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Korea's long wait for equality law

June is Pride Month and in much of the developed world, the rainbow flag is hard to miss — draped across public buildings as well as corporate storefronts. In Korea, it is harder to find. Beyond the Seoul Queer Culture Festival and its parade, the rainbows symbolizing the LGBTQ+ community are largely absent. Even Korean companies that create Pride campaigns for their overseas markets tend to stay quiet at home, wary of the backlash that such public support can invite. That reticence reflects a deeper gap. Korea remains one of only two OECD members, alongside Japan, without a comprehensive anti-discrimination law. Rep. Son Sol of the Progressive Party introduced a bill in January, followed by Rep. Chung Choon-saeng of the Rebuilding Korea Party in February. Gender Equality Minister Won Min-kyong also pledged her support. Yet the law remains unrealized, deferred once again on the familiar grounds that society has not reached a consensus. The comparison with Korea's neighbors makes the lag sharper. Japan, the other OECD holdout, has no national equality statute either, but municipal par

3 MIN READBy Kwon Mee-yoo

FAKE NEWS The fine line between policing facts and silencing critics

New revisions to the Information and Communications Network Act, which will take effect in July, will hand Korea one of the most decisive legal tools yet devised against online falsehoods. For a country that has watched deepfakes and manipulated clips spread faster than fact-checkers can debunk them, this is surely a step worth welcoming. But it also deserves to be implemented with care, so that a sound principle does not curdle into overreach. The revision targets influential online information producers, such as YouTubers with more than 100,000 subscribers or creators averaging over 100,000 monthly views. If such creators knowingly spread false or fabricated information and cause harm, they now face punitive financial damages of up to five times the loss incurred. Large platforms, defined as those with over a million daily users on average, must also establish formal reporting and response systems for disinformation. The case for action is persuasive. The Hyundai Research Institute has estimated that fake news costs the Korean economy roughly 30 trillion won annually, about 1.9 perce

4 MIN READBy Park Jin-wan

Olympic Park rallies: Peace is more powerful than violence

Korea’s younger generations have demonstrated how collective action can unite a community rather than divide it. Their creative, caring rallies offer a glimpse of hope in an increasingly fragmented world. While protesting what they view as violations of citizens’ voting rights in the June 3 local elections, they have organized rallies that are interactive and engaging. At Olympic Park in Seoul’s southern Songpa District, tens of thousands of citizens — many in their 20s and 30s — have gathered daily since June 4, the day after local elections were held nationwide. They chant slogans urging politicians to overhaul the National Election Commission (NEC) and demanding that local elections be redone. Instead of carrying professionally printed banners, many participants hold handwritten signs. When the rallies conclude, volunteers collect trash and clean the venue, helping to keep the area safe and welcoming. Olympic Park has evolved into a caring community. A man who introduced himself as having a science Ph.D. offers free math tutoring to school-age children accompanying their par

4 MIN READBy Kang Hyun-kyung

Second female PM

Timing is often an unruly thing. Many pundits have stressed the importance of timing in life. What I mean to say is, it is high time that Korea usher in another woman into a higher government office. The nation produced its first female president, Park Geun-hye, who served from 2013 until her disgraceful removal from office in 2017, and its first female prime minister, Han Myeong-sook, who served in the Roh Moo-hyun administration from 2006-07. Han Seong-sook, the current minister of SMEs and startups, has been tapped to become the next prime minister by President Lee Jae Myung. If she passes muster at the parliamentary hearings — which she did once before assuming the small and medium-sized enterprises ministership by promising, among other things, to sell off some of her real estate — she will become the second woman to become prime minister in Korean history. As Korea shifts gears to go headlong into the era of artificial intelligence (AI), Han's earlier career at IT company Naver is key. Her business background is different from the two women, Park and Han Myeong-sook who were

3 MIN READBy Kim Ji-soo

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Desk Columns

Korea's long wait for equality law

June is Pride Month and in much of the developed world, the rainbow flag is hard to miss — draped across public buildings as well as corporate storefronts. In Korea, it is harder to find. Beyond the Seoul Queer Culture Festival and its parade, the rainbows symbolizing the LGBTQ+ community are largely absent. Even Korean companies that create Pride campaigns for their overseas markets tend to stay quiet at home, wary of the backlash that such public support can invite. That reticence reflects a deeper gap. Korea remains one of only two OECD members, alongside Japan, without a comprehensive anti-discrimination law. Rep. Son Sol of the Progressive Party introduced a bill in January, followed by Rep. Chung Choon-saeng of the Rebuilding Korea Party in February. Gender Equality Minister Won Min-kyong also pledged her support. Yet the law remains unrealized, deferred once again on the familiar grounds that society has not reached a consensus. The comparison with Korea's neighbors makes the lag sharper. Japan, the other OECD holdout, has no national equality statute either, but municipal par

4h agoBy Kwon Mee-yoo
Korea's long wait for equality law
Tribune Service

The farm crisis demands certainty from congress now

Something is breaking in farm country, and the warning signs are growing harder to ignore. The clearest indicator arrived this spring, when farm bankruptcies reached their highest level in six years. For many Americans, it was just another sad statistic. In rural communities, it was something far more ominous. Risk and uncertainty have always been involved in farming. Weak prices, bad weather and rising costs come with the territory, and farmers can weather those setbacks. What makes this moment different is that several challenges, both old and new, are hitting at once, resulting in a squeeze that leaves few paths to recover when something goes wrong. The current predicament has been years in the making. During COVID, commodity prices surged. But when the pandemic boom ended, so did the gains. Today, prices for major crops are down as much as 40% from their recent highs. At the same time, President Donald Trump’s tariff battles — especially with China, Canada and Mexico — continue to upend key export markets, shrinking the number of buyers for American crops. Some problems are new

