Tag Archives: KOREA

Golden Eaglets Land In Korea Ahead Of Suwon Cup Tourney

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Nigeria’s U-17 boys, Golden Eaglets, on Tuesday arrived the Korea Republic to contest in the four-Nation U-19 Suwon Continental Cup against England, Iran and hosts, Korea.

 

The Eaglets on Monday departed the country via Murtala Mohammed Airport in Lagos on a seven hour non-stop flight aboard Qatar Airways to Hamad International Airport in Doha, from where they embarked on another nine-hour flight and landed at Incheon Airport in Seoul 5:14pm local time (9:15 am in Nigeria), with temperature oscillating between three and five degree Celsius.

 

In Seoul, the contingent was welcomed by the organisers as well as a representative from the Nigerian Embassy, Mrs. Igwe before traveling on a two-hour bus ride to Suwon City. Players and officials are lodged at the impressive Suwon High End Hotel.

 

Meanwhile, the Coach Manu Garba-led Golden Eaglets will open their account at the tournament on Wednesday against England at the Suwon World Cup Stadium – one of the stadia to host next year’s FIFA U20 World Cup.

 

However, England are in Korea with some British-Nigerians including Liverpool’s Ovie Ejaria who was omitted from the Eaglets’ 2013 FIFA World Cup-winning team as well as defender Fikayo Tomori, midfielder Joshua Onomah and forward Ademola Lookman, amongst others.

 

Hosts Korea kicked off the tournament on a winning note Tuesday evening with a 3-1 defeat of Iran. After playing England on Wednesday, the Golden Eaglets will trade tackles with Iran on Thursday and clash with host Korea Republic on Saturday.

Kim Jong-un Has Banned Sarcasm in North Korea to Protect Himself From Insults

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North Korea’s supreme leader Kim Jong-un is known to overreact. Just recently, he reportedly executed a high ranking official for sitting “disrespectfully.” Having banned weddings and funerals already, Kim Jong-un is now taking aim at another one of his fierce enemies: sarcasm. 

According to nonprofit news organization Radio Free Asia, North Koreans are being warned against using sarcasm. Sarcasm can be used to criticize the regime, which, state security officers have threatened, will not be forgiven.

In particular, officials pointed to popular expressions like “This is all America’s fault,” which can be used to ironically take shots at the regime. A source told RFA, “This habit of the central authorities of blaming the wrong country when a problem’s cause obviously lies elsewhere has led citizens to mock the party.”

Central government authorities gave the warnings to citizens at various mass meetings across the desolate country starting near the end of last month. Officials claimed to have organized the meetings to raise awareness of potential “hostile actions” by rebels, but a source told RFA, “The main point of the lecture was ‘Keep your mouths shut!'”

North Korea has never been a bastion of free speech, but the crackdown on sarcasm follows a year of more open defiance against the regime. Earlier this year, for example, graffiti at a construction site in the capital city of Pyongyang mocked the regime’s production slogans.

The suppression of sarcasm will surely solve all of North Korea’s problems and will continue to bring glory to the Supreme Leader.

Source: Complex

North Korea Fires Ballistic Missile From Submarine Off Coast Of South

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North Korea has fired a submarine-based ballistic missile off the coast of South Korea leaving the two countries on a war alert.

The incident comes as Pyongyang ramps up military tensions between North and South with a series of armed provocations over the past 12 months.

The latest missile launch, in the Sea of Japan, was announced by South Korea’s Yonhap news agency.

North Korea appeared to resume activities this year aimed at producing plutonium which can be used
in the core of an atomic bomb the U.N. nuclear watchdog has confirmed, although it added that signs of those activities stopped last month.

The North has even threatened to turn the US and South Korean armies into a “heap of ashes” after they were spotted performing joint military exercises.

Korea Kicks Off $15m Model Schools In Nigeria

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Korea International Cooperation Agency, KOICA, has commenced building $15 million Model Primary and Junior Secondary schools in Nigeria. The project is in partnership with the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, and the Federal Ministry of Budget and National Planning, MBNP, as the coordinating body. The flag-off of the project by Jangsan Construction Company, which took place at the site of Abuja Model School project, is scheduled to be completed in October 2017. Country Director of KOICA Nigeria, Mr. Jung Sang-Hoon, at the ground-breaking ceremony said Korea has set education as one of its critical areas to help Nigeria acquire effective capabilities, skills and knowledge to realise continuous national development and growth.

