explains-viagra-purchase/3311870.html

Why did President Park need Viagra?
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218777.html

>Justice minister and a secretary of scandal-ridden Korean president offer to resign
http://pulsenews.co.kr/view.php?sc=30800022&year=2016&no=814654

>Justice minister, presidential secretary offer to resign
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161123000606

>Justice Minister, senior presidential secretary offer to quit
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218765.html

>Etomidate-lipuro Injections

In response to the news report that the presidential office bought Etomidate-lipuro Injections, which are intravenous anesthetic agents, Jung said they are part of the drugs the presidential medical staff carry all the time for emergency situations.

(2nd LD) Presidential office voices hope for 'balanced, neutral' independent counsel
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2016/11/23/25/0301000000AEN20161123002552315F.html

>Office of South Korea's flagging president admits buying 360 Viagra pills https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/23/office-of-south-koreas-flagging-president-admits-buying-360-viagra-pills

South Korea President's 7-hour Sewol absence faces probe
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218261.html

President's '7 missing hours' still shrouded in mystery
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_21

>360 Viagra pills and 7hour missing during Sinking of MV Sewol incident
>Etomidate-lipuro Injections and 7hour missing during Sinking of MV Sewol incident

Sinking of MV Sewol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_MV_Sewol

>Ex-presidential doctor of South Korea unaware of Viagra purchase

President Park Geun-hye's former doctor said Saturday that he wasn't involved in Cheong Wa Dae's purchase of the anti-impotence drug Viagra, and knew nothing about it.

Doctor Suh Chang-suk served the president from September 2014 to February this year when he was appointed head of Seoul National University Hospital (SNUH).

"As I was not a full time doctor to the President, I had no involvement in drug purchases by Cheong Wa Dae," Suh said at the SNUH Cancer Center in Bundang. "I did not know the drugs included Viagra."

But he defended the presidential office saying, "I assume Cheong Wa Dae took precautions against the danger of altitude sickness as security guards sometimes have to run on high ground, which could cause such symptoms."

The presidential office said Wednesday that it purchased more than 350 drugs in December, including Viagra, explaining the latter was to ease possible altitude sickness during Park's visit to high-altitude nations in Africa.

In May, Park went on a trip to Ethiopia, Uganda and Kenya whose capital cities are located one to two kilometers above sea level.

The controversy over Viagra was sparked after the list of drug purchases was revealed by Rep. Kim Sang-hee of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK).

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_219009.html

Korean university students fights with the police against "GSOMIA"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6ewrCZqvEo

S. Korea and Japan set to sign controversial GSOMIA(Generel Security of Military Information Agreement) this week
>Opposition parties strongly opposing signing of agreement that they say could jeopardize security

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_international/771449.html

http://img.koreatimes.co.kr/upload/newsV2/images/161123_p02_japan.jpg

http://static.news.zumst.com/images/36/2016/11/23/419fe13e274d4da7b2a298172b67c2be.jpg

http://pds.joins.com/news/component/htmlphoto_mmdata/201611/23/htm_20161123114820232346.jpg

South Korea media, Photo journalists refuse to take photos of Japanese Ambassador to Seoul Yasumasa Nagamine entering the Ministry of National Defense in Seoul, Wednesday, as part of their boycott of covering the signing of the General Security of Military Information Agreement between Seoul and Tokyo. The photographers protested the ministry's decision not to make public the scene of the signing.

>>89418
>Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Geng Shuang's Regular Press Conference on November 23, 2016

Q: It is reported that the ROK and Japan have signed the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) in Seoul on November 23 to share confidential security information. What's your comment?

A: We have taken note of the relevant report. Intensified cooperation between relevant countries based on the deeply entrenched Cold War mentality for the sharing of military intelligence will only worsen the confrontation on the Korean Peninsula, and add to insecurity and instability in Northeast Asia. It runs counter to the trend of peace and development and the common interests of countries in the region. The current situation on the Korean Peninsula remains complex and sensitive. While carrying out military cooperation, relevant countries should take seriously the security concerns of regional countries and contribute more to regional peace and stability, rather than the opposite.

>Seoul-Tokyo Intelligence Deal Raises Fears in South Korea

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA
A landmark Japan-South Korea military pact is drawing complaints from opponents in Seoul, who are protesting the deal and how quickly it was arranged.

Historical differences still deeply divide the two countries, and it’s unclear if a military deal will stand as a beacon of warming political ties between Korea, the former colony, and Japan, the former colonizer.

Right now, President Park Geun-hye is fighting to stay in office after being named an accomplice in a corruption scandal with elements of abuse of power and extortion. If she survives an expected impeachment attempt, analysts have said she’ll likely serve out the remainder of her term as little more than a figurehead.

Under the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA), Seoul and Tokyo can now directly share some military intelligence about North Korea. The deal allows them to bypass the United States, which has played middleman with intelligence since late 2014.

Quick passage

In 2012, negative public sentiment derailed the signing of GSOMIA under former President Lee Myung-bak. But this week, the deal passed with relative ease following approval by Park and her Cabinet, less than a month after the defense ministry renewed efforts to approve it.

South Korean opposition parties have said they plan to file a motion at the end of the month to dismiss Defense Minister Han Min-koo for signing the deal with Japan.

Opponents of the GSOMIA, many of whom protested outside the Japanese Embassy and the defense ministry, say Park rammed through the deal at a time when the country is distracted by the corruption scandal surrounding her administration.

“[The scandal] basically created a huge black hole. It sucks in everything,” said Choi Jong-kyun, a professor of political science at Seoul’s Yonsei University

http://www.voanews.com/a/seoul-tokyo-intelligence-deal-raises-south-korean-fears/3611211.html

S.Korean City mayor Lee Jae-myung's official facebook:President Park Geun Hye is Evil Jap's Spy. Japan is Our Enemy!

>Seongnam
Seongnam is the second largest city in South Korea's Gyeonggi Province after Suwon and the 10th largest city in the country
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seongnam

References
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/area/771604.html

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&;mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=082&aid=0000649394

>South Korea Defense Ministry Denies Speculation on Signing ACSA with Japan

South Korea Defense Ministry official says
>"Generel Security of Military Information Agreement with Japan has NOTHING binding power "

>"military intelligence agreement" is an empty promise

South Korea agreed Generel Security of Military Information Agreement with Japan unwillingly.

South Korea Defense Ministry says
"Generel Security of Military Information Agreement with Japan was forced by United States of America to do it"

"We are victim, We dont want that but U.S. threatens Poor South Korea."

---
South Korea and Japan recently agreed to share military intelligence --- but defense officials in Seoul deny the two countries are thinking about sharing more tangible military supplies.

The recent signing of the General Security of Military Information Agreement is a reminder that as recently as four years ago, Seoul and Tokyo were also considering an Acquisition Cross-Servicing Agreement(ACSA), meaning their militaries would share ammunition, food and fuel.

The two agreements were side-by-side on the negotiation table in 2012 before talks broke down.

Defense Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-gyun told reporters Friday that neither side has proposed talks about renewing the ACSA agreement.

He also clarified that South Korea's information sharing with Japan will be mainly limited to matters dealing with North Korea's nuclear and missile threats.
http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/news_Po_detail.htm?lang=e&id=Po&No=123514&current_page=

>South Korea: No GSOMIA! Jap! Koreans tear Flag of Japan into shreds and demand U.S.' apology to them

http://m.edaily.co.kr/html/news/news.html#!society-view-02463286612849656-E

http://biz.khan.co.kr/photo_collection.html?art_id=20161126222401&;page=12&tab=0#prev

Pic
http://image.edaily.co.kr/images/photo/files/NP/S/2016/11/PS16112600450.jpg

[Movie]
대형 욱일승천기 찢는 시민들 (5차 범국민행동)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCuEGEiK7pY

>>81989
Sure is interesting when SK crime movies seem less ridiculous than real life.

>>88926
>>Etomidate-lipuro Injections
>Propofol

>Park got free health and beauty treatments, used silly pseudonym
http://mengnews.joins.com/view.aspx?aId=3026254

President Park Geun-hye received 150 million won ($127,920) worth of health and beauty care services from a high-end clinic in southern Seoul’s Gangnam District allegedly for free and under the name of Choi Soon-sil, the confidante whose pulling of strings at the Blue House has imperiled Park’s presidency.

According to an exclusive report by JTBC on Tuesday, Park was also registered at Chaum, an anti-aging center in Gangnam’s affluent Cheongdam-dong, under the code name Gil Ra-im, a character portrayed by actress Ha Ji-won in the 2010 hit TV drama series “Secret Garden.”

