SEOUL (TIP): Leaders of South Korea, China and Japan will meet next week in Seoul for their first trilateral talks in more than four years, South Korea’s presidential office announced May 23.
The trilateral summit among South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, Chinese Premier Li Qiang and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will take place in Seoul on Monday, Yoon’s presidential office said.
The three leaders were scheduled to hold bilateral talks among themselves on Sunday, according to the South Korean presidential office.
Since their inaugural stand-alone trilateral summit in 2008, the three Asian countries were supposed to hold such a meeting among their leaders each year. But the summit has been suspended since they were last held in December 2019 in China.
Efforts to boost cooperation among the Asian neighbors often hit snags because of a mix of issues, including historical disputes stemming from Japan’s wartime aggression and the strategic competition between China and the United States.
Ties between South Korea and Japan deteriorated severely due to issues originating from Japan’s 1910-45 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. But their relations warmed significantly since 2023 as the two countries took a series of major steps to move beyond that history and boost cooperation in the face of North Korea’s advancing nuclear program and other shared challenges.
North Korea’s growing arsenal of nuclear-capable missiles poses a major security threat to South Korea and Japan. But China, North Korea’s last major ally and biggest source of aid, is suspected of avoiding fully enforcing United Nations sanctions on North Korea and shipping covert assistance to help. (AP)
Tag: Yoon Suk Yeol
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Leaders of South Korea, China and Japan will meet next week for the first time since 2019
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South Korea’s parliament approves independent investigation of the devastating 2022 Halloween crush
SEOUL (TIP): South Korea’s parliament on May 2 approved legislation mandating a new, independent investigation into the 2022 Halloween crush in Seoul that killed 159 people.
The single-chamber National Assembly passed the bill by a 256-0 vote. It will become law after it is signed by President Yoon Suk Yeol and promulgated by his government agency — steps that are considered formalities because the president and his ruling party already agreed on the legislation.
The bill is meant to delve into the root cause of the crush, details about how authorities handled the disaster and who should be blamed for it. It also envisages the creation of a fact-finding committee with nine members that would independently examine the disaster for up to 15 months. Once the committee determines who is responsible and who should face charges, it would report them to the government’s investigation agencies. The agencies would then conclude investigations of the suspects within three months, according to the bill.
The crush, one of the biggest peacetime disasters in South Korea, caused a nationwide outpouring of grief. The victims, who were mostly in their 20s and 30s, had gathered in Seoul’s popular nightlife district of Itaewon for Halloween celebrations. In the aftermath of the tragedy, there was also anger that the government had again ignored safety and regulatory issues despite the lessons learned since the 2014 sinking of the ferry Sewol, which killed 304 people — mostly teenagers on a school trip.
In early 2023, a police special investigation concluded that police and municipal officials failed to formulate effective crowd control steps, despite correctly anticipating a huge number of people in Itaewon. At the time, investigators said police had also ignored hotline calls by pedestrians who warned of swelling crowds before the surge turned deadly.
More than 20 police and other officials have been on trial over the disaster but few top-level officials have been charged or held accountable, prompting bereaved families and opposition lawmakers to call for an independent probe.
President Yoon had previously opposed a new investigation of the disaster. However, during a meeting with liberal opposition leader Lee Jae-myung on Monday, Yoon said he would not oppose it, should some existing disputes be resolved, such as whether the fact-finding committee can request arrest warrants. (AP)