He said: “Local workshop and invitational training courses, which are scheduled from the summer of 2016, have also been consulted with Korean PMC Team to provide relevant capacity building programmes for key academic and admin staffs for model schools. “Particularly for local workshop, some multimedia-based training programmes, covering the areas from basics of computer education to the practical development of supplementary teaching material using multimedia tools, are aimed at enhancing the capacity of teachers for sustainable model school education at classroom-based teaching and learning. “Abuja Model School will provide standard education in multimedia environment for the development of Nigerian public school education, thereby producing very excellent students of global standard as well as contributing to sustainable development of Universal Basic Education in Nigeria.”

Credit: NationalMirror

Ghost Boats With Over 21 Bodies Appear On Japan Shores

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Ghost boats washing up on the shores of Japan are causing puzzlement, with indications that they come from North Korea. Since October, 21 bodies have been found on 13 otherwise empty boats, a spokesman for the coast guard said on Thursday.

“On almost all the boats there are indications that they come from the Korean Peninsula,” the spokesman said. A report from Japan said that the boats appeared to be from North Korea, although the spokesman said this was not confirmed. Some news reports said there were clues that they were possibly operated by the military, and the causes of death was not known.

They may have been soldiers who starved or froze after being sent on fishing missions as part of the recent drive by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to find more food for the resource-strapped country, some reports said. The boats were all found in the Sea of Japan- the phenomenon is nothing new, the spokesman said

South Korea Says Kim Jong Un Has Executed 70 Officials In ‘Reign Of Terror’

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Young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has executed 70 officials since taking power in late 2011 in a “reign of terror” that far exceeds the bloodshed of his dictator father’s early rule, South Korean officials said Thursday.

South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se, at a forum in Seoul, compared Kim Jong Un’s 70 executions with those of his late father, Kim Jong Il, who he said executed about 10 officials during his first years in power.

An official from South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, who refused to be named, citing office rules, confirmed that the spy agency believes the younger Kim has executed about 70 officials but
wouldn’t reveal how it obtained the information.

Yun also said that the younger Kim’s “reign of terror affects significantly” North Koreans working overseas by inspiring them to defect to the South, but he also didn’t reveal how he got the details.

North Korea, an authoritarian nation ruled by the Kim family since its founding in 1948, is secretive about its government’s inner workings, and information collected by outsiders is often impossible to confirm.

High-level government purges have a long history in North Korea.

To strengthen his power, Kim Jong Un’s grandfather, North Korea founder Kim Il Sung, removed pro-Soviet and pro-Chinese factions within the senior leadership in the years after the 1950-53 Korean War. The high-ranking victims included Pak Hon Yong, formerly the vice chairman of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea and the country’s foreign minister, who was executed in 1955 after being accused of spying for the United States.

Kim Jong Un has also removed key members of the old guard through a series of purges since taking over after the death of Kim Jong Il. The most spectacular purge to date was the 2013 execution of his uncle, Jang Song Thaek, for alleged treason. Jang was married to Kim Jong Il’s sister and was once considered the second most powerful man in North Korea.

South Korea’s spy agency told lawmakers in May that Kim ordered his then-defense chief Hyon Yong Chol executed with an anti-aircraft gun for complaining about the young ruler, talking back to him and sleeping during a meeting.

Experts say Kim could be using fear to solidify his leadership, but those efforts could fail if he doesn’t improve the country’s shattered economy.

Source: HuffPost

S Korea Shuts Nearly 2,000 Schools As MERS Cases Soar

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South Korean authorities have ordered nearly 2,000 schools closed nationwide to prevent the spread of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). The health ministry on Monday reported 23 new infections, bringing the total to 87. Six people have so far died in the outbreak, as the government looks for ways to contain the spread. Aljazeera was there:

Jeong Eun-Kyeong from the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention told Al Jazeera that the government is trying to monitor people suspected of being infected after reports that some people were ignoring instructions to isolate themselves.

“We did cellphone tracking in a couple of cases. For those we need to find we will request location tracking and get the data,” Jeong said.  South Korea now has the second highest number of infections in the world after Saudi Arabia, according to statistics from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.

Reflecting public concern among parents, 1,869 schools across the country are due to be closed on Monday, the education ministry said. The government, under criticism for a lack of transparency and failing to respond swiftly to the outbreak, also said it would track people who may have been in contact with patients through their mobile phones.