“Park would come here to exercise and receive health and beauty treatments, but she apparently asked people to not register her under her real name,” a former employee of Chaum told JTBC, an affiliate of the Korea JoongAng Daily. “So she was registered as Gil Ra-im.”

According to medical records obtained by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Park received treatments at Chaum from 2011 to 2014.

Park reportedly did not pay for the treatments. The center’s VIP membership costs 150 million won.

“Park would receive an average of 300,000 to 400,000 won worth of treatments per visit, but she paid for none of them,” said another former employee of Chaum. “What’s more, Park would be treated to meals at restaurants afterwards by the head of the center.”

>>90069
“Park always came with her aide Ahn Bong-geun,” she added. “And more than half the time, Choi would come with Park, too.”

Ahn, a former presidential secretary for public relations, was summoned by prosecutors on Monday for questioning in the ever-snowballing scandal dubbed Choi-gate. He is accused of allowing Choi to enter the Blue House without security clearance.

Chaum told JTBC that Park was registered as Gil Ra-im at the clinic from January to July of 2011, but she didn’t use the name afterwards. Yet according to the Health Ministry, Park was registered at Chaum as Gil Ra-im even after she won the presidential election in 2012.

The scandal is another humiliating twist for the president. Her friend Choi is accused of meddling in state affairs, embezzling the funds of two nonprofit foundations and acquiring classified presidential information without security clearance.

Park is suspected of strong-arming Korea’s largest companies to provide graft at the illegal request of Choi. Heads of conglomerates have been summoned by prosecutors for questioning over that allegation in the past week.

The Health Ministry investigated a former senior doctor at Chaum surnamed Kim, and examined Park’s medical records. It was revealed on Tuesday that Park received treatment at Chaum 29 times from 2011 to 2014.

According to Kim, Park received vitamin injections at Chaum seven times before her presidency. Four of the appointments were registered under the name of Choi Soon-sil, and three under the name of her sister Choi Soon-deuk. Even into her presidency, Park was prescribed vitamin injections 12 times under the name of Choi Soon-deuk.

>>90070
Kim said he brought the vitamins personally to the Blue House and injected Park.

Such injections are done from an IV bag filled with concentrated doses of vitamins.

Additionally, when a nurse at the Blue House brought a blood sample of Park’s to Chaum in September 2013 for examination, it was registered and recorded under Choi Soon-sil’s name.

Park may have received more medical treatments than recorded. From August 2010 to June this year, Choi Soon-sil is recorded to have visited Chaum 507 times and received 293 vitamin injections. In the same time period, her sister Choi Soon-deuk is recorded to have visited 158 times and received 109 vitamin injections. It’s unclear how many of them were actually treatments for the Choi sisters.

Choi also was prescribed vitamin injections 21 times in 2012 and 2013, and she told clinic staff that she would “take them to a hospital nearby to receive the injections.” It is unclear whether the injections were actually for Choi.

The Medical Service Act forbids doctors to register patients under false names or issue prescriptions without examining the patients.

Violations can be punished by up to three years of imprisonment and up to 10 million won in fines, in addition to a one month suspension of qualification as a medical service provider.

The ministry plans to charge Kim criminally.

Medical records of the Choi sisters showed, however, that they were never prescribed propofol, contradicting an allegation that it may have been prescribed to Park via the sisters.

>>90072
Propofol is an anesthetic and amnesiac drug implicated in the death of singer Michael Jackson in 2009.

Netizens pounced on the news, particularly the president’s choice of the pseudonym Gil Ra-im from a syrupy Korean television drama. It’s akin to an American celebrity using the pseudonym Lucy Ricardo or Scarlett O’Hara.

“Did I become Gil Ra-im for this?” reads a parodied screenshot of “Secret Garden” featuring an emotional scene with actress Ha Ji-won.

The statement echoed a line in Park’s second apology to the public on Nov. 4 over the national scandal, when she said, “I feel painful with a sense of shame, wondering to myself if I became the president for this.”

That self-pitying statement has been mercifully parodied on social media by netizens who have twisted it to, “Did I become a college student for this?” and “Did I become an employee for this?” and “Was I born in Korea for this?”

Edited photos showing Park’s face cropped into screenshots from “Secret Garden” also went viral, including a kiss with male lead Hyun Bin.

“Let’s all show up at the anti-Park rally this Saturday wearing Hyun Bin’s signature sweatsuit from the drama,” a user posted on Twitter.
Gil Ra-im was the No. 1 phrase being searched Wednesday afternoon on Naver, the country’s top portal site.

>>81989
>Blue House denies latest revelation about President Park’s ‘lost seven hours’ during Sewol sinking
http://mengnews.joins.com/view.aspx?aId=3026319

A nursing officer from the Armed Forces Medical Command in Seongnam, south of Seoul, was dispatched to the Blue House on the day of the Sewol ferry sinking, according to local media Thursday. If true, this could further support allegations that President Park Geun-hye was undergoing cosmetic surgery during the first seven hours of the sinking on April 16, 2014.

Broadcaster YTN reported Thursday that a nursing officer was at the presidential office on the day Sewol sank in waters off Jindo, South Jeolla, citing an anonymous source from the prosecution’s special investigation team into the scandal surrounding Choi Soon-sil, the longtime friend of the president.

While details over why the officer was sent to the Blue House and what medical procedures may have been performed were not reported, the broadcaster’s report added to suspicions that Park was under some form of medical treatment during the crucial hours after the ferry started sinking, which ultimately led to the deaths of 304 people. There is already speculation that Park may have undergone cosmetic surgery and was, at the time, anesthetized by propofol.

Such rumors stem from the fact that it took nearly seven hours for her to make a public appearance in the wake of what became the country’s worst maritime disaster. Park’s question to an official at around 5:15 p.m. that day, during her visit to the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, fueled such speculation. During the meeting, Park said, “I was told that the students were wearing life vests. Is it hard to find them?”

>>90075
The remark caused many to question whether she was aware of the gravity of the situation or had been receiving any updates on it during the morning.

Park’s seven-hour absence became a mystery, and Blue House officials initially refused to say where she was or what she was doing at the time. Kim Ki-choon, then presidential chief of staff, said before the National Assembly on July 7, 2014, that he had no information about Park’s whereabouts during those seven hours. The Presidential Security Service also refused to disclose any information.

The Blue House later revealed she had been briefed on the accident 15 times that day, but questions linger over what action the head of staff took in her first response after being briefed. Park’s disappearance is now referred to as the “lost seven hours” by critics.

The presidential office on Thursday denied the report that a nursing officer was dispatched to the Blue House, saying there was no record of such a visit.

>Sinking of MV Sewol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_MV_Sewol

The Bank of Korea,the central bank of South Korea,buys 1.5 trillion won in bonds to stabilize market

With the financial market jittery since U.S. Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen’s hinted at raising U.S. interest rates, Korea’s central bank announced it intends to intervene in the local market with the hopes of stabilizing it for the first time in eight years.

The Korean central bank said it will buy six government bonds worth 1.5 trillion won ($1.27 billion) at 2 p.m. today ranging from those with maturities of three years to those that mature in 20 years.

This is not the first time that the Bank of Korea has purchased Korean bonds; it purchased them three times last year alone. The last time was in October 2015, when the BOK bought 700 billion won in bonds. However, this is the first time since the 2008 global crisis that the Korean central bank is purchasing such a massive amount of government bonds. That year, the bank bought 1 trillion in treasuries on Nov. 19.

Market instabilities have risen since Donald J. Trump’s upset victory in the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 8. After the real estate mogul won the election, Korean bond interest has been rising rapidly, breaking this year’s all-time high.
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=3026428

>>90101
South Korea

Bond yields expected to rise on inflation concerns
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2016/11/123_218640.html

Bond yields are expected to rise further on the forecast of higher and faster inflation on the back of President-elect Donald Trump's pledge for fiscal stimulus, tax cuts and tightened immigration laws, analysts say.

Yields on government and corporate bonds have been rising toward record highs as global investors have been pulling their money out of their fixed-income portfolios on concerns that Trump's fiscal policy would not only increase U.S. debt but also bring forth a contractionary monetary policy to tame the expected inflation.

