Sound and Fury: Does Abe’s Constitutional Revision Really Matter?
Much attention has been paid recently to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s desire to revise the country’s constitution in what would be the first and only change since it was adopted in 1947. The focus especially has been on his intent to change Article 9, which prohibits the country from engaging in war and maintaining […]
Fine dust ups risk of lung cancer by 20%
Airborne fine dust can greatly increase the chance of developing lung cancer, according to a South Korean medical team. The team analyzed the correlation between fine dust and the development of respiratory diseases and concluded that long-term exposure increases the risk of lung cancer by up to 20 percent. It also increases the chance of developing asthma […]
97% of Koreans suffer ‘physical or mental’ distress due to fine dust: survey
Almost all Koreans are suffering from physical or mental distress due to airborne ultrafine dust that has blanketed the nation for days, a survey showed on Tuesday. In an online survey of 731 adults by recruiting website Incruit, 97 percent of them have found it difficult to live in the contaminated air and 93.7 percent called on […]
Introduction: Summitry in Asia
2018 in Asia could well be called The Year of the Summit, with the most dramatic centered on the Korean Peninsula: Kim Jong Un’s meetings with Xi Jinping, Moon Jae-in and Donald Trump. Casting our gaze more broadly, of course, we find that both bilateral and multilateral summitry is by no means limited to the […]
Seoul to build K-pop arena by 2024
A K-pop performance hall will be built in northern Seoul by 2024 to attract more foreign tourists, the city government said Wednesday. The Seoul Metropolitan Government unveiled its plan to establish a cultural complex near Changdong Station on subway Line No. 1 in Dobong-gu, the 18,400-seat Seoul Arena as its key project. Construction is scheduled to […]
Can Abe Get Japan Back on the Korea Bus?
At the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 20, 2017, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe outlined his hardline approach to North Korea in no uncertain terms. “Again and again, attempts to resolve issues through dialogue have all come to naught. In what hope of success are we now repeating the very same failure a third […]
Forecasting Korea’s future
The French have two expressions that capture the essence of Kim Jong-un’s New Year address. First, there’s “deja vu” ― or maybe “deja vu all over again,” as the American baseball player Yogi Berra famously put it. And then there’s “plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose” ― “the more things change, the more […]
Confusing ‘Korean age’ system dies hard
The year 2019 has arrived. This means all Koreans have just become a year older. Welcome to the “Korean age” system, in which everyone becomes a year old at birth and gains an additional year every New Year’s Day. This method originated in China centuries ago and was once used by several countries in the […]
Can Abe Get Japan Back on the Korea Bus?
At the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 20, 2017, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe outlined his hardline approach to North Korea in no uncertain terms. “Again and again, attempts to resolve issues through dialogue have all come to naught. In what hope of success are we now repeating the very same failure a third […]
Boosting ties between Korea, Philippines
My wife and I recently travelled to the municipality of Concepcion, Iloilo, Philippines, as part of the delegation of the Korea Heritage Society from Dec. 4 to Dec 10. The KHS was led by its chairman Choi Ha-kyung and advisory council members, at the invitation of Milliard S. Villanueva, the mayor of Concepcion. Our visit […]
![[Novel] The Road to Shamawes ⑯](http://www.theasian.asia/wp-content/themes/city-desk/timthumb.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theasian.asia%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2013%2F08%2FAshraf-2novel-news_9601.jpg&q=90&w=300&h=0&zc=1 "[Novel] The Road to Shamawes ⑯")
