• Hatred among NE Asians

    Mutual hatred between Korean, Japanese and Chinese people has risen to a worrisome level recently. This is no doubt a cause for concern, not only for those who strive for peace and prosperity in Northeast Asia, but for anyone who wants this world to be free from additional troubles. According…

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  • Save the whales, 2014

    It was widely known for many years that Japan’s “scientific whaling” program was a sham, designed to get around the international moratorium on hunting whales. Almost no research on the animals came from Japanese scientists; instead, whale meat kept showing up in restaurants and school lunches. Finally, Australia, a whaling…

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  • Disrupted by drones

    It’s time to calm down, check defense preparedness Three small, crashed drones presumably sent by North Korea have touched off a noisy but inconclusive controversy in the South. Tracing back the course of debate over recently found unmanned aerial vehicles, however, reveals big holes in the nation’s defense posture and…

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  • Human rights body’s fall

    Seoul must take swift steps to avoid further disgrace Korea’s human rights organization, once the object of envoy among new democracies, has become a disgrace to the nation. The National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRC), which barely limped along during the past seven years under successive conservative governments, is…

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  • Two-faced neighbor

    New Japanese textbooks ruin their children’s future Japan’s historical whitewashing reached a new low Friday when Tokyo expanded their targets of distorted education to include elementary schoolchildren. According to a revision added to their history books, Dokdo is Japanese sovereign territory unlawfully occupied by Korea. This is a glaring aggravation…

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  • Arms export by Japan

    Should the world let painful history repeat itself? Step by carefully calculated step, Japan is moving toward becoming a military power ― as it was 70 years ago. Nothing shows this better than Tokyo’s decision Tuesday to throw away its 46-year-old ban on the export of weapons and military hardware.…

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  • East Asia

    Can South Korea unify North Korea by absorption?

    Lessons to be learned from Crimean crisis The unrolling Ukrainian crisis has been in the news a lot of late. The recent succession of Crimea can be seen in various ways, but it seems that this dramatic event hints at one possible scenario of Korea’s future. Indeed, why did Crimea…

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  • West Asia

    A forgotten story of rebellion in British Raj

    “Once upon a time” the British ruled in the Indian sub-continent. I find this phrase “once upon a time” rather interesting in our context. It creates a distance between the events of the story and the reader: distance in time, connection or direct relevancy. Today, the history of the sub-continent…

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  • South East Asia

    Satellite TV channels boom in Bangladesh

    While a satellite TV broadcasting policy is under consideration by the government, the private satellite television sector in Bangladesh has been flourishing day by day. These TV channels were established with the primary aim to transmit news and entertainment, and the network of channels has been expanding with a continuous…

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  • East Asia

    S. Korea blasts Japan for history distortion at UN debate

    South Korea blasted Japan’s distorted view of history at a U.N. Security Council open debate on “War, its lessons, and the search for a permanent peace,” on Jan 29. 2014. China and North Korea also voiced criticism over Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s recent visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. Below…

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