North Korea

| RUSSIA - SOUTH KOREA

Baek Kwang-soon, 53, is being held on espionage charges. The Love Rice Sharing Foundation, a Protestant charity he works for, says that “all sorts of Russians, Thai and North Korean workers” are “in need, and we provide them with clothes, food, and gospel.” Last month, North Korea sent 300 workers, despite a UN ban.


Today's news: Pyongyang tests a "new" undersea nuclear weapon; Islamabad holds emergency meeting after border tensions; In Thailand, a man faces 50 years for lese majesty; New allegations of human rights violations in Colombo over anti-drug campaign; Tehran and Delhi begin talks to defend trade from Houthi attacks in the Red Sea.

| 19/01/2024
| ASIA TODAY
by Alessandra Tamponi

The North Korean leader outlined a radical change to inter-Korean relations in his latest address to the Supreme People's Assembly. The South is described as a hostile country, no longer home to countrymen. As a result, all bodies and agencies involved in relations between North and South will be scrapped.

| 17/01/2024
| NORTH KOREA

Today's news: Two of the three hostages featured in the Hamas video dead; North Korean hackers share clandestine money laundering networks with fraudsters and traffickers in Southeast Asia; An Iranian court handed down an additional 15-month sentence to Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi; Tajikistan and Uzbekistan 'do not recognise' the outcome of the vote in Taiwan.

| 16/01/2024
| ASIA TODAY

Today's news: Maldives calls for withdrawal of Indian troops from archipelago; New Pyongyang missile experiment, launches hypersonic solid-fuel medium range missile; First public appearance by Vietnamese Communist Party chief after days of health speculation; Work to restore the Baghdad-Kirkuk railway, closed for 20 years.

| 15/01/2024
| ASIA TODAY

The ruling by the Supreme Court upholds lower court decisions requiring Japanese companies to compensate workers or their families for forced labour during Japan’s colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula. This weakens the Japan-South Korea agreement of March 2023 setting up a voluntary compensation fund. A painful shared past still weighs heavily on the rapprochement between the two countries, with major security implications over North Korea.

 

| 11/01/2024
| SOUTH KOREA – JAPAN

Today's news: Muslim prisoners in Siberian jails went on hunger strike against religious discrimination. In Seoul over 1,000 military personnel carried out a series of defence drills, simulating an attack by North Korea. The Philippines will open four new medical departments in universities in as many provinces of the country.

| 28/12/2023
| ASIA TODAY
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“L’Asia: ecco il nostro comune compito per il terzo millennio!” - Giovanni Paolo II, da “Alzatevi, andiamo”