[Editorial] Spurring investment

The government is ratcheting up efforts to stimulate investment by domestic and foreign companies to sustain economic growth and strengthen the nation’s weakening growth potential.In recent months, the economy has lost much of its growth momentum due to a worsening external environment. In the first quarter of the year, the economy expanded 2.8 percent from a year ago, the smallest increase since the 1 percent gain in the first three months of 2009.Yet the first-quarter performance was much less

May 6, 2012

[Editorial] New nuclear plants

Korea has started building two new nuclear reactors, reaffirming its unwavering commitment to developing atomic energy. The government hailed the 1,400-megawatt reactors as “a new milestone” in Korea’s nuclear technology development, as their key components, such as the man-machine interface and reactor coolant pumps, were all designed and produced locally. The two reactors, both based on the nation’s Advanced Power Reactor design, will be built at the Uljin power plant on the southeastern coast

May 6, 2012

[Editorial] Much more to lose

Three more North Korean companies have recently been placed on a U.N. blacklist of corporations banned from international trade. On Wednesday, a U.N. Security Council committee decided to add the companies to the blacklist as sanctions on North Korea against its April 13 rocket launch.The U.N. decision followed China’s consent to sanctions on the three companies. The number fell far short of the 40 or so North Korean companies that the United States, South Korea and other countries had reportedl

May 4, 2012

[Editorial] Free trade with China

South Korea, which relies on external trade for growth, needs to promote free trade. The need for free trade is shared by China. Still, they find formidable obstacles to their pursuit of a free trade agreement.Growth in South Korea’s trade with China, which is larger than combined Korean-U.S. and Korean-EU trade, will certainly accelerate when many of the tariff and non-tariff barriers are removed or lowered. It is only natural for South Korea, which has concluded free trade agreements with both

May 4, 2012

[Editorial] Heed OECD’s advice

The OECD has recently published two reports on Korea that offer valuable advice to Korean politicians as well as government policymakers. One is the latest OECD economic survey of Korea while the other is the first OECD assessment of the Korean government’s urban policy. The OECD Economic Survey of Korea 2012 focuses on the two key challenges confronting the Korean economy ― sustaining economic growth in the face of rapid population aging and improving social cohesion by reducing inequality and

May 3, 2012

[Editorial] Voting fraud at UPP

The United Progressive Party is in crisis. An internal investigation team has confirmed that the party’s process of selecting proportional representation candidates for the April 11 parliamentary elections was riddled with irregularities. The left-wing minor party won a total of 13 seats in the election, seven from local districts and six by proportional representation. Of the six proportional lawmakers-elect, three were selected through online and offline voting within the party, while the othe

May 3, 2012

[Editorial] Who’s next?

A criminal investigation into a corruption scandal involving a shopping mall developer took a new turn when prosecutors summoned Park Young-joon, a former vice minister of knowledge economy and one of President Lee Myung-bak’s closest protgs, for questioning Wednesday.An inquiry into Park’s potential involvement in the scandal followed the arrest of Choi See-joong, a former chairman of the Korea Communications Commission, who was often dubbed Lee’s political mentor. Choi is suspected of taking h

May 2, 2012

[Editorial] Quasi-national debt

The process of writing the 2013 budget bill starts this month, with government agencies set to have submitted budget requests by May 31. The budget officers at the Ministry of Strategy and Finance will then review the requests, start consultations with the agencies and fix budget allocations ― a time-consuming process that will continue until a final report is prepared for submission to the president on Sept. 21.The guiding principle for the 2013 budget bill is to ensure the government lives wit

May 2, 2012

[Editorial] Countdown in the North

The National Human Rights Commission has offered a glimpse into how the North Korean regime survives its extreme destitution. The independent rights monitoring agency issued its first report on North Korean gulags, where hundreds of thousands of people perceived as threatening to the regime are living lives worse than death.Horror stories defying imagination fill the book, which is based on the testimonies of 60 refugees from the North with first-hand experiences in four concentration camps and

May 1, 2012

[Editorial] To boost tourist rush

May is the best sightseeing season in Northeast Asia. The economic rise of China pushes the tourism market in the region to an explosive growth. Combining these two factors, a tourism rush is expected across the region in the coming weeks. Yet, we have a sense of unease about the state of readiness in this particular service sector.These days, the Japanese, Chinese and South Koreans are thronging to each other’s tourism resorts and large cities, joined by American, European and Southeast Asian t