"The local yields on bonds are expected to continuously rise (due to the forecast of higher inflation), despite the central bank's commitment to market stabilization," said Peter Park, analyst at NH Investment & Securities.
Credit outlook for Korean banks, businesses stable for 2017: Moody's
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161122000825

Korea's rating table next year: Moody's
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2016/11/488_218733.html

>South Korea: The day of exterminating Shit(President.Park Geun Hye)!
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&;mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=022&aid=0003120425

>Guam,U.S.:Unruly Korean passenger sentenced to almost 3 years in prison
The Korean Air passenger who got into a fight with a flight attendant on board a plane bound for Guam from Seoul, South Korea was sentenced to 28 months and nine days in federal prison on Tuesday.

Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood’s punishment for passenger Kwon Woo Sung is a total of 36 months, including the past seven months he served under house arrest and in federal detainment. This leaves 28 months and nine days left on his sentence.

http://www.guampdn.com/story/news/2016/11/29/unruly-passenger-sentenced-almost-3-years-prison/94586042/
Korean Air passenger allegedly drinks beers, smokes on plane, engages in brawl
http://www.guampdn.com/story/news/2016/04/20/korean-air-passenger-allegedly-drinks-beers-smokes-plane-engages-brawl/83267120/

Flight attendants are forced to tie up passenger after he 'drank five beers, smoked in the loo and started a fight after being refused more alcohol'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3551652/Korean-Air-flight-attendants-forced-tie-passenger-s-hands-feet-drank-five-beers-smoked-loo-started-fight-refused-alcohol.html

>Georgia,U.S.: Korean women"We are not prostitutes, We the victim, Police apologize!!"
arrested Korean women appealed for false charges and went for legal measures against police
http://www.radiokorea.com/news/article.php?uid=245287

>>90419
> Colorado. Korean man accused of pointing loaded gun at kids who threw snowballs
BOULDER, Colo. – Police in Boulder have arrested a man on suspicions that he pointed a loaded gun at children after a snowball they threw struck his minivan, CBS Denver reported.

http://kdvr.com/2016/11/22/aurora-man-points-loaded-gun-at-kids-throwing-snowballs/

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/colorado-man-accused-of-pointing-loaded-gun-at-kids-who-threw-snowballs/
http://www.koreadaily.com/news/read.asp?art_id=4792617

>Pittsburgh:Pirates' Jung Ho Kang, Korean baseball player, Arrested In South Korea
http://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2016/12/01/report-pirates-player-jung-ho-kang-arrested-in-south-korea/

>Korea:Samsung washing machine 2.8 million top-load models recalled in US due to fears of explosion

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/samsung-recalls-2-8-million-top-loading-washing-machines-us-due-explosion-fears-1589985

>South Korea:Birthplace of President Park geun hye's father torched in arson
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_219309.html

>South Korea:LeeJung-hyun,Leader of Ruling Party Saenuri says Park Geun Hye is "Jesus Christ"!!
According to Kukmin Ilbo newspaper on 24th November

Lee Jung-hyun
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Jung-hyun_(politician)

Ex-Saenuri chief is axis of conservative realignment
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/11/116_218947.html

Kukmin Ilbo
>Kukmin Ilbo is a South Korean daily newspaper
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kukmin_Ilbo

>S.Korean City mayor Lee Jae-myung's official Facebook:President Park Geun Hye is Evil Jap's Spy. Japan is Enemy!
>Seongnam
Seongnam is the second largest city in South Korea's Gyeonggi Province after Suwon and the 10th largest city in the country
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seongnam

References
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/area/771604.html
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&;mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=082&aid=0000649394

Gender Colors Outrage Over Scandal Involving South Korea’s President
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/22/world/asia/south-korea-park-geun-hye-women.html

>South Korea:President Park Geun-hye effectively declared war on the people

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/773657.html

>South Korea:Choi Soon-sil and Her Daughter Being Investigated by German Prosecutors
http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/news_In_detail.htm?No=123660

When will Choi’s daughter return?
http://m.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161201000727

North Korea: Kim Jong Un Warns US To Stop ‘Hostile Nuclear Threats,
>"Washington's hope for North Korea's denuclearization is an outdated illusion," Rodong Sinmun, a North Korean newspaper, reportedly said.
http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-update-kim-jong-un-warns-us-stop-hostile-nuclear-threats-slams-obama-2450283

>N. Korea-China trade on steady rise despite sanctions
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2016/11/25/0401000000AEN20161125006900315.html

>China's October coal imports from North Korea up on month after falling in September
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-northkorea-coal-idUSKBN13K138

>North Korea Radio Broadcasts Cryptic Numbers, Likely To Be Coded Messages For Spies In South Korea, Report Says
http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-radio-broadcasts-cryptic-numbers-likely-be-coded-messages-spies-south-2451089

Less than half as many illegal Chinese fishing boats in S. Korean waters after firing
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_international/772811.html

South Korea's President Park impeached in parliamentary vote
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-politics-idUSKBN13X2JS

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/south-korean-assembly-set-to-vote-on-presidents-impeachment/2016/12/08/b1429d8c-bd8c-11e6-ae79-bec72d34f8c9_story.html

South Korea:Hyun Gi-hwan,former Executive senior presidential secretary, tried to commit suicide
青瓦台前首秘自殺未遂 - 澳門日報電子版
http://www.macaodaily.com/html/2016-12/01/content_1140099.htm

青瓦台前首秘自殺未遂. 【本報訊】據中央社首爾三十日消息:因涉嫌釜山海雲台地標LCT項目開發弊案的韓國前青瓦台政務首席秘書玄伎煥,今天傍晚六時三十分許,在釜山鎮區某酒店割腕自殺未遂

South Korea:Citizens launched DDoS attacks to Blue House(executive office) homepage to shut down

>Citizens launching targeted social media attacks while planning large-scale candlelight demonstrations for this weekend

Members of the public are seething after the Saenuri Party moved to adopt plans for an April resignation by President Park Geun-hye and an early election in June as its platform at a general lawmakers’ meeting on Dec. 1.
The decision brought a storm of indignation against the politicians’ flailing over a motion to impeach Park. Later that day, messages calling for protest calls to Saenuri lawmakers were shared on social media, along with the mobile phone numbers of the party’s 128 members of the 20th National Assembly. One citizen posted a blog message showing a strongly worded protest text message they had sent to local lawmaker Kweon Seong-dong.

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/773023.html

Hyundai Merchant Marine Co. (HMM) released a statement refuting the Wall Street Journal’s recent report on HMM’s failure in joining 2M alliance on December 1.

The Wall Street Journal said on November 30 (local time), “The world’s largest container-shipping alliance has decided not to allow Hyundai Merchant Marine Co. to join amid customer backlash, dealing a blow to the troubled South Korean shipping concern," by quoting the saying of a senior executive with the 2M alliance who declined to be identified. The executive said, “We reckon that at this point going to bed with Hyundai could shake customer confidence so we are looking for looser forms of cooperation.” The media added that Hyundai Merchant wasn't immediately available for comment.

The US-based economic journal went on saying, “In a November note to clients, Maersk Line said that rather than Hyundai Merchant becoming a 2M alliance member, the parties are looking ‘at other cooperation possibilities’ including taking over Hyundai Merchant’s chartered vessels and deploying them into the 2M network.”

In the statement, however, HMM said, “The WSJ’s article released today didn’t include a full understanding of what HMM and 2M discussed. HMM and 2M are still in negotiations over details of alliance membership and we will wrap up the negotiations at the meetings scheduled in Europe next week.”

http://www.businesskorea.co.kr/english/news/industry/16648-controversy-over-2m-membership-hmm-refutes-wall-street-journal

>Hyundai Merchant Denies Alliance Hopes Are Dead
http://www.wsj.com/articles/hyundai-merchant-denies-alliance-hopes-are-dead-1480585053

>>81989
Korean Presidents

>1st President - impeached because of rigged election, defect to Hawaii
>2nd President - resigns due to coup, sentenced 3 years imprisonment in court-martial
>3rd President - wife shot by guy trying to kill him, soon after killed by close adviser
>4th President - couldn't control demonstrations, resigns due to Gwangju after just 8 months in office
>5th President - sentenced to death for his role in the Gwangju Massacre, later pardoned
>6th President - arrested for bribery after term, imprisoned 17 years for munity and treaso during Gwangju Massacre, later pardoned
>7th President - economic crisis forcing IMF to step in during term, second son arrested for bribery of intercession and tax evasion
>8th President - 5 family members including his 3 sons guilty of bribery
>9th President - "slips and dies" while climbing a mountain during investigations for bribery
>10th President - brother arrested, wife's cousin arrested, accused of violating real estate laws
>11th President - daughter of 3rd president, puppet of a cult leader, impeached

>>90493
some are stretching it, but man does that look like a mess

>South Korea:Yoon Chang-jung,former Chief spokesman for President Park, says "We should protect her!"
http://news.nate.com/view/20161203n09549

Yoon Chang-jung
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoon_Chang-jung

Yoon Chang-jung is a South Korean journalist and official. He briefly served as the press spokesman for Korean president Park Geun-hye in early 2013, and was fired following a sexual assault on a Korean American female intern at the South Korean Embassy in the U.S. in May 2013.
This event is said to "have overshadowed President Park's first visit to the US".

