Asia

During the past few years, the United States has begun three important initiatives that alter its defense commitment to South Korea (Republic of Korea [ROK]). First, Washington started to decrease…

In October 2006, Kim Jong-il’s North Korea again seized international attention. With its claimed underground nuclear test, Pyongyang upped the ante in its confrontation with the United States and the…

From 1966 to 1981, around 2,000 Peace Corps volunteers lived and worked in South Korea. After returning to the United States, many volunteers wanted a way to share their Korean…

October 2015 will mark 25 years since the official reunification of East and West Germany. Meanwhile, the Korean Peninsula remains divided. South Korean President Park Geun-Hye has referenced Germany many…

The Eugene Bell Foundation has been working in the DPRK for 20 years. Now they focus on multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), a deadly disease that is incredibly expensive and time-consuming to…

In the recent agreement between Seoul and Pyeongyang to defuse tensions along the DMZ, the two governments included a promise to "vitalize" non-governmental organization (NGO) exchanges in various fields.   …

By Jenna Gibson  Every language has "untranslatable words" - a word that perfectly encapsulates a feeling or situation which lacks an exact equivalent in other languages. German's "schadenfreude" famously describes the feeling of deriving pleasure from another person's pain. Korean has plenty of these words. Some commonly cited examples are 정 (jung), a deep love…

By Juni Kim Notoriously chilly relations between South Korea and Japan received encouraging news this week. In a new joint survey conducted by the South Korea-based East Asia Institute and the Japan-based Genron NPO, fewer South Koreans and Japanese hold negative impressions of each other than in previous years. South Korean unfavorable impressions of Japan…

By Jenna Gibson After a rough 2015 marred by a major health scare, tourism to South Korea has bounced back and then some. In newly released data from the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO), 8.1 million tourists entered South Korea so far in 2016, a 21 percent increase over the same period in 2015. If the…

By Jenna Gibson In Thailand, students applying to college will soon have the option of using Korean as their foreign language. Beginning in 2018, Korean will become the seventh foreign language available on the test, along with Chinese, Arabic, Japanese, French, German, and Pali. English communication is also a required part of the exam. This…