Global tension is reaching fever pitch.Yesterday India displayed its defence prowess by successfully test firing a new long-range missile. It demonstrated that the country has joined the league of nuclear powerhouses.“This launch has given a message to the entire world that India has the capability to design, develop, build and manufacture missiles of this class, and we are today a missile power,” said VK Saraswat, head of India’s Defence Research and Development Organization, which developed an

Rape is in the South Korean news headlines once again. However, this time it is not the brutality of a U.S. soldier but the perfidy of a Korean talent agency chief that occupies the front page. While the story is an old one, that of men using alcohol and position to coerce women into sex, the alleged addition of an “aphrodisiac” is the twist that changes a Korean dating norm into the crime of rape. This change occurs because the addition of a drug, rather than only soju, to the beer gives the vi

We are approaching a dangerous precipice in South and North Korea relations. The North says that it is preparing for “special actions” to take place. There should always be a degree of skepticism, but in lieu of their failed rocket launch and Kim Jong-un’s rise to power, most likely there will be yet another provocative and aggressive action. Yet, another aggressive action is not so insignificant this time. Many South Koreans who live in Seoul, not far from certain destruction if a war were to s

North Korea is threatening “retaliatory measures” for a decision by the United States to withhold 240,000 metric tons of food promised as part of an agreement announced less than two months ago. Never mind that the cancellation followed Pyongyang’s failed launching of a missile designed to put a satellite into space, an operation the U.S. considered a violation of that same agreement, not to mention U.N. Security Council resolutions. The regime’s chutzpah and hypocrisy know no bounds.At the same

NEW DELHI ― India and Pakistan are enjoying one of the better periods in their turbulent relationship. Recent months have witnessed no terrorist incidents, no escalating rhetoric, and no diplomatic flashpoints. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari just made a successful, if brief, personal visit to India (mainly to visit a famous shrine, but with a lunch with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh thrown in). Sixteen years after India granted Pakistan most-favored-nation (MFN) trading status, Pakistan is

For millennia, East Asians called the sea located to the east of the Eurasian continent East Sea, and in more recent centuries, Western navigators called it the equivalent of the East Sea or Sea of Korea or Corea. Only from the late 19th century when Japan became an imperial power, did growing political influence lead “Sea of Japan” to overtake “East Sea” in international usage. Japanese official emphasis on the Sea of Japan is connected with Tokyo’s territorial claim to Dokdo, which it calls Ta

More than two dozen countries, including China, France, Korea, Mexico, Russia and the United States, face potential leadership transitions this year. A central factor determining the outcomes of these events is the prospect for more jobs and incomes. A topic not on the political radar, however, is climate change. Yet, it should be ― because our growing understanding of climate science and economics warns us that sustaining people’s well-being, in large and small economies, hinges on confronting

Demoralized as the Russian capital’s protest movement may be, there are still plenty of angry people out in the hinterlands. They have less to lose than well-fed Muscovites, and president-elect Vladimir Putin has yet to figure out how to handle them.In the southern provincial capital of Astrakhan, population 520,000, a soft-spoken, bespectacled historian named Oleg Shein has emerged as the new hope of the opposition. As of this writing, he has been on hunger strike for more than a month, putting

Which of the following describes careers in software engineering? A. Intellectually stimulating and gratifying. B. Excellent pay for new bachelor’s degree grads. C. A career dead-end. The correct answer (with a “your mileage may vary” disclaimer) is: D. All of the above. Although the very term “coding” evokes an image of tedium, it is an intellectually challenging activity, creative and even artistic. If you like puzzles and are good analytically, software development may be your cup of tea. You

The Justice Department filed suit last week against Apple Inc. and two major book publishers, Macmillan and Penguin Group USA, accusing them of colluding in 2010 to raise the prices of e-books. Three other publishers that were investigated -- Hachette, Simon & Schuster and HarperCollins -- agreed to a settlement, which Sharis A. Pozen, the acting director of the Justice Department’s antitrust division, said “will begin to undo the harm caused by the companies‘ anticompetitive conduct, and will r