South Korean President Park Geun-hye visited the United States between May 5th and May 9th, with Yoon accompanying Park as her chief spokesman

>South Korean President Fires Spokesman for ‘Unsavory Act’ During Visit to U.S.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/11/world/asia/spokesman-for-south-korean-leader-quits.html

>South Korean President Fires Spokesman Amid Sexual Assault Allegations in US
http://abcnews.go.com/International/south-korean-president-fires-spokesman-amid-sexual-assault/story?id=19148794

Viagra Pills Create New Scandal for South Korea's President Park Geun Hye
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/world/asia/viagra-south-korea-park-geun-hye.html

South Korean leader defends purchase of 360 Viagra pills
http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/south-korean-leader-defends-purchase-of-360-viagra-pills-1.3172800

Viagra purchase for South Korean president's jet was for 'altitude sickness': Report
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/23/viagra-purchase-for-south-korea-leader-park-geun-h/

This is one of the best threads I've seen here

>>90489
>Hyun Gi-hwan,former Executive senior presidential secretary, tried to commit suicide

He was arrested by police after trying to commist suicide, no english source has issued

>>90420
>Texas:Korean Man assaulted, dragged victim into West Campus street, police say
AUSTIN - A man is facing an aggravated assault charge after he allegedly knocked another man to the ground and dragged him into the middle of a busy street.

Police have charged Dong Hyun Kim, 27, in the alleged assault. Court documents allege that around 4:25 p.m. Nov. 29, Kim began screaming at a woman along the 2300 block of Guadalupe Street from a parked car. Police said Kim believed the woman – who was walking to class at the time – was responsible for him being suspended from the university.

Kim allegedly got out of the car and charged screaming at the woman. The victim was walking on Guadalupe at the time and approached Kim, who threw a smoothie in the victim’s face. According to the affidavit, the victim told police the driver pulled away with his hand stuck in the rolled-up passenger window. Cell phone video provided to police shows the victim jogging beside Kim’s car until it stops due to traffic.

The affidavit states Kim exited the vehicle again and began punching the victim, knocking him to the ground. Kim then allegedly grabbed the victim by the ankles and dragged him into Guadalupe Street’s rush hour traffic. Cell phone video shows a Good Samaritan grab Kim and pull both him and the victim out of traffic.
Police also allege Kim posted on Facebook after the assault, “I knocked that (expletive) out on the drag and dragged his ass into the middle of the street. Everyone saw it. And I got to walk away free.”

Kim was arrested and booked into the Travis County Jail on Wednesday afternoon. Bond has been set at $25,000.

http://www.kvue.com/news/crime/120116-west-campus-assault-charge/361055967

>South Korea:When will our Fleet AirCraft carrier building plan go ahead again?

http://news.mk.co.kr/newsRead.php?year=2016&;no=838204

Chae Woo-seok, head of Korea Association of Defense Industry Studies and Former Major General of South Korea Army says

"We should build Fleet AirCraft Carrier Syngman Rhee"
http://www.gdnews.kr/news/article.html?no=4212

South Korea: Asia's New Powerhouse Arms Exporter
http://thediplomat.com/2014/05/south-korea-asias-new-powerhouse-arms-exporter/

“South Korea's defense industry has developed under a special situation, having North Korea next to it,” said Chae Woo-seok, head of Korea Association of Defense Industry Studies

South Korea: 'Cult' scandal bringing down a president
They're angry over a political scandal that threatens to end the rule of South Korea's president Park Geun-hye. Ms Park is accused of abusing her power by colluding with close friend Choi Soon-sil who is facing fraud charges.
http://www.news.com.au/finance/work/leaders/inside-the-bizarre-scandal-haunting-south-koreas-leader-park-geunhye/news-story/e61d66120fefa7fb9b61961b8f6c9143

>South Korea:Asiana Airlines under fire for letting injured pilot fly after punch-up
Asiana Airlines has come under fire for letting a co-pilot injured in a bloody fight, operate a flight bound for New York from Seoul, South Korea, last week, risking the safety of 275 passengers. According to reports
http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/east-asia/article/2052152/asiana-airlines-under-fire-letting-injured-pilot-fly-after-punch

>Asiana Airlines flight makes emergency landing in Russia after smoke alarm
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2016/12/06/78/0200000000AEN20161206000600315F.html

North Korean Hackers Suspected Of Attacking South Korean Defense Ministry's Cyber Wing
South Korea announced its defense ministry's cyber wing had been attacked by hackers suspected to be North Korean. The cyberattack reportedly took place in September but the confirmation of the attack came Tuesday.

South Korean authorities are trying to determine the extent of the data leak following the attack. The cyber wing of the defense ministry was set up in January 2010 as part of the country's counter-hacking measures against attempts specifically carried out by Pyongyang.

"The military formed a cyber investigative team to look into this matter and found that some military data — including confidential information — has been leaked. It appears to be a North Korean act," the defense ministry said.

http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korean-hackers-suspected-attacking-south-korean-defense-ministrys-cyber-wing-2455566

North Korea slams 'Obama and his lackeys' in furious response to sanctions
>"Obama and his lackeys are sadly mistaken if they calculate that they can force the DPRK to abandon its line of nuclear weaponization and undermine its status as a nuclear power through base sanctions to pressurize it," the statement read.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/01/asia/north-korea-sanctions-reaction/

>South Korea: 5000 citizens file lawsuit against President Park over influence-peddling scandal

As many as 5,000 people are reportedly claiming 500,000 South Korean won (£335, $427) each in compensation from Park for allegedly causing mental suffering through the ongoing influence-peddling scandal, involving her confidante Choi Soon-sil.
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/5000-south-koreans-file-lawsuit-against-president-park-impeachment-motion-looms-1595056

South Korea proud of this action as "true democracy"

>>88916
>See! This is what we get when we have a woman president for a change.’
>Women’s groups were having none of it.
HAHAHAHA this is hilarious!!

Protesters Take to Seoul Streets for Sixth Straight Weekend with 416torches and 2,320,000 candles

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA —
Hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in Seoul on Saturday to call for the ouster of President Park Geun-hye, marking the sixth straight weekend of demonstrations in the city.

The protests started shortly after South Korea's National Assembly announced Friday a vote to impeach Park had been postponed until December 9.

The president has been embroiled in a multi-million-dollar influence peddling scandal that has decimated her image as a strong and incorruptible leader.
http://www.voanews.com/a/south-korean-opposition-files-impeachment-notion/3621561.html

>South Korea:Korean lawmaker reportedly sneaky illegal trespassed on U.S. military base in Texas

>Opposition lawmaker reportedly sneaked into Texas military base

SEOUL, Dec. 2 (Yonhap) -- A South Korean lawmaker was reportedly caught sneaking into a U.S. military base in Texas late last month to interview a nursing officer believed to hold key information on a controversy over President Park Geun-hye's whereabouts during a ferry disaster in 2014.

The Asahi Shimbun, a Japanese daily, reported Friday Rep. Ahn Min-suk of the main opposition Democratic Party entered the military facility without authorization and was expelled immediately.

He allegedly tried to meet a South Korean nursing officer who worked at the presidential office in 2014.

The Sewol ferry, which sunk on April 16, 2014, was en route to the southern resort island of Jeju from Incheon, west of Seoul, with a total of 476 passengers. Most of the 304 dead were high school students on a field trip.

The daily added the U.S. government lodged a complaint to the Seoul government and parliament over the incident on Thursday.

A local diplomatic source said the U.S. delivered its stance, but it is not an official complaint.

Sources said the Democratic Party is looking into the details of the incident.

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2016/12/02/0200000000AEN20161202008451315.html

>>91170
>South Korea lawmaker:Nurse linked to 'seven missing hours' under US military protection

>The U.S. military v.s. South Korea congress

The U.S. military is protecting a Korean Army nurse who may know what President Park Geun-hye was doing for seven hours while the Sewol ferry was sinking on April 16, 2014, an opposition lawmaker alleged Monday.

This may be because the Seoul's defense ministry requested protection for the nurse, identified only as Capt. Cho, according to Rep. An Min-suk of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea.

