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Home › Forums › Short Online Seminars › Two Koreas, Fall 2019 › north and south korea in the news
Len Krieger.
clay dubeI created a topic for us to share news stories that might be of interest, but might not be immediately linked to the current week's topics. Here's one that caught my eye:
It seems that the University of Rochester orchestra ("Eastman" - a reminder of the town and university's industrial heritage) will soon visit China. But it won't be bringing along three student musicians who happen to be South Korean nationals. The school has decided to go ahead with the trip despite this being quite unfair to the three students.
I don't understand why the students were not able to secure visas. The speculation about this being related to the Chinese government's unhappiness about the THAAD missile defense system does not seem likely to me, given that 4,183,000 South Koreans visited China in 2018.
On the other hand, Chinese tourism to South Korea has declined over the past three years. In Oct. 2016, for example, 681,000 Chinese visited South Korea. In Oct. 2018, about 475,000 visited. Some of that decline stems from China's slowing economy. In Sept. 2019, over 541,000 Chinese visited South Korea. Even with the decline from earlier in the decade, however, about one in three visitors to South Korea are Chinese.
Len KriegerClay, thank you for creating this thread to post news topics on.
I found a very interesting article that Otto Warmbier was arrested for attempting to steal a propaganda poster. Also it seemed as though the way it was described, he was tortured just to the brink of death and was purposely left alive to not make matters worse since Otto was an American citizen. I actually believe the seized NK cargo ship that is the basis for the article, is just, and fair pittance for NK. They should have to have some accountabilty for the death of Otto Warmbier, because they clearly are liable and the family is the one that has to suffer the rest of their lives for a crime that doesn't seem all that major in my opinion. My only question going forward is what was NK's stance on the cargo ship being seized? Did they let it go because they knew they were in the wrong? Or was it because the cargo and the ship itself was not worth the hassle to them? Though you'd figure it would be a pride thing to NK instead of dollars and cents.
Len KriegerClass,
I found this great article after last weeks zoom session and I think it tied into to the whole notion that, Korean mean are having to marry non-Korean women and have children that are not 100 percent Korean in order to keep the population higher among other reasons why. When you look at the statistics provided in this article, some of them are mind blowing. The one that shocked me the most was by 2050 the population will be at a mere 44 million people in the entire country, and then projections show they will lose about 600,000 people a year thereafter. Geographically speaking, I think this would be good to show or read in social studies classes, because most students percieve Asian countries (China, Japan, India) as densley populated with tons of people and to see a country like SK that is starting to dwindle could definitely change those perceptions after reading this article.
Len KriegerClass,
This was an article that was just published right now and is a pretty scary and unsettling read. Now, I might be overreacting and read it out of context, but articles like this always make me ueasy. If you have not read it yet, I encourage you to do so, because if a solution is not reached soon and better decisions are made by all parties involved then we could possibly have another war on our hands. I don't know if these are scare tactics or a proverbial "pissing contest" between the two world leaders, but I did not enjoy reading this especially the following quote by NK's Chief of Staff.
"Pak also warned that all-out armed conflict could recommence between the two countries at any time, even by accident, and warned that the use of armed forces against North Korea “will be a horrible thing” for the United States. "