Demoralized as the Russian capital’s protest movement may be, there are still plenty of angry people out in the hinterlands. They have less to lose than well-fed Muscovites, and president-elect Vladimir Putin has yet to figure out how to handle them.In the southern provincial capital of Astrakhan, population 520,000, a soft-spoken, bespectacled historian named Oleg Shein has emerged as the new hope of the opposition. As of this writing, he has been on hunger strike for more than a month, putting

More than two dozen countries, including China, France, Korea, Mexico, Russia and the United States, face potential leadership transitions this year. A central factor determining the outcomes of these events is the prospect for more jobs and incomes. A topic not on the political radar, however, is climate change. Yet, it should be -- because our growing understanding of climate science and economics warns us that sustaining people’s well-being, in large and small economies, hinges on confronting

TOKYO ― At 7:39 a.m. on April 13, North Korea fired a missile (which it called a satellite launch) in the face of opposition from almost the entire international community. In a perverse way, the world got its way, because the vehicle exploded a minute after takeoff, its debris falling harmlessly into the sea.North Korea typically goes silent after such episodes: “failure” does not exist in its political lexicon, so it cannot be reported or discussed. The country’s media routinely meets any fail

The race for the Dec. 19 presidential vote has begun. The election management commission opened its registry for “provisional candidates” Monday. Earlier on Sunday, Gyeonggi Province Gov. Kim Moon-soo declared his candidacy first for the Saenuri Party. Park Geun-hye, Chung Mong-joon and Lee Jae-oh will follow soon.Both Saenuri and the main opposition Democratic United Party will hold nomination conventions in August. The focal issues in the two parties will be what rules they will adopt for the

A few years ago, according to the Justice Department, publishers decided on a strategy to fight the grave and gathering menace posed to their business model by the rise of digital books: They would meet about it. “These meetings took place in private dining rooms of upscale Manhattan restaurants,” says the department’s complaint in its antitrust lawsuit. Later meetings took place in Europe, though presumably not at the Paris Chipotle. The case will turn on whether the publishers were meeting to

Get ready for the tax wars.President Obama wants to raise taxes on the rich, setting a minimum tax rate of 30 percent on millionaires (the so-called “Buffett Rule,” named after billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who says it’s unfair that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary).Mitt Romney, the presumed Republican presidential candidate, wants to lower taxes on the rich. He supports the House Republicans’ plan to cut the highest tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent, thereby reducing the

North and South Korea played their own distinctive games of power politics last week. The processes of leadership selection were enacted almost simultaneously, a coincidence that defined them so sharply as to provide a classroom lesson on the differences between the two systems.North Korea got all the publicity, not all of it because of the long-range missile it insisted on firing in the face of warnings to cease and desist. There was also the huge outpouring in Pyongyang for the centennial of t

The recent Korea-U.S. FTA has not only resulted in a discussion of the pros and cons of such an agreement but a debate regarding the entrance of major international law firms into the Korean legal marketplace. What will be the impact on Korean law firms now that the major U.S. and European law firms announced they will soon open offices in Korea? Most of the international law firms have offices in Hong Kong, Singapore or Shanghai besides the U.S. and Europe and it is questionable if such firms t

On March 15, Korea’s free trade agreement with the U.S entered into effect. While public opinion in Korea on the benefits of this agreement is still unsettled, Korean industries like electronics, pharmaceuticals and autos look forward to benefit as they expect an increase in imports and exports between the two countries. Various logistical changes have been implemented in Korea to cope with the effects of the FTA. For example, Korean based airlines like Korean and Asiana Airlines have introduced

LONDON ― Every child has a right to an education. Yet millions of children are living in countries where that right is systematically violated as a result of armed conflict. It is time for the international community to stop this state of affairs by getting serious about its responsibility to protect education in all countries, irrespective of the barriers created by armed conflict.Education seldom figures in media reporting from conflict zones. Yet the effects are devastating. In eastern Democr