What's New at Kimsoft? May 2001 |
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05/21 kww: Seoul Searching: No Comfort - Sex slaves used by Japanese soldiers during wartime now have a new enemy -- America. During the 1930s and '40s, Japan forced thousands of Korean, Chinese, Dutch and other women to work as assembly-line prostitutes for its soldiers. When the war ended, it abandoned the women on the front lines and buried their memory, until survivors started to step forward in the early 1990s to tell the world their unimaginable tales. Japan could no longer deny what happened. But Tokyo has declined to admit legal responsibility, pay reparations or try to punish the guilty. After committing the crime, Japan is perpetuating it by stonewalling the victims. Instead, it has focused its efforts on public relations and legal wrangling aimed at avoiding taking responsibility. Apparently with some success -- the U.S. government is now taking Tokyo's side in this tragic affair.
05/19 kww: KOREA TRUTH COMMISSION / INTERNATIONAL ACTION CENTER - Help the People's Investigation of U.S. War Crimes Against Korea. Join International Grass Roots Groups Organizing for War Crimes Tribunal June 23rd, 2001, NEW YORK CITY
05/18 kww: Korean-Americans want families on agenda (USAToday) - The Bush administration is taking its time reviewing U.S. policy toward North Korea. But for Benjamin Eung Eo Koh, each day that goes by diminishes the chances he will be reunited with two brothers he last saw in North Korea 51 years ago.
05/16 kww: AsiaTimes EDITORIAL: Bush has got it wrong on the Koreas - We take serious exception to the notion that there is something basically wrong with the "sunshine" policy of South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and to his treatment in Washington in March. What's the alternative to South-North rapprochement? When the United States reviews its policy with South Korea and Japan in Hawaii later this month, a firm commitment to the sunshine policy should be the priority outcome.
05/16 kww: Kexpat is a mailing list for expatriates in Korea. The list was started on May 28th, 1996 and currently has more than 200 members. The majority of members reside in Korea, however, there are members living in several other parts of the world.
05/16 kww: N. Korea Food Crisis Intensifies As Dependence Rises, South Debates Politics of Outside Aid (WP) - North Koreans are facing a bleak spring and are once again eating leaves and roots to survive as the Stalinist country becomes increasingly dependent on the outside world to feed its people, according to aid workers and diplomats.
05/16 kww: Life Expectancy Plummets, North Korea Says (NYT) - Famine and economic collapse cut the life expectancy of North Koreans by more than six years in the 1990's. Death rates for infants and young children climbed while incomes fell by almost half, according to a report presented by Deputy Foreign Minister Choe Su Hon at a Unicef conference in Beijing.
05/12 kww: An Open Letter to Korean-Americans and other Kyopos - Edward Kim, Editor, The Chosun Journal - North Korea is not a separate country from South Korea. According to both governments' constitutions, there is only one Korea, and at least in SK, any refugee from the North who arrives is automatically a citizen. In other words, the two regimes still recognize that 50 years of division cannot deny the country's over 2,000 years of cultural unity. What the North during the US Civil War was not willing to concede, neither North nor South Korea have been willing to do either.
05/10 kww: Fat Bear: No meeting Mickey Mouse any time soon - Kim Jong-il, we may safely predict, is not amused. A regime which denies liberty and even life to its subjects, preaches puritan communist morality and excoriates capitalism and the West, lets its playboy princeling swan into so-called enemy territory on a tacky fake passport, with son, two young women (neither his wife), a trunkful of cash and all the vulgar display of the new rich.
05/10 kww: Japan's First Female Foreign Minister - The new prime minister of Japan, Junichiro Koizumi, has appointed Makiko Tanaka as Japan’s first female foreign minister. She is the daughter of former Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka, who normalized relations with China in the early 1970s. Makiko Tanaka was chief of the Science and Technology Agency from 1994 to 1995. The outspoken Tanaka, at 57, is one of Japan’s most popular politicians. She is not affiliated with any LDP faction and was a supporter of Koizumi’s campaign.
05/7 kww: Outrage over "weak" govt. greets deportation of Kim Jong Il's son
05/7 kww: South Korea monitors deportation episode - The South Korean government will likely maintain its wait-and-see attitude over the consequences of Japan's deportation Friday of a man believed to be Kim Jong Nam, the eldest son of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.
05/7 kww: North Korean leader's son traveled illegally, but in style - He had a Rolex on his wrist and rings on his fingers. His two women companions carried Louis Vuitton bags and wore gold bracelets.