Unification with South Korea No Longer Possible, Says Kim Jong-un

THE GUARDIAN: In a speech, the North Korean leader has called for constitutional change to identify the south as ‘number one hostile state’

In this photo provided by the North Korean government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks at the Supreme People’s Assembly in Pyongyang, North Korea on Monday. Photograph: 朝鮮通信社/AP
North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, has called for a change to the constitution to identify South Korea as the “number one hostile state”, ending the regime’s commitment to unifying the Korean peninsula.

In a speech to the supreme people’s assembly – North Korea’s rubber-stamp parliament – Kim said he no longer believed unification was possible and accused the South of attempting to foment regime change and promote unification by stealth.

In another sign of quickly deteriorating ties between the two Koreas, which ended their 1950-53 war with a truce but not a peace treaty – Kim said: “We don’t want war, but we have no intention of avoiding it.” » | Justin McCurry in Tokyo and agencies | Tuesday, January 16, 2024

Behind the Scenes of South Korea's Barrier-Breaking LGBTQ Reality Shows

South Korea’s first LGBTQ reality shows “Merry Queer” and “His Man” premiered on streaming platform Wavve this summer—and the people behind these shows hope they’ll help bring awareness to the long fight for LGBTQ rights in the country. South Korea does not recognize same-sex marriage and offers little legal protection to its LGBTQ citizens. “Merry Queer” co-host Hong Seok-cheon—one of the most prominent openly gay celebrities in South Korea—spoke to TIME along with the shows' producer Lim Chang-hyuck and “His Man” cast member Lee Jeong-ho on what these shows mean for queer representation. “In the future, I hope 'Merry Queer,' 'His Man' and other cultural content could open up more opportunities to bring awareness to issues that need to be resolved or discussed,” Hong said.

South Korea Promises to React Strongly If North Korea Furthers Tensions

South Korea says it will respond strongly if North Korea keeps raising tensions after Pyongyang blew up a liaison office in the border town of Kaesong. It comes after days of threats of military action by the North Korean leadership. Al Jazeera's Rob McBride reports from Seoul.

Moon Jae-in Says Kim Jong-un Wants Denuclearisation

South Korean president addresses the media following his surprise meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. He reveals the cordiality of the meeting and indicates that Pyongyang remains committed to the US-North Korean summit scheduled for 12 June.

Is Peace on the Horizon between North and South Korea? | Inside Story

It was just one small gesture, one small step forward, but the significance of the move by North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un is certainly historic, and will be remembered for years to come.

Kim became the first North Korean leader to visit South Korea since the end of the war between the two countries in 1953. He was warmly welcomed and embraced by South Korea's President Moon Jae-In.

Both leaders were relaxed and smiling during small talk. But big and complicated issues need to be negotiated. After decades of military standoff between the two sides, their leaders made a declaration of peace and promised a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula. So, is peace coming to the Korean peninsula?

Presenter: Laura Kyle | Guests: Aidan Foster Carter - Honorary Senior Research Fellow in Sociology and Modern Korea at Leeds University; Tong Zhao - Fellow at the Nuclear Policy Programme at Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy; Jasper Kim - Director for Conflict Management at Ewha Womans University in South Korea.

Can the Olympics Bring the Koreas Together?

On Asia Trip, Trump Met by Protests Calling on U.S. to Open Diplomatic Relations with North Korea

President Donald Trump continued his five-nation tour of Asia, landing in Vietnam today for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. This comes as Trump said on Thursday that he wants Russia’s help in getting North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons. In Korea, he attempted to visit the Demilitarized Zone, but his fleet of helicopters was turned back due to bad weather. We speak with Professor Bruce Cumings, who just returned from Seoul, South Korea, where Trump was met with protests. He is professor of history at the University of Chicago and the author of several books on Korea, including “Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History.”

South Korea: 'Time Running Out to Prevent a Nuclear N. Korea'

Kang Kyung-wha: South Korea Minister of Foreign Affairs »

Seoul: Living in the Shadow of the Bomb - BBC Newsnight

Gabriel Gatehouse reports from Seoul on the North Korean defectors who want to bring down Kim Jong-un and asks if Seoul’s residents are concerned about the nuclear threat from North Korea.