Cho worked at the presidential office at the time of the country's worst maritime disaster that killed 304 people.

An also claimed Cheong Wa Dae has systematically monitored Cho, who is currently taking a course at a U.S. Army hospital in Texas.

The lawmaker said when he visited Texas late last month to interview the nurse, a Korean male officer was seen "guarding" her. An also claimed the U.S. military did not allow him to meet with Cho and told him that it could not confirm anything about her. When he asked why, the four-term legislator said that the U.S. military cited a request from the Korean government.

Cho was one of two army nurses who worked at Cheong Wa Dae in 2014.

An said Cho is a key witness into Park's "seven missing hours."

The President appeared at an emergency measures headquarters seven hours after the tragic incident began.

Owing to the lack of an explanation about her whereabouts during those critical hours, rumors have abounded that she might have been undergoing plastic surgery or another medical procedure.

After the high-profile corruption and influence-peddling scandal involving the President and her longtime friend Choi Soon-sil became public in late October, opposition lawmakers and prosecutors have also been looking into the seven-hour absence

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_219555.html

>>91171
An belongs to an 18-member National Assembly panel investigating the scandal, which is being conducted separately from an investigation by the prosecution, and one to be conducted by an independent counsel expected to start this week.

He visited the U.S. from Nov. 29 to Dec. 2, but failed to meet Cho.

"I was so close to meeting Cho on the base, but the meeting fell through due to the U.S. military interrupting it," An said during a radio interview. "The U.S. military said there was a request from the Korean government but did not confirm whether the body that made such a request was Cheong Wa Dae, the Ministry of National Defense or the Korean Embassy."

At the parliamentary investigation session, the lawmaker said soon after he failed to meet Cho, she suddenly held an interview with Korean correspondents in the U.S. and denied allegations surrounding Park.

"This has only fueled suspicion," he said, raising the possibility of government intervention.

During the interview, Nov. 30, Cho said Park received no treatment from medical staff on the day of the ferry disaster. When asked whether Park usually received Botox wrinkle treatment or other cosmetic procedures, Cho said, "Not that I know of."

She also refused to answer questions on whether Park received various nutritional injections or used outside medical facilities, citing patient confidentiality.

Disclosing a tipoff from a Korean-American soldier, An said the Korean male officer suddenly appeared at a cafeteria on the base on Nov. 29.

>>91172
"I demand that the identification of this male officer, who was closely monitoring Cho, be revealed," An said. "I also call for disclosing who had Cho move her residence four times in four months since August."

The lawmaker called on the Assembly to have her appear before the parliamentary hearing.

An also denied reports that he was caught sneaking onto the U.S. base to interview Cho. The Asahi Shimbun, a Japanese daily, reported Friday that An tried to enter the military facility without authorization and was immediately expelled.

He said he entered the base without any legal problems, showing a photo of him and a U.S. military officer taken inside the base.

"If I trespassed there and was expelled, I would not have been able to take this photo," he said.

Meanwhile, the defense ministry denied allegations that the male officer has been monitoring Cho.

"An Army doctor also has been training in Texas for a month," spokesman Moon Sang-gyun said. "The male officer An was talking about would be this person."

Moon said the male officer will be returning home today.

>South Korea:Park Geun Hye spent 90minutes hair styling when 315 students trapped in sinking ferry

President Park Geun-hye spent 90 minutes getting her hair styled by a popular hairdresser at her residence at Cheong Wa Dae while the Sewol ferry was sinking on April 16, 2014, the local daily Hankyoreh reported Tuesday.

The 90 minutes were part of the "missing seven hours" while the ferry was sinking, during which nobody saw the President who only received written or phone reports about the incident without holding an emergency meeting with government officials.

With Cheong Wa Dae being denounced for an inept response to the sinking, Park's hair styling during the critical hours may deal another blow to her if it is proven true.

According to the newspaper, a hairdresser who runs a beauty salon in Gangnam, southern Seoul, did President Park's hair up for about 90 minutes between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. at Cheong Wa Dae after being called by the presidential office.

Park has enjoyed her signature up-style hair, reminiscent of her mother former first lady Yuk Young-soo who was assassinated by a Japanese-born North Korean in 1972.

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_219630.html

>>91174
But Cheong Wa Dae described the report as "ridiculous," saying, "We have used two hairdressers for the President since 2013 and they come almost every day. On the day of the ferry sinking, they gave her a trim for 20 minutes after 3 p.m."

It said the President had her hair done after deciding to visit the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters.

There have been suspicions that the President received cosmetic treatment during the missing seven hours. The suspicions grew after it was confirmed that Cheong Wa Dae had purchased large doses of various fatigue relieving and cosmetic shots.

On Monday, the chief of Cheong Wa Dae's medical office conceded that he prescribed such shots for the President, during a National Assembly investigation into Cheong Wa Dae on the influence-peddling scandal surrounding Park's confidant Choi Soon-sil.

It was contrary to the presidential office's earlier claim that it bought such shots for staffers' health.

In the early hours of questioning, Lee had denied prescribing cosmetic shots for the President. But nearly at the end of the session, he admitted doing so, after being pressed continually by lawmakers to tell the truth.

To the question of whether the President had received any fatigue-relieving and cosmetic shots, he said, "They were prescribed as needed."

>>91175
The official said Cheong Wa Dae officials had also received shots, but that placenta injections were only given to the President. Lee said the shots were not provided for cosmetic purposes, claiming "it is an antioxidant and is prescribed to boost the immune system and improve health."

But he said the President did not receive any treatments on the day of the Sewol tragedy.

About the cosmetics treatment suspicions on the day of the ferry sinking, Rep. Park Young-sun of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) showed two photos of the President taken on April 15 and April 16 of 2014, saying that experts say she appears to have received Botox injections, based on the differences between the photos.

Meanwhile, Cheong Wa Dae was found to have covered up the fact that army nurses were working at the presidential office at the time. The nurses said they did not treat the President on the day of the disaster.

Rep. An Min-suk of the DPK said one of the two nurses, surnamed Cho, who is currently receiving training at an army hospital in Texas, is being protected by the U.S. military.

He said this could be upon the Korean government's request, as the nurse is believed to know the President's whereabouts on the day of the Sewol disaster. An said this is what he heard from the U.S. military when he attempted to meet Cho there. An visited Texas from Nov. 29 to Dec. 2 to speak to her but failed to do so.

Viagra Pills Create New Scandal for South Korea's President Park Geun Hye
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/world/asia/viagra-south-korea-park-geun-hye.html

S. Korean leader under fire over huge Viagra order
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/south-korea-president-park-geun-hye-viagra-altitude-sickness-scandal/

South Korean leader defends purchase of 360 Viagra pills
http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/south-korean-leader-defends-purchase-of-360-viagra-pills-1.3172800

Viagra purchase for South Korean president's jet was for 'altitude sickness': Report
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/nov/23/viagra-purchase-for-south-korea-leader-park-geun-h/

South Korea scandal: Can Viagra help with altitude sickness?
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/24/health/viagra-south-korea-altitude-sickness/

>Pills purchased for Africa trip
The Viagra pills story came to light on Wednesday after a local Korean newspaper, Munhwa Ilbo, released a list of medicine purchased by the president's office between January 2014 and September 2016.

It was requested by opposition party member Kim Sang-hee. Among the items were 364 Viagra pills, 150 placenta parental injections and medicine for chronic fatigue.

"Viagra pills were purchased in preparation for altitude sickness ahead of (President) Park's visit to African nations," South Korean Presidential spokesman Jung Youn-kuk said during a daily briefing.

"None of them were used."

>Park's secret antiaging formula?
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20161124000949

>>91177
South Korea's President Park Geun Hye purchase of 3 luxury beds to use in the Presidential Office Building
http://news.joins.com/article/20797396

Kenya : Why South Korean president bought 360 Viagra pills in Kenya
https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000224549/why-south-korean-president-bought-360-viagra-pills-in-kenya

President's 'Sewol absence' to be investigated
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_219427.html

Why did presidential house need Viagra?
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_218777.html

President Park, a liar
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_218663.html

President's '7 missing hours' still shrouded in mystery
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2016/12/116_218732.html

>>91174
>>91175
>>91176
>South Korea:Park’s hairdo after Sewol tragedy took 20 mins, not 90, office says

THE South Korean presidential office has denied a recent news report claiming President Park Geun-hye spent over 90 minutes getting her hair done during the critical first few hours of the 2014 ferry disaster that claimed hundreds of lives.

