As the 2024 general election looms, new third parties are emerging in Seoul as potential challengers to the established parties. The nascent third parties say they are launching their bids to challenge the country’s two major political parties -- the ruling People Power Party and the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea -- and to woo a considerable niche of voters who identify as independents. According to polls, support for the two main parties is hardly 50 to 50, with around a quart

Politics Nov. 16, 2023

South Korea’s Prime Minister Han Duck-soo made a final push to woo support for South Korea to host the World Expo 2023 during his trip to Paris, his office said Wednesday. The prime minister, who was in Paris from Sunday, met with 61 representatives from 50 countries to ask them to back Busan, the South Korean port city bidding to be host of the expo, with the vote less than two weeks away. “Unlike sporting events like the Olympics where countries compete for medals, expositions shou

Politics Nov. 15, 2023

Rep. Ha Tae-keung of the ruling People Power Party said Wednesday he submitted a bill allowing the South Korean government to place groups and individuals on the foreign terrorist list in the absence of a United Nations designation. Ha said the proposed amendment to the laws on counter-terrorism would let the prime minister, whose role is largely administrative and ceremonial, designate Hamas as a terrorist organization without having to wait for a designation by the UN. Hamas is an Islamist mil

Politics Nov. 15, 2023

Since its establishment in 1961 as the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, South Korea’s National Intelligence Service has not only collected intelligence on cases related to North Korea, but also investigated them. Come January, the South’s most important intelligence headquarters will be barred from investigating cases related to North Korea. Rep. Kim Byung-kee of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea, a former high-ranking official at the NIS, says prohibiting the intellig

Politics Nov. 14, 2023

South Korean ruling party’s reform committee is facing the possibility of an early disbandment amid an internal backlash over its unpopular demands. The People Power Party’s reform committee was formed on Oct. 26 to lay out a vision for realigning the party for the 2024 general election, and headed by a party outsider -- Yohan Ihn, a third-generation descendant of a US missionary who gave humanitarian aid during Japanese colonial times. Ihn has announced a series of reform measures i

Politics Nov. 14, 2023

South Korea’s Ministry of Justice on Tuesday held a high-level seminar with the International Criminal Court to mark the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Rome Statute -- the founding treaty of The Hague-based war crimes court. The regional seminar, held under the theme of the “ICC and the Asia-Pacific: past, present and future of the Rome Statute -- vision for the greater regional solidarity,” was hosted in Seoul by the Justice Ministry and the Supreme Court on Nov. 14-1

Politics Nov. 14, 2023

South Korea’s spy service suspects Chinese agencies are behind the operation of fake websites posing as well-known South Korean news outlets to spread propaganda. The National Intelligence Service said Monday that Chinese press relations agencies Haimai and Haixun created phishing websites that look like websites of news outlets here and then generated a series of stories it said are “pro-China” and “anti-US." Some of the examples of the stories circulated by the pho

Politics Nov. 13, 2023

South Korea is likely to begin a trilateral discussion on the 52-hour weekly work cap, with the government moving to resume talks as the labor umbrella union returns to the dialogue for the first time in five months. The discussion will include the government's latest proposal on allowing exceptions to the legally set maximum of 52 hours of work per week. The Ministry of Employment and Labor said Monday that employers may be given more flexibility in arranging the work schedules on a weekly

Politics Nov. 13, 2023

Rep. Tae Yong-ho, a former North Korean diplomat, met with five members of the US congress during his trip to Washington on Nov. 7-8 to jointly raise concerns about China forcibly repatriating North Koreans who defected into its territories. The South Korean lawmaker with the ruling People Power Party said in a release Friday that he discussed the issue of China’s forced repatriation of North Korean defectors in meetings with Sen. Ted Cruz and House of Representatives members Chris Smith,

Politics Nov. 10, 2023

South Korea’s National Assembly recently became the 32nd legislature to be represented in the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, an association of lawmakers concerned about Beijing’s increasingly hostile behaviors. The first South Korean lawmakers to join the cross-parliamentarian alliance are the ruling People Power Party’s Rep. Ji Seong-ho and the opposition Democratic Party of Korea’s Rep. Oh Yeong-hwan. The two lawmakers will serve as inaugural co-chairs until the

Politics Nov. 10, 2023

The Democratic Party of Korea said Friday it would file a second motion to remove the chief of the country’s broadcaster regulator, after withdrawing the first one. In Thursday’s National Assembly plenary session, the Democratic Party introduced and passed the contentious motion to impeach Lee Dong-kwan, who heads the Korea Communications Commission, only to retract it a day later amid public outcry. The Democratic Party, which holds enough seats in the Assembly to pass motions witho

Politics Nov. 10, 2023

The main opposition Democratic Party of Korea on Friday rescinded the impeachment motion targeting a senior incumbent prosecutor overseeing criminal investigations into the party's leader, Rep. Lee Jae-myung. The retraction came one day after the Democratic Party filed and passed a motion to impeach Prosecutor Lee Jung-seop during Thursday's Assembly plenary session, triggering public backlash. The senior prosecutor has been leading the ongoing investigations into some of the more high-profile c

Politics Nov. 10, 2023

President Yoon Suk Yeol is again being pressured by the main opposition to remove one of the minister-level heads in his Cabinet. The Democratic Party of Korea, which has the majority in the National Assembly, on Thursday adopted a motion to impeach Lee Dong-kwan as the head of the country’s broadcasting regulator, the Korea Communications Commission. The opposition party said that Lee, who was appointed on Aug. 25 to lead the KCC, the mission of which is to monitor broadcasting content an

Politics Nov. 9, 2023

A debate is roiling in South Korea over the plan to make Seoul larger, a recycled election promise that is failing to win voters in and out of the capital, polls reveal. Enlarging Seoul is a recurring proposal in South Korean politics -- interpreted as being intended to sway voters in the capital’s many satellite cities -- renewed by the People Power Party with the general election less than six months away. The plan was previously endorsed in past elections by some candidates with the Dem

Politics Nov. 5, 2023

A few days after the Islamist militant group Hamas entered Israel on Oct. 7 and killed more than a thousand civilians, posters sympathizing with the deadly attacks popped up on several South Korean college campuses. The posters, which defended the Hamas attacks as an act of self-defense by Palestinians, were taken down shortly after -- but the debate on the war continues to rage on. Speaking to The Korea Herald, one Seoul university sophomore said she was “stunned by such open support for

Politics Nov. 2, 2023