Category Archives: South Korea

Why a giant fictional penguin could be the cure for millennial burnout

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Pengsoo was created for children’s television, yet it became such a sensation with adults that it was named South Korea’s person of the year. Now it’s ready to take over the globe

Growing up in the South Pole, Pengsoo was to his penguin peers what Rudolph was to Santa’s reindeers: an outcast shunned for being different. Bullies latched on to Pengsoo’s towering frame – at nearly 7ft, Pengsoo is almost twice the height of the average emperor penguin – and its large, unblinking eyes.

“The other penguins didn’t play with me because I was too big,” 10-year-old Pengsoo told producers at a studio in the Korea Educational Broadcasting System (EBS) headquarters in Seoul in April 2019. Sitting in a gray room, empty save a too-small chair positioned beside a childish self-portrait, Pengsoo stared at the producers as it spoke. Pengsoo had swum to South Korea from the Antarctic “not too long ago”, it said, in the hopes of becoming the next big sensation on YouTube, which was “getting very popular” in its homeland. But the bullying there had been too much.

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‘Stealing our culture’: South Koreans upset after China claims kimchi as its own

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Agriculture ministry drawn in to row after state media prompts backlash with claims that China leads global kimchi industry

Social media users in China and South Korea are embroiled in another row, this time over the provenance of kimchi, the fermented cabbage dish that most people recognise as an essential part of the Korean diet.

Not, though, in China, where state media have sparked an online backlash after one of the country’s fermented dishes received certification from the International Organisation for Standardisation [ISO].

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North Korean hackers tried to disrupt vaccine in South, says spy agency

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South Korean intelligence foiled the attempt by secretive regime to infiltrate pharmaceutical companies working on treatments

South Korea’s intelligence agency has foiled attempts by North Korean hackers to disrupt attempts to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, according to officials.

Ha Tae-keung, a conservative member of the national assembly who was briefed by intelligence officials, said attempts by the North to target South Korean drugmakers had failed, but did not identify the companies involved.

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France to ease Covid rules as Asian countries consider stricter action

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WHO says Europe faces third wave early in 2021 if nations repeat their failures to prepare

France is preparing to ease its Covid-19 lockdown rules in the weeks leading up to Christmas with new daily caseloads falling and pressure building from retailers to allow the annual shopping season to go ahead.

But parts of east Asia that were thought to be controlling the disease have raised the possibility of new restrictions.

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Map of the soul: how BTS rewrote the western pop rulebook

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Contrary to their dismissive framing as manufactured robots, South Korea’s BTS use social media, documentary and storytelling to make themselves into profoundly human stars

BTS’s leader RM looks up from under a black baseball cap, then stares back down at his hands. “Doing the promotional interviews, [I kept saying], ‘Music truly transcends every barrier.’ But even while I was saying it I questioned myself if I indeed believe it.”

It’s late September, and the rapper is confiding in over one million fans live from his Seoul studio. His “complex set of feelings” about the explosive, record-breaking success of Dynamite – the first fully English-language single from the South Korean megastars – is not the celebration you’d expect from a band that just topped the US Billboard Hot 100, the first K-pop act to do so. But this kind of frank, unfiltered conversation is exactly what their global “Army” fanbase love: BTS’s candid social media presence has included their fans in every step of their artistic journey, and, as they release new album Be this week, has made them the biggest pop group on the planet.

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South Korea facing ‘crisis’, says PM, as Covid measures tightened

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Chanting and singing at concerts banned amid daily case rises and fears for the looming winter flu season

South Korea has strengthened social distancing measures amid a rise in new coronavirus cases, with the country’s prime minister warning that action was needed to avoid a crisis with the arrival of the winter flu season.

The country has won widespread praise for preventing a serious Covid-19 outbreak through a combination of mass testing, vigorous track and tracing and isolation, coupled with social distancing and mask wearing.

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K-pop band Blackpink prompt anger in China by holding baby panda without gloves

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Outrage after members the band were shown holding Fu Bao, the first panda to be born in South Korea, as part of a trailer for their online reality show

Another K-pop act has sparked outrage in China after members of the globally popular girl band Blackpink were shown holding a baby panda – drawing accusations that they had risked harming the health of a national treasure.

Last month, the K-pop phenomenon BTS were criticised in China after the band’s leader, RM, cited the “history of pain” shared between South Korea and the US, who fought alongside each other in the Korean war. China came to the aid of North Korean forces during the 1950-53 conflict and suffered significant losses.

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Joe Biden’s move to net zero emissions will leave Australia in the (coal) dust | Bill Hare

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Australia will be increasingly isolated as the US joins the club of countries, including China, with ambitious mid-century goals

The election of Joe Biden to the White House is likely to see Australia increasingly isolated as the world heads to net zero emissions, with quite fundamental implications for our economy.

Let’s have a look at what has happened in the last two months.

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Lee Kun-hee, Samsung Electronics chairman, dies aged 78

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Transformative leader who took over from father made Samsung a global name with turnover worth a fifth of South Korea’s GDP

The Samsung Electronics chairman, Lee Kun-hee, who made the South Korean company a global name, has died at the age of 78.

Under Lee’s leadership Samsung rose to become the world’s largest producer of smartphones and memory chips, with overall turnover equivalent to a fifth of South Korea’s GDP.

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Doctors in South Korea call for flu vaccinations to be paused after 25 deaths

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Authorities say programme will continue after finding no direct links between the deaths and the vaccines

South Korean officials refused on Thursday to suspend a seasonal influenza inoculation effort, despite growing calls for a halt, including an appeal from a key group of doctors, after the deaths of at least 25 of those vaccinated. Health authorities said they found no direct links between the deaths and the vaccines.