"Talks Can Work": As Tensions Rise on Korean Peninsula, Advocates Call for Demilitarization

US Options In North Korea Down To Binary Choice | Morning Joe | MSNBC

On Sunday, North Korea claimed it had successfully detonated a hydrogen bomb, which prompted South Korea to stage a simulated attack on North Korea. The panel discusses the latest developments.

North Korea - South Korea: Kim Jong-un Promises 'Indiscriminate Strikes' and Places Country on 'War Footing' after Artillery Shots Fired

THE INDEPENDENT: Tensions arose following South Korea's use of loudspeakers on DMZ

Kim Jong-un has put North Korea on a war footing and threatened "indiscriminate strikes" against the South if it doesn't agree to halt propaganda broadcasts by Saturday evening at 5pm.

Mr Kim claimed North Korea’s soldiers were in a “quasi-state of war” and ordered them to prepare for battle, according to state news outlet KCNA.

The country has threatened action unless South Korea stops its anti-Pyongyang broadcasts over the heavily fortified North-South border by 5pm (local time) on Saturday.

South Korea's defence ministry has warned that the nation will "strongly retaliate against any kind of North Korean attacks". » | Rose Troup Buchanan | Friday, August 21, 2015

US Ambassador to South Korea Attacked with Razor During Lecture

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Mark Lippert seen bleeding from the head and wrist after he was slashed in the face by an armed man

The US ambassador to South Korea has been attacked by a man wielding a razor blade as he attended a lecture in Seoul.

In pictures broadcast by the country’s Yonhap news agency, Mark Lippert was seen holding his face as blood gushed from wounds to his head and left wrist.

Mr Lippert, 42, who was about to deliver a speech at a breakfast being held at Sejong Hall, was taken to hospital with non life-threatening injuries. » | Telegraph reporter | Wednesday, March 04, 2015

North Korea Threatens to 'Wipe Out' South Korea's Government

THE INDEPENDENT: Reclusive state hits out at neighbour's 'intolerable' provocation

North Korea threatened on Tuesday to “wipe out” South Korea's government in a furious response a day after a Seoul official said the North “must disappear soon,” in an escalation of rhetoric between the rivals.

The North's powerful National Defence Commission called the South Korean comments an “intolerable” provocation that showed the South wants to take over the North.

It said in a statement carried by state media that North Korea will launch “all-out ... merciless” strikes to “wipe out every last person” in South Korean President Park Geun-hye's government. (+ video) » | Hyung-Jim Kim | Seoul | AP | Tuesday, May 13, 2014

North Korea Labels South's President as 'Crafty Prostitute' after Obama Visit

Barack Obama with the South Korean president, Park Geun-hye,
in Seoul on Saturday

THE GUARDIAN: Tirade against Park Geun-hye hits new low in unusually personal abuse, which analysts say may indicate Kim Jong-un echoing his grandfather

North Korea has launched a vitriolic attack on the South Korean president, comparing her to "crafty prostitute" in thrall to her "pimp" Barack Obama.

It also described Park Geun-hye as America's "comfort woman", a reference likely to enrage many in South Korea, where anger still runs high over the plight of thousands of women who were enslaved in Japanese military brothels during the second world war.

The comments were issued on Sunday by the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea (CPRK), which handles cross-border affairs, following the US president's two-day visit to Seoul. He arrived in Malaysia on Sunday for the penultimate stop on his four-nation tour of Asia.

While Pyongyang is known for its aggressive rhetoric, recent remarks have been unusually personal.

Earlier this month state media ran misogynist articles, including one headlined "We accuse Park the bitch", labelling her as a lunatic, idiot and "cold-blooded animal" and emphasising the fact that she has never married or had children.

Those remarks were presented in the form of quotes from ordinary North Koreans, while the latest tirade, carried by state news agency KCNA, is presented as a statement from an official body. » | Tania Branigan in Seoul | Sunday, April 27, 2014

AP: N Korea criticizes S Korea Prez’s ‘Swish of Skirt’ »

Bittersweet Tears as Divided Koreans Meet after 60 Years

South Korean Park Yang-gon (R), 53, and his North Korean brother
Park Yang-su, who was abducted by North Korea, cry during their
family reunion at the Mount Kumgang resort in North Korea

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Elderly relatives meet in snowy North Korean resort at reunion brokered by high-level negotiations between Pyongyang and Seoul

Several hundred elderly South and North Korean relatives yesterday clung to each-other, rocking and weeping, and trading photos and faded memories as they met after 60 years Thursday at a reunion for families divided by the Korean War.

