SEOUL – Former U. N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday he’ll soon announce whether to run for South Korea’s top job as he returned home and strongly hinted at his political ambitions before hundreds of cheering supporters.
Ban’s return will likely heat up local politics as he’s considered as the only major conservative contender in a possible early election to replace impeached President Park Geun-hye. Dozens of lawmakers already bolted from Park’s conservative ruling party and want to align with Ban, while the main liberal opposition party is escalating a political offensive against him.
“Many people have asked me whether I have a will for power. If ‘will for power’ means uniting a divided country into one and making it a first-class country again, then I have already said I am ready to burn my body in devotion to this and my mind hasn’t changed,” Ban told a televised conference upon his arrival at Incheon International Airport near Seoul.
As his supporters shouted his name, Ban, a former South Korean foreign minister, said he’ll get diverse opinions about his return to South Korean politics. “Based on my talks will people, I will make a decision that will be free from selfish motives. That decision won’t take long,” he said.
Opinion polls show Ban is one of the favorites to succeed Park, who is now on trial at the Constitutional Court that will determine whether to formally end her rule and hold a new election. The opposition-controlled parliament impeached her last month over her alleged roles in an explosive corruption scandal. South Korea is originally scheduled to hold a presidential election in December.
Ban, who ended his 10-year service as U. N. chief last month, is a soft-spoken career diplomat known for a gentle image and an ability to avoid making enemies. But he also faced criticism that he lacks charisma and experience in domestic politics.
Many South Koreans have taken great pride in him because they think Ban’s top U. N. job represents their country’s rise in the international arena from the rubbles of the 1950-53 Korean War. But critics say Ban would not have assumed the U. N. post without the help from the government of late President Roh Moo-hyun, which reportedly made massive efforts to make him the first South Korean U. N. chief.
Ban denied an allegation in the media that he took bribes from a businessman who was at the center of a corruption scandal that led to Roh’s suicide in 2009. Two of Ban’s relatives were charged in the U. S. with plotting to bribe a Middle East official to influence the $800 million sale of a building complex in Vietnam, an indictment unsealed Tuesday showed.
Ban’s main potential rival is Moon Jae-in, a former leader of the largest opposition Democratic Party who lost the 2012 election to Park.
A survey released this week by Realmeter showed Moon had a 27.9 percent approval rating compared to Ban’s 20.3 percent. The survey of 1,511 respondents had a margin of error of 2.5 points.

© Source: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/01/12/asia-pacific/politics-diplomacy-asia-pacific/ex-u-n-chief-back-south-korea-hints-presidential-bid/
All rights are reserved and belongs to a source media.

Samsung Group Vice Chair, Lee Jae-Yong, arrived at the South Korean special prosecutor’s office on Thursday morning for questioning over the firm’s alleged corruption association in the political scandal that could lead to the historical impeachment of President Park Geun- Hye.
Like Us on Facebook
Dressed in a dark suit with a white shirt and red tie, Lee arrived at the office where he was greeted with journalists seeking to hear his comment on the case and a jeering crowd protesting for his immediate arrest.
“I apologize to the Korean community over our failure to set out a better image on the case,” Lee said to journalists. He then bowed before the group of protestors and the media.
The 48-year-old heir of Samsung has been under scrutiny after investigations found a link between the company and  Choi Soon-sil, who had been detained since October after charges of abuse of power and attempted fraud and bribery were charged against her. Choi is a close ally of Park. 
Bloomberg reported that an established corruption link that transpired between the two parties will go a long way in determining the fate of Park’s presidency.
“Special prosecutors are mainly after President Park,” Chung Sun-sup, director at Chaebul.com, said. “In this case, however, to charge Park with bribery, they have to prove her connection with Samsung. ”
Yahoo News cited an unnamed investigator saying that the chance of the prosecutors to seek a warrant of arrest is “high. ”
Reports indicated that Lee was expected to be invited for questioning. However, many were surprised when he was called in as a suspect instead of a witness.
Park is on the verge of making a double history as she became the first female president of South Korea and could also be the first to be impeached.

© Source: http://www.chinatopix.com/articles/109874/20170112/south-korea-park-geun-hye-impeachment-trial-park-geun-hye-gate-scandal-samsung-lee-jae-yong.htm
All rights are reserved and belongs to a source media.

WASHINGTON – US authorities on Wednesday announced sanctions against North Korean government agencies and senior officials — among them leader Kim Jong Un’s sister — in response to Pyongyang’s “serious” human rights abuses and censorship activities.
The latest action, which sees another seven individuals added to America’s growing list of sanctioned North Koreans, targets security and prison officials accused of rights abuses.
Those blacklisted include Kim Won Hong, who heads the Ministry of State Security (MSS).
“The MSS engages in torture and inhumane treatment of detainees during interrogation and in the country’s network of political prison camps,” the U. S. Department of the Treasury said in a statement.
“This inhumane treatment includes beatings, forced starvation, sexual assault, forced abortions, and infanticide.”
The Treasury announcement came as the U. S. State Department released a report on rights abuses in North Korea, which it said are among the worst in the world.
“The North Korean government continues to commit extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrest and detention, forced labor, and torture,” the State Department said.
The Treasury Department also targeted Kim Yo Jong, the vice director of the Workers’ Party of Korea Propaganda and Agitation Department and the younger sister of Kim Jong Un, and Kim Il Nam, who heads the South Hamgyong Province political prison camp.
Also on the list are Choe Hwi, Min Byong Chol, Jo Yong Won, and Kang P’il Hun.
The sanctioned agencies are the State Planning Commission and the Ministry of Labor.
The United States in July placed Kim Jong Un on its sanctions blacklist for the first time, calling him directly responsible for a long list of serious human rights abuses.