At least 22 of the dead, including a 17-year-old boy, were part of a campaign to inoculate 19 million teenagers and senior citizens for free, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said.

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Russia’s cyber-attack plan for Olympics part of a familiar pattern

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The reach of the GRU spy unit behind attacks on Japan and South Korea is remarkable

In the aftermath of Moscow’s hacking of the 2016 US election, many analysts expected the GRU to be punished. After all, Russia’s powerful military spy agency had been caught red-handed. The FBI indicted several GRU hackers in humiliating fashion. The spies who stole Democratic party emails – tens and thousands of them – were named and shamed.

In fact, the GRU avoided any repressions. In recent years Vladimir Putin has carried out a sweeping and brutal reorganisation at the top of government, sending a shiver down the spine of nervous bureaucrats. He has sacked or had arrested regional governors and ministers. Even the FSB, Putin’s old spy agency and a rival to the GRU, has seen generals fired.

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K-Pop band BTS scores huge hit on South Korea stock market in management firm’s IPO

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Investors scramble to buy shares in Big Hit Entertainment amid speculation that the boy band members could be allowed to defer military service

The management company behind the popular South Korean boy band BTS has scored a huge hit on the country’s stock market after its shares doubled on their first day of trading.

Investors scrambled to buy into the success story of Big Hit Entertainment amid speculation that the South Korean government could allow K-pop and other celebrities to defer their military service, citing their huge contribution to the country’s economy and international reputation.

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UK’s test and trace ‘having marginal impact’: which countries got it right?

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Scientists’ verdict on £12bn system has refocused attention on what is working elsewhere in cutting Covid-19 transmission rates

The newly released assessment by the UK government’s scientific advisers that the £12bn test and trace programme “is having a marginal impact” in reducing Covid-19 transmission has refocused attention on how other countries are faring with their regimes.

Since test-and-trace programmes were first mooted around the world at the outset of the pandemic – including monitoring via apps or hardware – they have been beset by issues of privacy and public support over both downloading and using apps and also with a wider willingness to abide by isolation measures.

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BTS faces China backlash over Korean war comments

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Boyband member RM told award ceremony they would always remember sacrifices of US and South Korea in war

K-pop phenomenon BTS are facing a barrage of criticism in China after the South Korean boyband cited their country’s solidarity with the US stemming from the Korean war.

The band’s leader, RM, sparked outrage on social media in China when he cited the “history of pain” shared between South Korea and the US, who fought alongside each other in the 1950-53 conflict.

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Blaze engulfs 33-storey apartment block in Ulsan, South Korea – video

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A large fire has spread throughout a 33-storey apartment block in the South Korean city of Ulsan. The fire began on the 12th floor before spreading across the building that houses 136 apartments. Seventy-seven people had been treated for smoke inhalation, the fire department said, and the blaze has now been extinguished. The blaze, which broke out at about 11pm on Thursday, was fanned by strong winds.

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Coronavirus live news: concern over case clusters at French schools and universities; Melbourne lifts curfew

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Le Monde reports 32% of outbreaks in France found in schools or universities; Victoria ends curfew

Families are counting down the days to moving into new homes in a Hong Kong estate that had been used as a Covid-19 quarantine centre in what had become a lightning rod for discontent, the South China Morning Post reports.

They included L.N. Siu, her husband and daughter, who were overjoyed when they were finally allocated a public housing flat at the Chun Yeung Estate in Hong Kong last December. They had been waiting eight years.

Romanians go to the polls on Sunday to choose mayors and local councillors, but a Covid-19 surge is threatening to hit the first electoral test after years of political turbulence with a high abstention rate.

Nationwide, the east European country of almost 19 million people has 43,000 seats to fill in the single-round election seen as a test ahead of national polls in December.

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South Korea to ask North to further investigate killing of official

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South’s president Moon Jae-in faces growing public and political outrage over the shooting of the fisheries official

South Korea will ask North Korea to further investigate the shooting death of one of its officials, as public and political outrage over the killing grew.

After a national security council meeting on Friday, South Korea said on Saturday that it would call for a joint probe into the case with the North if needed, saying there were discrepancies in accounts of the accident from the two sides.

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North Korea apologises for ‘unfortunate’ killing of South Korean official

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Kim Jong-un says death ‘should not have happened’ after man shot in North Korean waters

North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, has apologised for the “unexpected” and “unfortunate” killing of a South Korean official this week after he drifted across the countries’ maritime border, possibly in an attempt to defect.

In a message to the South Korean president, Moon Jae-in, Kim said he was “very sorry”, adding that the incident, which has raised tensions between the two countries, “should not have happened”, according to media reports.

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Global preparation: how different countries planned for the second wave of Covid-19

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Lockdowns brought temporary relief to some but, everywhere, test and trace is key

The first wave of coronavirus swept through a world unprepared. Authorities struggled to test for the disease, and didn’t know how to slow the spread of Covid-19.

Lockdowns brought the virus under temporary control in some places, including the UK, buying a window for the revival of education and the economy, and time to prepare for future waves that epidemiologists said were almost inevitable.

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Global report: Covid cases near 30m as China expects vaccine as soon as November

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Coronavirus deaths pass 925,000; biosafety head at Chinese CDC says vaccine progress ‘very smooth’; South Korea to secure early vaccines for 30 million

As global coronavirus cases neared 30 million on Tuesday, a senior health official in China said she expected a vaccine to be publicly available as early as November this year.

According to the Johns Hopkins University Covid-19 tracker, which relies on official government data, there are 29,190,588 confirmed infections worldwide. Deaths stand at 927,245 and are expected to pass 1 million by October.

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