Most Popular
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Marine Corps commander summoned by CIO for questioning on alleged influence-peddling case
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Debate rages over ‘overly fatty’ samgyeopsal
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[Weekender] Korean psyche untangled: Musok
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40 flights canceled on Jeju Island due to bad weather
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[Eye Interview] 'If you live to 100, you might as well be happy,' says 88-year-old bestselling essayist
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N. Korea slams US, other countries for seeking alternative to UN sanctions monitoring panel
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Pandemic left Korea more depressed than before: report
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From fake prostitution ring to nonexistent robber, prank calls hamper police
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Missing S. Korean traveler in Paris found safe after 2 weeks
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Defense chiefs of US, Australia, Japan decry NK-Russia military cooperation
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[Editorial] Electoral reform
Political parties in South Korea are set to discuss electoral reform measures next week in a bid to fix the problems with the current mixed-member proportional representation system. But the outlook for a breakthrough is far from positive, given that major parties and their lawmakers seem unlikely to give up their vested interests. All lawmakers from the ruling People Power Party, the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea and the minor opposition Justice Party are scheduled to attend a parli
EditorialMarch 21, 2023
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[Daniel DePetris] China brokers Iran-Saudi deal but the US benefits
There was a time, only a few short years ago, when Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman thought Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was worse than Adolf Hitler. “I believe that the Iranian supreme leader makes Hitler look good,” Prince Mohammed told The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg in a 2018 interview. Hitler may have tried to conquer Europe, he said, but Iran is “trying to conquer the world.” Contrast those alarmist words with a dip
ViewpointsMarch 21, 2023
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[LZ Granderson] Don't blame Mexico on gun, drug
Ken Salazar, the US ambassador to Mexico, met with the Los Angeles Tiems for more than an hour while visiting California in November. Her was eager to talk up the celebrations surrounding the US-Mexico diplomacy bicentennial. We were eager to talk about the border. The pas de deuk featured a lot of platitudes, a couple of tense moments, and a number I can't shake: 13,000. That was the estimate Salazar gave for the number of Mexicans who were studying at our universities at the time. Many of
ViewpointsMarch 21, 2023
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[George Soros] Updating my Munich predictions
It is exactly one month ago that I gave a speech on the eve of the Munich Security Conference. Since then, so many remarkable things have happened -- and have happened so fast -- that it is worth comparing my predictions of a month ago with the actual developments. The biggest changes have occurred in the global climate system. By this, I mean actual climate events and climate scientists’ understanding of those events. The main message I wanted to convey in Munich was that the global clima
ViewpointsMarch 20, 2023
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[Editorial] A new beginning
President Yoon Suk Yeol returned home Friday night from his two-day visit to Japan. Through his meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, he kick-started summit diplomacy with Japan after a 12-year hiatus. The summit is a turning point in bilateral relations and a new starting point for mutual visits by the leaders of both countries. Yoon made a difficult first move to normalize South Korea’s relations with Japan. The summit owes much to his bold decision. The Yoon administration
EditorialMarch 20, 2023
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[Yoon Young-kwan] How China lost Asia to the US
Since the dawn of international politics, smaller states have faced the formidable challenge of navigating great-power rivalries. Today, it is the geopolitical contest between the United States and China that has compelled countries to balance their competing national interests. Toward which side they gravitate depends on domestic and external circumstances. Consider the Philippines, which has an interest in maintaining both its growing economic ties with neighboring China as well as its half-
ViewpointsMarch 17, 2023
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[Editorial] Allay bank fears
Since Silicon Valley Bank, the 16th-largest bank in the US, went bust on March 10, a series of unnerving developments have hit the global market, touching off concerns that banking woes could spread to the broader economy and other sectors. The sudden demise of SVB, whose main clients are technology and life-science startups, triggered volatility in stocks, bonds and other assets across the globe. The shock did not die down even though regulators quickly stepped in to allay fears and keep the tu
EditorialMarch 17, 2023
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[Lee Kyong-hee] Forgive but not forget a lasting solution
President Yoon Suk Yeol’s controversial speech on the 104th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement prompted me to watch two movies: “A Resistance” and “Anarchist from Colony.” Both are based on the heart-wrenching fate of courageous Koreans who as teenagers joined the massive anti-Japanese protests of March 1, 1919. A presidential speech customarily marks the watershed event. Yoon, no stranger to delivering fuzzy logic, kept his first March 1 address so
ViewpointsMarch 16, 2023
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[Editorial] Brace for contingency
North Korea recently carried out a series of missile provocations in an apparent protest against a resumed South Korea-US combined military exercise. It fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea off its east coast Tuesday. The launch came two days after it test-fired what it claimed to be two “strategic cruise missiles” from a submarine. It is the first time that it launched cruise missiles from a sub. Five days earlier, on March 9, it had fired six short-range missiles t
EditorialMarch 16, 2023
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[Jan-Werner Mueller] The dilemma of anti-populism
