United States of America

Trade ties between the United States and many East Asian countries have faced a high degree of uncertainty since Donald Trump took office in early 2017. The world is now…

During his visit to Asia in November 2017, President Donald Trump announced his vision of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” as the U.S. approach to the region. The Department of…

Beef trade was a major sticking point between the United States and South Korea in ratifying the KORUS FTA. The outcome of the renegotiations that led to the March 2018…

The sudden announcement of a North Korea-U.S. summit in March 2018 upended all previous diplomacy concerning North Korea’s nuclear program. In return for a bilateral presidential summit, Pyongyang has agreed…

The US House of Representatives adopted the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act on November 20. The original act was first adopted by Congress in 2004, but such legislation is valid for only four or five years. Congress must “reauthorize” or adopt new legislation if the provisions are still needed. The original North Korean Human…

South Korean media have been filled with discussion about what the return to power of Donald Trump in the United States may mean for the Korean Peninsula. High on the list is the possibility that Trump will rekindle his bromance with North Korean autocrat Kim Jong-un, picking up the threads of a bargain that broke…

Uncertainty prevails when it comes to the incoming Donald Trump administration and the US-ROK alliance. Observers are feverishly speculating on a range of potential policy trajectories from universal and across-the-board 10-20 percent tariffs, obstructed implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and less flexible US export controls to increased cost- and burden-sharing demands related to…

North Korea’s human rights violations have been a priority of UN organizations since 2004, when the UN Human Rights Council first appointed a UN Special Rapporteur to report annually on the issue to the UN Security Council and the UN General Assembly. This focus on North Korea’s human rights violations has been in addition to…

Please join KEI and KIEP for a discussion about the first 10 years of KORUS and the future of the U.S.-Korea economic relationship.