The emotional gathering at North Korea’s Mount Kumgang resort was the result of tortuous, high-level negotiations between Pyongyang and Seoul, which had nearly broken down over the North’s objections to overlapping South Korea-US military drills.

Television footage showed snow falling hard as 82 South Koreans - some so frail they had to be stretchered indoors - arrived at the resort in a convoy of buses to meet 180 North Korean relatives they have not seen for decades.

Inside the main hall, where numbered tables had been laid out, there were moving scenes as divided brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, step-siblings and in-laws sought each other out and then collapsed into each others’ arms.

One of the oldest South Koreans, a 93-year-old man who was separated from his pregnant wife during the 1950-53 conflict, met the now 64-year-old son he had never seen. » | AFP | Thursday, February 20, 2014

North Korea Proposes Family Reunions with South

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Kim Jong-un's regime sends surprise letter to South Korea calling for reconciliation

North Korea has made a sudden proposal for the resumption of reunions for families separated since the Korean War, saying the programme could help improve cross-border ties.

South Korea immediately welcomed the offer, which followed a recent series of trust-building gestures from the nuclear-armed communist country.

The North's Red Cross faxed a message to its South Korean counterpart, calling for a family reunion event after the Lunar New Year on January 31, according to its official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

The North suggested that the South could choose a date for the event "at its convenience" after the Lunar New Year when the weather thaws. » | AFP | Friday, January 24, 2014

South Korea Warns That Purge in Pyongyang Points to a Reign of Terror

Park Geun-hye, President of South Korea

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: China and South Korea raise concerns over stability of North Korea regime after Kim Jong-un purges uncle

China and South Korea on Tuesday raised concerns over the stability of Kim Jong-un's North Korean regime following the extraordinary public purge of the leader's uncle and second-in-command.

Park Geun-hye, the South Korean president, said the public removal of Jang Song-thaek, Mr Kim's uncle and mentor, was part of a "reign of terror" in North Korea that could further inflame tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

China's foreign ministry emphasised its hope that North Korea "can maintain national stability", as state-run media called for Mr Kim to be invited on a diplomatic trip to Beijing as soon as possible.

"China should help bring about Kim Jong-un's visit to China as soon as possible, which will benefit the North's long term stability and bilateral friendly ties," the Global Times said in an editorial.

The 67-year-old Mr Jang, until recently considered the second most powerful figure in Pyongyang, was regarded as a friend by China, and supported Chinese-style economic reforms. » | Julian Ryall, in Tokyo and Hannah Strange | Tuesday, December 10, 2013

South Korea Refuses to Forgive Japan’s Wartime Atrocities

South Korean President Park Geun-hye

THE INDEPENDENT: World Focus: In South Korea a sense of vulnerability bred from past humiliations lies just below the surface

Old hatreds bred from old atrocities and injustices are slow to disappear. South Korean President Park Geun-hye said at the start of visits to France and Britain this week that she is willing to hold a summit anytime with the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, whose country intermittently threatens war against South Korea.

But she rejects flatly any idea of meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe until Japan apologises for wrongdoings during its 35-year occupation of Korea.

In particular, South Korea wants a deeper apology and greater compensation for an estimated 200,000 South Korean “comfort women” who were forced to work as prostitutes in Japanese military brothels during the occupation. Everything to do with the 1910-45 Japanese occupation of Korea, brutal and authoritarian even compared with most other imperial occupations, still festers. The Japanese response to Ms Park’s remarks – that what happened during the occupation and Second World War is very ancient history – is not going to mollify South Korean resentments. » | Patrick Cockburn | Tuesday, November 05, 2013

South Korea 'Deploys Warships to Track North Missiles'
BBC: South Korea has deployed two warships with missile-defence systems in response to North Korea moving missiles to its east coast.

The dispute over its nuclear weapons programme has seen Pyongyang ramp up its rhetoric and make specific threats to target US territory.

Lucy Williamson reports from Seoul. Watch BBC video » | Friday, April 05, 2013