© Source: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/01/12/asia-pacific/u-s-sanctions-north-korean-officials-rights-abuses/
All rights are reserved and belongs to a source media.

It is the first US military response to Pyongyang’s claim it could launch an intercontinental ballistic missile.
The sea-based X-band radar (SB-X) is able to track the long-range launches and provide crucial data.
What can be learned by not shooting down a North Korean missile
The radar, whose home port is in Hawaii, has deployed several times in the past to monitor North Korean missile activity. But it can only remain at sea for a certain, undisclosed, period of time, so military officials try to calculate the most significant times, the official said.
Generally the SB-X is sent north of Hawaii and stationed about halfway to Alaska for the optimum spot to track a potential North Korean missile launch headed for Alaska, Guam or the West Coast of the United States.
Additional surveillance assets are being identified to monitor activity on the Korean Peninsula, but the official declined to discuss any details.
Defense officials are emphasizing that if North Korea were to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile, it might not be shot down by a US missile defense system.
“If the missile’s threatening, it will be intercepted. If it’s not threatening, we won’t necessarily do so,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter told reporters Tuesday. “It may be more to our advantage to, first of all, save our interceptor inventory, and, second, to gather intelligence from the flight rather than do that (shoot it down) when it’s not threatening. ”
The SB-X radar will increase the US ability to collect that type of missile data.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un recently said the t est launch of an ICBM is in its final stages.
US officials continue to say they do not believe the North Koreans have mastered the technology needed for the missile to re-enter the atmosphere.
There have been launches of three-stage long-range rockets with a satellite on the front end being boosted into space. The two technologies are very similar, but it is re-entry of the warhead that has not yet been demonstrated, US officials said.
On Wednesday, the US Treasury froze all US property interests and assets belonging to seven North Korean government officials. According to a statement, the Treasury imposed the sanctions because North Korea continues to engage in grave human rights abuses and actively uses censorship policies to conceal those abuses.
Most of the seven sanctioned North Koreans on the blacklist work in top-level security and prison operations. They include Kim’s younger sister, Kim Yo Jong — Vice Director of the Korean Workers’ Party Propaganda and Agitation Department.
The Treasury further sanctioned the State Planning Commission and the Ministry of Labor, slamming the two government bodies for coordinating forced labor — including in North Korean mines.
This is the second time the US has imposed human rights sanctions on Kim’s government, after blacklisting Kim and other top officials in July.

© Source: http://rss.cnn.com/~r/rss/edition_world/~3/CaNOYv077Xg/index.html
All rights are reserved and belongs to a source media.

SEOUL: Former U. N. chief Ban Ki-moon arrived home in South Korea on Thursday and said he will make a decision soon on his political career, amid expectations he will run in an election that may come early if President Park Geun-hye is forced from office.
Ban, 72 is among front-runners in polls to succeed Park, whose fate will be decided when the Constitutional Court decides whether or not to uphold parliament’s December impeachment of her over an influence-peddling scandal.
Ban, a former foreign minister whose 10 years as U. N. secretary-general ended in December, has not said whether he will run for president, nor has he affiliated himself with any party.
“I’ve been saying I will listen to our people’s thoughts after returning home. I will have that opportunity from tomorrow. I will make a selfless decision with a humble heart,” Ban said at the airport after his arrival.
Ban’s possible path to the presidency hit a bump this week when his younger brother, Ban Ki-sang, and nephew, Joo Hyun Bahn, were accused in a Manhattan federal court of a scheme to bribe a Middle Eastern official in connection with the attempted US$800 million sale of a building complex in Vietnam.
Ban told Korean reporters in New York on Wednesday, before his departure for South Korea, that he was dismayed by the affair and had no knowledge of it.
“I am perplexed and embarrassed that close members of my family have become involved in something like this. I feel it is regrettable the situation has troubled many,” Ban said.
“I had absolutely no knowledge. My nephew is grown and I barely had any involvement in his life or how he does business,” Ban, who was not mentioned in the indictment, said in remarks broadcast on South Korean TV.
Throngs of media and well-wishers, some carrying signs saying B. I. G., the acronym for a fan club, Ban Ki-moon Infinite Good Fortune, greeted him at the airport.
“Thank you! Thank you! ” a smiling Ban said as some in the crowd shouted his name. Ban picked up a baby dressed in traditional Korean hanbok clothing.
Ban returns to a country gripped by political crisis stemming from the influence-peddling scandal that has engulfed the political elite.
Park, 64, the daughter of a former military ruler, has denied any wrongdoing but was stripped of her presidential powers pending the court decision on whether or not to uphold her impeachment.
If it does, Park would become South Korea’s first democratically elected leader to leave office in disgrace and an election would be held in two months. As is, the scheduled date of the next election for a five-year single term is Dec. 20.
While Ban was greeting supporters, Jay Y. Lee, scion of the Samsung Group, the country’s biggest conglomerate, was being questioned by special prosecutors on suspicion of bribery in the wide-reaching scandal.
Prosecutors are investigating whether Samsung gave about US$25 million to a business and foundations backed by a friend of Park’s in exchange for the national pension fund’s support for a 2015 merger of two Samsung affiliates.
Lee in December denied accusations the conglomerate sought to curry favour with Park or her friend to secure the merger.
The political crisis has seen big peaceful protests every weekend, with demonstrators calling for Park to step down.
“History will remember the year of 2016,” said Ban, who before the political scandal had been expected to run as a member of Park’s conservative Saenuri party.
“It will remember a miracle, made by the people in the public square, good people united to make a good country,” Ban said before heading in to central Seoul on the airport train.

© Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/ex-un-chief-ban-to-make-decision-on-political-future-soon/3432566.html
All rights are reserved and belongs to a source media.