Following a year of halting negotiations, six of Turkey’s opposition parties have finally united behind a single presidential candidate in the election this May, with the hope of ending Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s increasingly autocratic and repressive two-decade rule. This month, the so-called Table of Six converged on Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of the social democratic and secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP), after having sidelined younger, more charismatic contenders s
ViewpointsMarch 15, 2023
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[Kim Seong-kon] Doing the opposite of foreigners’ observations
In the late 19th and early 20th century, foreign adventurers, reporters and missionaries visited Joseon, which is now Korea. During their stay in the “Land of the Morning Calm,” they wrote some penetrating accounts describing pre-modern Korea. Some of them were favorable remarks, and others were somewhat negative observations, though amusing. For example, they unanimously praised the Korean people’s exquisite handcrafts such as pottery, and their superb skills at archery. They
ViewpointsMarch 15, 2023
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[Editorial] Kakao’s takeover of SM
South Korean tech behemoth Kakao is now set to take over major K-pop agency SM Entertainment after striking a deal with Hybe, the fast-growing competitor agency that is home to BTS and NewJeans, to end their competition and cooperate with each other. The conclusion of the monthlong feud for SM came as welcome news to their respective investors and those who want K-pop to expand further with greater platform power and a deep talent pool. At some point, Hybe was close to winning the competition, b
EditorialMarch 15, 2023
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[Josep Borrell] Honesty can advance the Middle East peace process
Too many people are dying every week in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, and millions are living in fear and hopelessness. The world’s response has been characterized by too many statements and too little action. That must change. We in the European Union and the wider international community need to do more. We know that people around the world expect us to work for peace, justice and international law everywhere. But to act successfully, we first must be honest with each
ViewpointsMarch 14, 2023
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[Anastassia Fedyk, James Hodson, Ilona Sologoub] Russian opposition’s irrelevant demands
A year ago, two of us (Fedyk and Hodson) co-authored a commentary arguing that Russians would not rise up to stop President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine. There was too much suppression of dissent in Putin’s Russia, we noted, and too much real support for the war among the public. That assessment proved correct. Still, there is a lingering question: What role are Russian “opposition” parties playing in the conflict? While Russian opposition figures like the jailed
ViewpointsMarch 14, 2023
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[Editorial] Shameless trips
The majority opposition Democratic Party of Korea convened a monthlong provisional session of the National Assembly beginning on the March 1 Independence Movement Day, and then scores of its lawmakers traveled abroad. It is the first time in Korean constitutional history that an Assembly session was convened on the statutory holiday. All of the party’s 169 lawmakers requested the March session on Feb. 24. Under the Assembly Act, a provisional session must be convened when requested by more
ViewpointsMarch 14, 2023
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[James Stavridis] US needs to create a Cyber Force
Two disturbing incidents roiled the cyber seas last week, one foreign and one domestic. They both strengthen the case -- which was already convincing, and which I have been making for almost a decade now -- for the creation of a US Cyber Force. The first incident was yet another cyberattack on a NATO member, Albania, by Iran. It was part of an ongoing Iranian campaign to attack Albania, a small Muslim nation of only about 3 million in the Balkans. The attacks have included zeroing out personal b
ViewpointsMarch 13, 2023
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[Editorial] More red signs for economy
A host of new red signs are popping up for the South Korean economy, which is bad news for policymakers already struggling to tame high inflation and tackle the economic slowdown. There are three worrisome developments. First, the country posted a record current account deficit in January. Second, the Korean currency is losing its value against the US dollar at a rapid clip. Third, investors are worried about the ripple impact from the collapse of the San Francisco-based Silicon Valley Bank, hit
EditorialMarch 13, 2023
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[Nicholas Goldberg] How I became a tool of China's propaganda machine
When I write critical columns about US policies and politics, I occasionally strike a nerve and get enraged letters from readers denouncing me as a traitor or suggesting I am providing grist for our nation's enemies. I've been told, for instance, that I should move to China because I'm anti-American. And when I raised the possibility of negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, I was accused of being Vladimir Putin's lapdog. I've never taken such accusations seriously beca
ViewpointsMarch 13, 2023
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[Robert J. Fouser] Is Korean worth learning?
The 21st century has seen a boom in learning Korean around the world. The wave began in the early 2000s as hallyu gained popularity in Asia and grew in the 2010s as K-pop swept the world. Universities around the world have started and expanded Korean language classes, online classes have boomed, and K-pop fans have created informal learning networks spanning the globe. Meanwhile, the number of foreign students studying in South Korea grew rapidly, only to be cut short by travel restrictions duri
ViewpointsMarch 10, 2023
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[Editorial] Upgrading US alliance
Seoul and Washington said President Yoon Suk Yeol will pay a state visit to the US on April 26. Yoon will have his third meeting with US President Joe Biden. Biden visited Seoul in May 2022, 11 days after President Yoon was inaugurated. They met again on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in November. The last time a South Korean president paid a state visit to the US was 12 years ago. Yoon is the second leader invited by Biden for a state visit after French President E
EditorialMarch 10, 2023