Foreign Relations

Both India’s and South Korea’s strategic choices are deeply influenced by the rapidly evolving Indo-Pacific construct, particularly amid a mounting U.S.-China rivalry. With India’s “Look/Act East” policy and South Korea’s…

The New Northern Policy, proclaimed by the South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Vladivostok in September 2017, is designed to boost economic cooperation between Russia and South Korea. However, two…

This examination of the relations among these four governments assesses the ever-closer China-Russia relationship featuring stronger strategic alignment against the United States and its interests in many parts of the…

The Japanese government makes no secret of its intensifying security concerns. The Ministry of Defense’s most recent annual white paper includes the assessment that, “The security environment surrounding Japan has…

The war in Ukraine directly and indirectly impacted policy and perceptions on and around the Korean Peninsula, starting with Russia’s invasion in early 2022 and continuing apace in 2023. Although the war has provided Seoul the opportunity to enhance its contributions to global security, simultaneously it presents challenges that accelerate its security concerns closer to…

North Korea was the first country to severely restrict travel and trade across its borders when the pandemic began in 2020. While the rest of the world has since largely returned to normal, many of North Korea’s COVID restrictions remained in place at the beginning of 2023. However, Pyongyang began to ease these constraints in…

At the end of August, U.S. officials at the United Nations headquarters in New York and White House officials in Washington cited intelligence reports that Moscow was seeking weapons and ammunition from North Korea.  Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York, stated that “Russia is negotiating potential deals…

The 18 August 2023 summit that brought together the leaders of Japan, South Korea and the United States at Camp David was rightly hailed as a breakthrough moment in consolidating trilateral security ties, especially after years of near-frozen relations. US officials stressed the importance of creating enduring institutions and structures among the three countries. These…