According to the Yonhap News Agency, local daily Hankyoreh reported that the president had her hairdresser at the Cheong Wa Dae (presidential office) between 1pm and 3pm on April 16, 2014, which corresponded with the time rescuers frantically searched for survivors in the waters off the southwestern island of Jindo.

The presidential office, however, insists Park’s hairdo and makeup only took 20 minutes and that the two contract-based workers had entered the office at around 3.20pm that the day.

This is not the first time the presidential office has had to quell speculation on the president’s whereabouts in the first seven hours of the ferry sinking. Rumours have continued to swirl since the disaster two years ago but re-emerged recently when the ongoing influence-peddling scandal involving Park and her confidante Choi Soon-sil hit headlines.

Among the rumours swirling is that the sinking of the ferry was part of a cult ritual and the victims were “offerings”, or that the president had received plastic surgery during the accident.

According to the Korea Times, the presidential office insists the president was in her office working at the time, bu has never quite given a clear explanation of Park’s whereabouts during those seven hours.

https://asiancorrespondent.com/2016/12/south-korea-parks-hairdo-sewol-ferry-tragedy-took-20-mins-not-90-office-says/

>South Korea:"President Park Geun Hye is Queen Elizabeth I of Korea"

South Korean women furious that Park scandal sets them back
http://www.todayonline.com/world/asia/south-korean-women-furious-park-scandal-sets-them-back

One country, many systems
http://mengnews.joins.com/view.aspx?aId=3026708

>>91181
>South Korean women furious that Park scandal sets them back

SEOUL — A popular South Korean singer, Lee Seung-chul, recently posted on Twitter what he called a sad joke that reflected public outrage over a scandal involving the country’s President, Ms Park Geun-hye.

“If Hillary is elected, the United States will have its first female president. If Trump is elected, it will have its first crazy president,” went the joke, which was widely shared online. “South Korea got both in 2012.”
Ms Park’s 2012 victory was hailed as a milestone in South Korea’s deeply patriarchal society. But four years later, pressure is mounting across the country, and even from within her party, for Ms Park to step down or face impeachment. This week, she became South Korea’s first sitting President to be accused by prosecutors of a criminal conspiracy.

The scandal surrounding Ms Park has left many South Korean women infuriated with the President and fearful that it could be used to argue that women are unfit to lead. They worry that the country, already among the lowest in global gender-equality rankings, could become even more resistant to elevating women to positions of power.

>>91182
“We have had more than our share of outrageous male politicians,” said Kim Yun-jeong, 22, who had a placard that read “Park Geun-hye, OUT!” at a recent demonstration in Seoul. “But I feel men now saying, behind our backs and with a smirk on their faces: ‘See! This is what we get when we have a woman president for a change.’”

Ms Park’s troubles stem from her decades of ties to Ms Choi Soon-sil, a daughter of Choi Tae-min, the founder of a fringe religious sect who befriended Ms Park in the 1970s. Ms Choi was indicted on Sunday on charges of using her influence with Ms Park to extort millions from businesses. Prosecutors said Ms Park was an accomplice of Ms Choi, but she is protected by the Constitution from criminal indictment.

Ms Park has agreed to submit to an inquiry. But on Tuesday, her lawyer, Mr Yoo Yeong-ha, tried to use Ms Park’s gender as a shield, saying that she was “a woman before being President” and that her “privacy as a woman” should be protected from prosecutors who sought to question her.

>>91183
Women’s groups were having none of it. “They are not investigating her privacy as a woman but her acts of destroying constitutional order as President,” a group of women’s advocacy organisations said in a joint statement. Mr Yoo declined to elaborate on what Ms Park’s privacy had to do with the investigation.

South Korea’s women have been just as loud as its men in denouncing Ms Park. Recent polls have found her to be deeply unpopular among both men and women.

And in the huge protests that have filled central Seoul over the past four weekends, women have often led peaceful marches — an unusual sight in South Korea, where anti-government demonstrations often feature men clashing with riot police officers.

During a Nov 12 rally that attracted one million people, by some estimates, a student from the Sacred Heart Girls’ High School in Seoul, Ms Park’s alma mater, took the podium. “You have become an object of shame for us,” the student said of Ms Park, prompting wild cheers from the crowd. “We can no longer tolerate you representing our nation.”

>>91184
Although Ms Park is often called South Korea’s first female President, that label fails to capture the complicated ways in which people here regard her presidency.

Ms Park has never been considered a champion of women’s rights, either as the President or as a legislator before that. According to Kim Young-soon, a leader at the Korean Women’s Associations United, gender inequality has actually worsened under Ms Park, with sex crimes on the rise and a growing wealth gap taking a harder toll on women.

Her presidential campaign was aimed at securing the support of older conservatives who still revered her father, the military dictator Park Chung-hee, for leading the country out of poverty in the 1960s and ’70s. Many saw in Ms Park a modern version of her charismatic father.

South Koreans like to say that they see Ms Park not as a female President, but as Mr Park Chung-hee’s daughter. That places her in a peculiar and precarious position in South Korea, where patriarchy rules the political and corporate worlds.

A Twitter post widely shared last year summed up the challenges Ms Park has faced in the shadow of her father’s legacy and with the cultural misgivings over female leaders: “When President Park Geun-hye does well, she wears the clothes of Park Chung-hee. But when she does badly, she becomes a woman.”

>>91185
So far, Ms Park’s gender has not been an outright issue in the scandal, but it has coloured the outrage. Older conservative men who have turned against Ms Park since the scandal often disdainfully refer to her as an “unfilial daughter”.

Online, men have attacked Ms Park and Ms Choi by invoking an old Korean diatribe against assertive women: “If a hen crows, the household collapses.” (When a man used that phrase at a recent protest, it set off both cheers and boos from the crowd.)

In the local news media, photographs have emerged that show urinals painted with images of Ms Park and Ms Choi. People have derided Ms Choi, who has no background in government or policy making, as an “ajumma”, or homemaker, “from Gangnam”, a Seoul district often associated with affluence and moral weakness.

“President Park is taken as evidence that women are not qualified for politics,” a feminist group said last week, objecting to what it called gender prejudices tainting the campaign against Ms Park.

>>91186
Ms Park has seldom spoken of her gender. But she has styled herself after her mother, Ms Yuk Young-soo, who is seen as a symbol of feminine sacrifice among older Koreans. The former First Lady was fatally shot in 1974 by a pro-North Korean assassin who had targeted her husband. For decades, Ms Park’s hairstyle has reminded people of her mother.

She has also built a muscular political reputation in what some analysts have called an attempt to dispel the notion that a female leader would be weak on security issues. She has been hawkish on North Korea, predicting its collapse and promising military retaliation if provoked. At home, she has been a disciplinarian, stressing national order and calling her critics “unclean forces”.

Her upbringing and manners have led critics to accuse her of acting with a sense of entitlement. Those accusations have carried a powerful punch in South Korea, where many have grown disillusioned with so-called imperial male leaders in politics and in the corporate world, and expected a less rigid style from the first female President. Much of the most bitter criticism has come from other women.

Ms Park once sat motionless in the rain, waiting for an aide to step forward and pull her hood over her head, according to the aide, Ms Jeon Yeo-ok, who later parted ways with Ms Park and caused a sensation when she recounted the tale. “She is the kind of woman who would wear her crown to a nightclub,” Ms Jeon said in 2012

>>91187
It is not the only time Ms Park, who once named Queen Elizabeth I of Britain her role model, has been accused of behaving like royalty.

During a presidential debate in 2012, Ms Lee Jung-hee, the head of a small left-wing party, accused Ms Park of trying to become “not a female President, but a queen” and denounced what she called her “disconnectedness and arrogance”.

After Ms Park came to power in early 2013, her government disbanded Ms Lee’s party on charges of being pro-North Korea. Many, including members of Ms Park’s Saenuri Party, now find Ms Lee’s criticism to have been prescient.

“We have been living in a monarchy,” Mr Kim Sung-tae, a Saenuri lawmaker, said during a recent party meeting.

>“And our party has been loyal vassals for Queen Park Geun-hye.” THE NEW YORK TIMES

>>91181
>One country, many systems

Here’s a pop quiz. Of the following world leaders, who has not ridden in a state coach with England’s Queen Elizabeth II? 1. Barack Obama 2. Angela Merkel 3. Xi Jinping 4. Park Geun-hye.

There are actually two answers. Obama could have taken the ride, but he did not, and Merkel was not qualified to do so. It might sound ridiculous, especially since she has been called the bastion of liberalism in the West, but because she is a chancellor and not a president, she is not considered a head of state.