April 30, 2012

[Editorial] Military service exemption

Conscience tells us that active military service to defend the nation is more than a duty ―it is the privilege of healthy Korean men. So, it is dismaying to hear people talk about the “privilege” of being exempted from military service for various reasons. Further puzzling is the fact that this privilege is officially recognized for persons who “raised the national prestige” with outstanding results in international sports and arts competitions.The idea behind this peculiar system practiced for

April 30, 2012

[Editorial] Lawmakers’ plagiarism

One of the first things an undergraduate is required to learn is give due credit whenever he uses another person’s ideas, thoughts or expressions. Otherwise, they will be accused of presenting them as their original work and, by doing so, purloining them.They are also required to give credit to any piece of information, be it a fact or a statistic, when it is not deemed to be common knowledge. It is the same with paraphrased words, either spoken or written, of another person. They must adhere to

April 29, 2012

[Editorial] Where is Ahn headed?

Rep. Chung Mong-joon of the ruling Saenuri Party declared his bid for the presidency on Sunday. He was the second politician, after Gyeonggi Gov. Kim Moon-soo, to make public his plan to fight for the ruling party’s presidential nomination. With Kim and Chung apparently aiming to get the advantage of moving first, competition is not likely to get into full swing until after it holds a national convention on May 15 to elect its leadership.It is the same with the main opposition Democratic United

April 29, 2012

[Editorial] Twist in sea name dispute

The war between Korea and Japan over the name of the sea separating the two countries is shifting into a new phase as the International Hydrographic Organization, the global authority on the names and locations of seas and oceans, has delayed a decision on the naming dispute to 2017.The IHO held a general meeting in Monaco to update its publication dubbed “Limits of Oceans and Seas,” a document considered the most authoritative when it comes to oceanic boundaries and names. Better known as S-23,

April 27, 2012

[Editorial] Fighting tax evasion

Each year, the National Tax Service launches a special tax probe on self-employed professionals suspected of underreporting their incomes. In 2010, it zeroed in on 150 luxury businesses, such as plastic surgery clinics, skincare clinics and beauty parlors.Wrapping up its two-year-long probe, the tax office announced on Tuesday it has collected a total of 100.2 billion won in back taxes from the businesses. The investigation result is disturbing as it suggests rampant tax evasion among people eng

April 27, 2012

[Editorial] ‘Morally perfect’

Moral perfection, together with omnipotence, is in the realm of deity. It is beyond the power of humanity. Nonetheless, President Lee Myung-bak had the audacity to claim that his was the “morally perfect administration.”On Sept. 30, 2011, he was quoted as saying at a conference with his top aides, “Ours is a morally perfect administration. As such, not even the smallest blemish should be left upon it.”When this remark was made public, his aides rushed to tone it down: He meant to say that he too

April 26, 2012

[Editorial] Mad cow disease, again

Prudence appeared to have prevailed when President Lee Myung-bak’s administration decided not to take any action to halt customs clearance of U.S. beef imports immediately after mad cow disease was found in a dairy cow earlier in the week. Korean officials cited a lack of sufficient information as the reason.In making the decision, the Korean administration apparently accepted the U.S. assurance, at least for now, that meat from the dairy cow did not enter the food chain and that there was no ca

April 26, 2012

[Editorial] Caught in debt trap

The Bank of Korea has released a report highlighting the negative impact of the sustained growth of household and government debt on the economy. One of the report’s main points is that the Korean economy is already caught in a debt trap.The bank does not see the household debt bomb detonating any time soon to trigger a fresh financial crisis. Yet it urges concerted government efforts to defuse it because it has begun to undermine the fundamentals of the languishing national economy, The nation’

April 25, 2012

[Editorial] Inefficient Assembly

On Tuesday, lawmakers of the rival political parties were supposed to hold the last plenary session of the 18th National Assembly before its term expires on May 28. Yet the session was canceled due to their differences on a bill aimed at preventing physical clashes between legislators.The cancellation of the session has put the fate of many important bills in limbo, including those related to people’s livelihoods. They included a bill on making over-the-counter drugs available at non-pharmacy ou

April 25, 2012

[Editorial] Pyongyang’s hysteria

North Korean hysteria against the South has reached new heights with its military, government and party organizations competing to hurl the worst-ever verbal provocations, with threats of imminent “retaliatory attacks” on President Lee Myung-bak and other “anti-North” forces here. The harsher its words become, the calmer our response should be.On Monday, a People’s Army outfit called the “Special Operations Action Group” made a “notice” to the South via the North’s official Central News Agency,

April 24, 2012