I would like to respond to some assertions made by Chun Doo-hwan about my father.My name is Christopher Peterson. I am the youngest son of Arnold A. Peterson. Also known as Peh Teh Son. He is the author of the book “5-18 The Kwangju Incident.”Recently, former president Chun Doo-hwan libeled my father in his memoirs. He says that my father was a liar in regards to his account of the Gwangju Incident. He called him “Satan in the guise of a cleric.” My father’s testimony during congressional hearin

May 8, 2017

Donald Trump won the presidency thanks to a series of cocky, what-me-worry promises to solve seemingly intractable problems using his supposedly superior art-of-the-deal negotiating skills.Last week, he made another such promise. After meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas at the White House, he vowed flippantly to bring the century-old conflict between Israelis and Palestinians to an end, adding that the problem is “something that, I think, is frankly maybe not as difficult

May 8, 2017

Once the initial market relief plays out -- that, even during an unprecedented “anti-establishment” wave in both Europe and the US, French voters rejected a far-right president in Marine Le Pen of the National Front -- interest will shift to how relative newcomer Emmanuel Macron will manage to govern in a country accustomed to mainstream politics. And it is not just about his prospects for reinvigorating the French economy and, working closely with Germany, spearheading a modernization of Europe

May 8, 2017

Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority continues to pay monthly salaries to convicted terrorists and imprison Palestinian peace activists for meeting with Israelis. This is not a recipe for peace -- 1,000 White House receptions and international peace summits will not bring us any closer to peace, if the process continues to empower the corrupt and impotent Palestinian Authority. The new Trump administration would be advised to concentrate on behind-the-scenes grass-roots diplomacy that strengthen

May 8, 2017

President Donald Trump’s frequent praise for dictators around the world has long suggested that he would be no champion of human rights. Regrettably, it looks as though his disdain for universal freedoms will now become an official tenet of US foreign policy.　In a May 3 address to State Department employees, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that while US foreign policy is guided by fundamental values, too much reliance on human rights principles “really creates obstacles to our ability to a

May 8, 2017

American politics has a new organizing principle, according to a theory that has been making the rounds. Reaganism is dead. Our central debate no longer concerns big vs. small government, or traditionalism vs. progressivism on morals. Instead it pits nationalism against globalism.　R.R. Reno, the editor of the religious-conservative journal First Things, writes that President Donald Trump recognizes “the new schism in American life,” which “is about immigration, free trade and the broad and deep

May 7, 2017

It’s too early to draw any large conclusions about the performance of the US economy during the Trump administration, but the first quarter of 2017’s growth rate, 0.7 percent, is distressingly low.　North Korea’s growth rate is estimated at between 1 and 1.5 percent, by comparison.　The US stock market, among the economy’s leading indicators, continues to go up. The investor class reaps immediate benefit, pension plans and 401(k)s get a boost, and consumer spending is bolstered by the wealth effec

May 7, 2017

Into the deadly morass of the Syrian War, Russian President Vladimir Putin has dropped a new peace proposal that calls for establishing safe zones in several parts of the country, grounding the Syria Air Force and possibly creating buffer zones between combatants to be monitored by international peacekeeping troops.　Putin outlined his plan in a telephone call Tuesday with President Trump, according to a diplomatic source. Putin requested the call and dominated the conversation. The White House h

May 7, 2017

Americans want their cyber data to be safe from prying eyes. They also want the government to be able to catch criminals. Can they have both?　It’s an especially pertinent question to ask at a time when concerns over Russian hacking are prevalent. Can we expose lawbreakers without also putting law-abiders at greater risk? After all, the same iPhone that makes life easier for ordinary Americans also makes life easier for criminals.　Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. has described the oper

May 7, 2017

Remember March, when Democrats were in a swivet over President Trump’s budget proposal -- the one that threatened to gut the Environmental Protection Agency, eliminate funding for public broadcasting and the arts, and use the money for a border wall?　Never mind. The spending bill Congress produced this week cuts the EPA by all of 1 percent, increases spending on the arts by $2 million and prohibits any spending on a wall. It was -- gasp! -- an old-fashioned bipartisan compromise, with Republican

May 5, 2017

According to President Donald Trump, he had decided to pull out of NAFTA until, at the last minute the other day, he talked with the leaders of Canada and Mexico, who convinced him to first try renegotiating the 23-year-old trade agreement with them instead.　According to other sources, Trump’s economic team showed him the actual numbers involved in the existing trade among the three nations. And the businessman who cast himself as a godlike job creator saw a real danger in simply walking. Let’s

May 4, 2017

Last week, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft went where nothing made by humans had ever gone before -- it successfully navigated a path between Saturn and its rings and survived. Cassini also beamed back pictures and other essential data as it maneuvered the 2,414-kilometer-wide space between the solar system’s second-largest planet and its icy rings.　The images, which take 78 minutes to make the 1.6 million-kilometer trip back to Earth, reveal a blazing, mysterious process of alternating light and dark

May 4, 2017

The likely victory of Emmanuel Macron in the French presidential election has elicited a global sigh of relief. At least Europe is not going down the protectionist path that President Donald Trump is forcing the United States to take.But advocates of globalization should keep the champagne on ice: protectionists and advocates of “illiberal democracy” are on the rise in many other countries. And the fact that an open bigot and habitual liar could get as many votes as Trump did in the US, and that

May 3, 2017

In a topsy-turvy world, yesterday’s enemy can be today’s friend. The US has played this game (Germany, Japan, Italy, Vietnam and so forth). For another remarkable reversal of enmity and alliance, let’s drop in on the Kremlin.In 1989, the Soviet Union limped out of Afghanistan, defeated by ragtag mujahedeen fighters determined to turn back Moscow’s bid to commandeer their homeland. Those mujahedeen forces evolved into the Afghan Taliban, ousted from power by America’s post-9/11 invasion of Afghan

May 3, 2017