After the scandal involving President Park Geun-hye and Choi Soon-sil, many are suggesting Korea end its presidential system. I agree with this sentiment. Some argue a parliamentary cabinet system should be the alternative, but because there are no clear standards, this is not a simple matter. Other advanced democracies with a similar size population as Korea provide examples.

First, a president can also exist in a parliamentary cabinet system if there is no monarch. The president is directly elected in France and indirectly in Germany and Italy. Of course, a directly elected president has significant power. The president of Turkey was elected through a direct election, and he now wants to become the president of a presidential system. How much power should a president have? If the president is given significant authority, the system should be called a semi-presidential system.

>>91189
Additionally, the idea that a majority party will form an administration is not easy. The United Kingdom, a country with a long history of democracy, used to have a two-party system. It was effective, but it was also limited in reflecting complicated interests. The Scottish National Party, which won 1.45 million votes in last year’s general election, won 56 seats, but the U.K. Independence Party, which won 3.88 million votes, only occupies two seats. The inequality in vote value was a problem.

In most countries, multiparty systems exist to reflect religions, ideologies, regions and interests. Coalitions are therefore unavoidable. Belgium took 514 days to negotiate a coalition. Spain ran the risk of having three general elections in one year after its two-party system was changed to a multiparty system. Is efficiency or consensus more important?

Do we also want to increase the number of lawmakers, who are now the subject of national distrust and disgust? In the United Kingdom, with a population of 650 million, the House of Commons has 650 members, 120 of whom are senior party members.

Three decades ago, we filled Gwanghwamun Square with voices demanding the direct election of the country’s leader. Can we get used to an ambiguous system in which we vote for a lawmaker when we are actually voting for the prime minister?

Once discussions of a constitutional amendment begin, various questions will be raised and we must find an answer with the greatest common denominator. The new political system will stay for the next 50 years, maybe a century. Insight and wisdom will be absolutely necessary.

JoongAng Ilbo, Nov. 25, Page 35

>South Korea: 70years old Korean Man Arrested After Arson with loathing at National Assembly
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&;mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=011&aid=0002932974

>South Korea:Giant Statue of prostitute appears infront of National Assembly against Japan
>>90455
http://ojsfile.ohmynews.com/STD_IMG_FILE/2016/1208/IE002066344_STD.jpg
http://newspim.com/news/view/20161208000418?category_cd=010901

>[Movie] Tractor and car trying to plunge into National Assembly and Executive Office of South Korea
>Protests in Seoul as lawmakers vote on Park impeachment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUjc3JzYyQg

>A car plunged into the South Korean Executive Office

a police officer was injured

>South Korea:Impeachment is Korea's "Glorious Revolution", victory of the people's will and democracy

South Koreans Dance In The Street Celebrating The Fall Of Their President
http://dailycaller.com/2016/12/09/south-koreans-dance-in-the-street-to-celebrate-the-fall-of-their-president/

S. Koreans celebrate with hugs and selfies
http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/s-koreans-celebrate-with-hugs-and-selfies

>Choo Calls Impeachment Public Triumph
http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/news_Po_detail.htm?No=123828

The chairwoman of South Korea's main opposition Democratic Party is describing Friday's impeachment as a victory for the Korean people.

Following the passage of the impeachment motion, Choo Mi-ae told reporters outside the National Assembly it's important for the Constitutional Court to issue a swift ruling.

She described the past six weeks of peaceful mass rallies as a "glorious civil revolution."

And she said it's now the job of lawmakers to put the country's security and economic affairs on a normal course.

>>81994
what's even scarier is that that is how low a political leader's approval needs to be before they get impeached. The entire country needs to hate their leader before they can be impeached

>U.S. and South Korean military operation plan maybe infiltrated by N. Korean hacker

Some people in the military say that the hacked documents include provisional plans for large-scale South Korea-U.S. joint military exercises such as the Ulchi Freedom Guardian and special warfare plans against the North. Even though they are provisional plans, they are based on actual operational plans and are thus not too different from the real ones.

If the hacked operational plan is the OPCON 5015, a new South Korea-U.S. joint operational plan signed in June last year and applied to joint military exercises for the first time in March this year, the incident is extremely serious. OPCON 5015 is the highest-level of operational plan that includes measures against North Korea’s use of weapons of mass destruction and cyber, biological and chemical warfare. When the National Assembly’s National Defense Committee asked the Defense Ministry to brief on OPCON 5015, Defense Minister Han Min-koo refused to do so, saying that if the plan is revealed, it would have to be scrapped and replaced with a new one.

http://english.donga.com/Home/3/all/26/798611/1

>South Korea:Park Geun Hye says "I really am shedding tears of blood right now"
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/774302.html

>Food:Egypt to export 10,000 donkeys to China, dogs to South Korea
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/variety/2016/12/10/Egypt-to-export-10-000-donkeys-to-China-dogs-to-Korea.html

>South Korea:Egypt to 'export' stray dogs to Korea
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/world/2016/12/182_220077.html

>Park Geun-hye impeached: Did a puppy bring down South Korea's president?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38259068

>South Korea central bank: market impact of impeachment vote seems limited
"There seems to be limited impact," the Bank of Korea said in a statement after a meeting to review policy measures to contain any fallout from Friday's impeachment vote. The bank's Governor Lee Ju-yeol asked his officials to closely monitor the ...
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-economy-cenbank-idUSKBN13Z02H

>South Korea to monitor economy under 24-hour emergency response system
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2016/12/09/South-Korea-to-monitor-economy-under-24-hour-emergency-response-system/6681481342850/
>S. Korea to take preemptive steps against any volatility over impeachment
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2016/12/10/0200000000AEN20161210001751320.html

>North Korea slams 'Obama and his lackeys' in furious response to sanctions

>"Obama and his lackeys are sadly mistaken if they calculate that they can force the DPRK to abandon its line of nuclear weaponization and undermine its status as a nuclear power through base sanctions to pressurize it," the statement read.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/01/asia/north-korea-sanctions-reaction/

>Government of South Korea, Samsung, South Korea Navy
v.s.
>Government of India, Indian Navy,merchant sailors and Lloyd's

>Korean Common Sense Lost In Translation – Hebei Spirit
http://maritimeaccident.org/tags/hebei-spirit/

Something got lost in translating English ‘fair treatment of seafarers’ into Korean, in which language it apparently means “use any excuse to lock ’em up” or prehaps the South Korean courts were taking advice from their Stalinist siblings to the north on how to run a show trial. “Technically flawed” was the phrase used by the defense lawyers for Captain Jasprit Chawla and Chief Officer Shyam Chetan of the tanker Hebei Spirit, holed while at anchor by an errant barge. “Judicial incompetence” is another phrase that comes to mind: Those asked to adjudicate the case had neither the knowledge nor experience to pass judgement upon it.

Hebei Spirit was at anchor on 7th December when a barge carrying a crane came loose from its towing cable and slammed into the Hebei Spirit, holing it and causing leaks from its cargo tanks. An earlier, and more competent, court, found the officers of the Hebei Spirit innocent of fault.

That wasn’t the result the Korean government wanted so it detained Captain Chawla and Chief Officer Chetan until it could find a course more amenable to locking up innocent men. It found that court, and disgraced Korea.

To put in other terms, it is as if you had put your car in a parking lot, switched off the engine, and a passing car lost control and hit yours, causing you car’s gas tank to leak. Your fault? Of course not. It was your fault, according to the Korean judicial system.

>>92898

According to the court, tankers are like motor cars. One just turns a key and the full power of the engine is instantly available for you to reverse out of trouble. Captain Chawla or Chief Officer Shyman simply had to immediately go full stern when they saw the barge coming – without actually knowing what was going on. They had to do that from a standing start.

Nobody, it seems, explained to their honors that damn great oil tankers don’t drive like Kia Prides.

Then Captin Chawla, in the court’s opinion, should not have concerned himself with ensuring that a highly inflammable cargo did not catch fire and the vessel and the crew be lost, causing even greater pollution, the loss of lives and the loss of the ship. He should not have inerted the tanks, which was, by any measure of common sense, the right thing to do.

Korea’s government, evidentally devoid of common sense, complained that a critical article in Lloyd’s List, which pointed out Korea’s obligations towards seafarers and the appalling and unjustice court decision “disgraced Korea”.

No, Korea disgraced itself, it dishonoured itself It put a court in judgement of issues with which it was not competent to deal and put pressure on that court to imprison innocent people.

If one acts disgracefully, as Korea has in this case, one has no excuse for complaining about being disgraced.

>>92900
V-Ship’s comment on the imprisonment bears repeating:

Today’s decision by the Korean Appeal Court to find guilty the Master and Chief Officer of the ‘Hebei Spirit’, an anchored VLCC which was struck by a Samsung Crane Barge, will surely go down as one of the most disgraceful examples of a miscarriage of justice in a ‘supposedly’ advanced nation state. For Capt Chawla and Chief Officer Chetan to be sentenced to prison terms and lead from the court in handcuffs is a disgrace and insult to the whole shipping industry.

It is hardly surprising that the Indian seafarers’ unions are up in arms. No wonder the ITF and its international membership are questioning whether it is safe for its members to travel on ships to Korea. No wonder carriers are considering future calls at Korean Ports. Certainly ship owners will be reviewing their future shipbuilding orders in Korean yards.

Having found the ‘Hebei Spirit’ officers innocent of all charges at a court hearing on June 24 this year, it appeared to be an extraordinary decision made by the Korean prosecutor to go for appeal on such an open and shut case.

To then follow this decision by failing to allow the ‘Hebei Spirit’ officers to return home to their loved ones after 6 months held in Korea, was to compound the gross injustice that had been done and was despite assurances from V.Ships that the officers would return for any future hearings. The two officers have now been held in Korea, without the right to leave the country, for one year

As far as the appeal case itself is concerned, the reliance placed upon the Korean Maritime Safety Tribunal (KMST ) findings and conclusions, has resulted in technically flawed, unreliable and unjust evidence being submitted to the Daejeon District Court, the Court of Appeal, which returned its decision today.

>>92898
>>92900
>>92901
In submitting their report, the KMST has demonstrated both its incompetence and an obvious desire to find fault with the officers of the Hebei Spirit. It is also a matter of fact that in compiling their report, the KMST has not complied with the IMO guidelines for consultation with other parties.

This blatant and totally unjustifiable case of criminalisation of a profession that we all rely upon for our international trade must not go unanswered by the international community and all those in the shipping industry.

We can only hope that the Authorities in Korea will take immediate steps to restore the country’s now tarnished image as a place where all who deal there can expect justice and respect of human rights.

The question raised by the V-Ships response to the Korean iniquity is whether the industry really does have the guts to respond appropriately, or to respond at all. It is not an industry noted for intestinal fortitude.

South Korea’s defence of its dishonourable behaviour, as published in Lloyd’s List, sadly makes it clear that its own arrogance will deny it the decency to put things right.

Occasionally there is talk of the reunification of North and South Korea. No reunification is required, South Korea has already adopted North Korea’s approach to human rights. It has little left to do but to change its name.

>Kim Jong Il will be proud of them.

>>92898
>DNA - Mumbai - Family of Indian sentenced in South Korea is shattered
http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report-family-of-indian-sentenced-in-s-korea-is-shattered-1213349

Chetan Syam’s family is crestfallen after he is sentenced in South Korea.

“Old man, don’t be worried, I shall be back,” first officer Chetan Syam told his father Commodore (Rtd) DR Syam before leaving for the court. DR Syam who served in the Indian Navy for 40 years as an engineer had been waiting for his son since last December.

Two days ago, an appeals court in Daejeon, South Korea, sentenced Chetan to eight months in prison turning down a lower court’s decision six months ago.

Chetan and Jaspreet Chawla, the first officer and captain respectively of super tanker Hebei Spirit, were found guilty of being ‘insufficiently vigilant’ as the anchored vessel spilled 10,900 tonnes of crude oil into the sea. The oil spill took place on December 7, 2007 after a barge carrying a construction crane broke free, rammed into the tanker and bored three holes in it.

“His mother is shattered. We are all very shocked. On that day, Chetan called me up and said there had been an incident. He did not say what. The next day he narrated the whole incident. There was no talk of a case being registered then. Suddenly, a few days later, he told us that his ship was being allowed to sail towards China, but he, along with his captain, had been detained and charges pressed against them. The news was very distressing,” said Commodore Syam, who lives in Mumbai with his wife, Alice.

Alice said that Chetan’s wife left for South Korea to be with him. “On June 25, the lower court exonerated my son and captain Chawla. We were extremely relieved. We were hoping Chetan would be back by June 27 or so and we would all celebrate his son Agastya’s first birthday on July 2,” said Alice.

>>92903
But on his way to the airport, Chetan was stopped from flying out of the country. There had been an appeal in the case by the prosecution in the higher court. “It was a shock. They could have easily flown back for the appeal,” said Commodore Syam.

A letter from the Indian shipping ministry requesting South Korea to allow them return did not help and Chetan was forced to wait for the appeal and was holed up in a service apartment.

“In my opinion, there was nothing wrong with what the captain and the crew did. I have spent 40 years with the Indian Navy and am well versed with all aspects of shipping. In fact, the captain of the ship was awarded by an international shipping body for his exemplary role in trying to control the oil leak. Clearly, there is a serious misunderstanding,” said the retired naval officer.

The court also fined Chetan 7,000 dollars. His captain was given a heavier sentence, a year with a fine of 14,000 dollars.

“I was shattered after hearing the judgment. No one was expecting this,” said Chetan’s wife Preetha over the phone from Daejeon, South Korea.

>>92898
>>92903
THE HINDU

Mumbai: The shipping fraternity in India has stepped up its campaign over the
sentencing of two Indian seamen in South Korea in connection with an oil spill
in Korean waters. Angry protesters gathered at the Azad Maidan
here on Tuesday and pledged to boycott Korean products, especially from Samsung,
headquartered in Seoul, South Korea.

Captain Jasprit Chawla and Chief Officer Syam Chetan of Hebei Spirit, a very large
crude carrier managed by V. Ships, were on December 10, 2008, sentenced to jail
for 18 months and eight months respectively by the Daejeon district court in South Korea. In addition, Mr. Chawla was fined thousands of U.S. dollars.

This judgment reversed the earlier order of a lower court, which exonerated the two
officers. The spilling accident took place on December 7, 2007, near the Port of
Daesan on the Yellow Sea coast off Taean County.

According to the press note by the Indian Seafarers Federation (ISF) and media reports,
Hebei Spirit, carrying 2,60,000 tonnes of crude oil, was anchored when a free-floating
barge owned by Samsung collided with the ship and punctured it. Some “10,800 tonnes
of oil” was leaked along the coast, causing massive pollution and affecting the livelihoods
of fishing communities.

Shipping and maritime organisations across the board contend that the two officers were
not to be blamed for the spillage. On the contrary, their efforts saved lives and prevented the tanker from exploding.
termed the judgment an “example of criminalisation of seafarers for discharging their duties.”

Decrying the judgment, Abdulgani Y. Serang, general secretary of National Union of
Seafarers (NUSI), said the inquiry report of the Korean maritime authorities was an
“attempt to implicate the seafarers.” At a press conference here on Tuesday, he also
cited instances of alleged manipulation by Samsung.
http://www.hindu.com/2008/12/24/stories/2008122461321300.htm

>>92906
The families of Mr. Chawla and Mr. Chetan are also fighting a tough battle against a powerful nation and corporation.

The judgment comes as a crushing blow to them as they were all set to celebrate the earlier acquittal.

“I am the saddest and most distressed father of Syam Chetan,” said his father Commodore (retd.)

D.R. Syam, Indian Navy. He said his family had not seen their son for the past 14months.
“I was in touch with my son ever since he was first detained. He used to tell me justice will prevail.

When he was acquitted, he even told us the flight details for his return journey. However, the new judgment is highly biased; it is a miscarriage of justice. Since December 10, I have not been able to speak to my son,” he said.

Gurpreet, Mr. Chawla’s wife, is a picture of despair. With two children back home in Dehradun, this fight for justice is a protracted ordeal for her. “In between, I had gone to meet him in Korea.

We were very hopeful. Shipping experts all over the world have condemned this decision. My husband cannot even get bail. The court was biased against us. We were not given enough time to present our case.

The witnesses were only from the Korean side.

One Korean witness told us that he would speak in our favour. The next we heard was he had lost his job. We ignored all these limitations as we were sure of our innocence,” she said.

Commodore (retd.) D.R. Syam said though the seamen were given the best legal aid, all the proceedings were in Korean and one did not know what was being said. He said the families had received support from the Indian government. “At the diplomatic level, the External Affairs Ministry has summoned

the South Korean ambassador thrice. This is the utmost it can do. However, it has been to no avail.

We would therefore request thegovernment to step up their act.”