8h agoBy Adam Minter
Guest Columns

Bosnia must stand on its own

STOCKHOLM — Bosnia needs a political reboot. More than three decades after the Dayton Accords ended the devastating 1992-95 war, it is high time that the country bear full responsibility for its own future. As part of the 1995 settlement, an international High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina was established to help coordinate and implement all the civilian and political provisions of the peace agreement. A massive NATO force would remain responsible for separating the military forces, but it was agreed that an independent political office was needed to bring the country back together. That task fell initially to me as the first in a series of high representatives. My immediate priority was to set up the office and get the country’s institutions working, as outlined in the new constitution that had been agreed in Dayton. So, that is what I did. But the high representative was never supposed to be a permanent institution with powers to intervene directly in the country’s governance. Had any participant in the Dayton talks dared to propose such a thing, the idea would have

11h agoBy Carl Bildt
Bosnia must stand on its own
Guest Columns

Trump’s gesture, Pyongyang’s calculations

As a ceasefire memorandum of understanding to end the Iran war came within reach, U.S. President Donald Trump posted a striking photograph on his social media channel. It showed Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un walking side by side during their 2018 Singapore summit. There was no caption, yet the message seemed clear: After Iran, North Korea may be Trump’s next diplomatic agenda. Trump has reasons to revive the North Korean issue. With U.S. midterm elections only four months away, the political outlook for Republicans is uncertain. The prolonged war with Iran has pushed up oil prices, fueled inflation and weakened public support for Trump. If he seeks a dramatic event to shift public attention, few options rival another summit with Kim. Trump has also long sought to portray himself as a peacemaker. Few issues fit that image better than North Korea’s nuclear program. The Nobel Peace Prize may remain an unfulfilled ambition. Trump has repeatedly signaled his willingness to meet Kim again. He did so during last year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Korea

12h agoBy Ma Young-sam
Trump’s gesture, Pyongyang’s calculations
Tribune Service

Kevin Warsh can’t succeed without help from the White House

Kevin Warsh faces a truly daunting task. The new chairman of the Federal Reserve must avoid provoking a president he had to charm to get the job. He needs to repair relations with the Fed’s other policymakers, many of whom he recently criticized — not least, former Chair Jerome Powell, who remains on the central bank’s board for now. While contending with all that, he must also affirm the Fed’s commitment to get inflation back down to 2%. After his first meeting as leader of the Fed’s policymaking committee, Warsh left no doubt that he means to make a difference. But rising to these challenges — while achieving steady growth and stable prices — will require allies on the Federal Open Market Committee and room for maneuver from the White House. With luck, the president will see that an independent Fed is in his own interests, too. The most recent reading on inflation hasn’t helped. Tariffs and high energy costs thanks to the conflict with Iran have pushed consumer price inflation back above 4%. The annual rate has now been running at more than the 2% target for more than

1d ago
Guest Columns

AI sovereignty is about options, not ownership

ÉVIAN — The U.S. government’s sudden decision, on June 12, to restrict foreign access to some of Anthropic’s most advanced models is further confirmation that AI is now a geopolitical issue of the highest order. Until recently, countries competed by building services, infrastructure, and applications on top of frontier artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Now, access to the systems themselves is a strategic concern. The prevailing assumption used to be that AI would follow the logic of globalization. Countries would rely on a handful of frontier models, mostly developed in the United States, while competing in downstream services, semiconductors, data, and applications. Access to the most advanced AI systems was largely taken for granted. But if this assumption no longer holds, the central question is not which model is best, but which can be accessed at all. With frontier capabilities becoming an issue of national security and diplomacy, governments will be tempted to pursue “AI sovereignty” through the development of national champions or domestic alternatives to the lead

1d agoBy Ren Ito
AI sovereignty is about options, not ownership
Lee Jong-eun

Upgrading Korea's election system

On June 3, Korea held its local elections. The election procedures, however, became subject to widespread public outrage over the National Election Commission’s (NEC) mismanagement, including insufficient ballots at multiple polling stations. For more than a week, crowds of mostly young people gathered in Seoul to protest, with some even demanding a new election. Political figures have also weighed in on the controversy. Some have used the controversy to spread election conspiracy theories. Many others have called for government audits or special prosecutor investigations into the NEC to restore public trust in election administration. Beyond overhauling the NEC’s operations, broader policy debates will likely arise from the ongoing controversy regarding reform of election and campaign procedures. As a professor who teaches courses on U.S. politics and elections, I compare how elections are conducted in Korea and the United States. Such a comparison may help Koreans evaluate both the strengths and limitations of their current election system. Korea establishes a fixed time frame fo

1d agoBy Lee Jong-eun
Upgrading Korea's election system
Guest Columns

Korea's role at G7 summit in Evian

On the plane heading home from Evian, France, I reflected on a flurry of meetings of the past few days. As a Sherpa preparing the 2026 G7 Summit for the leaders, I could feel the shifting dynamics of global governance. This year’s gathering, hosted by France, included not only the G7 members but also pivotal global actors, such as Brazil and India. Watching the intensive debates among these leaders, it became very clear that Korea’s presence carried a distinct strategic weight. When French President Emmanuel Macron extended his invitation to President Lee Jae Myung to attend the summit in Evian, it reminded me of the recent assertion by Marc Julienne, director of the Center for Asian Studies at the French Institute of International Relations. He noted in an article in November 2025 that opening up the G7 to like-minded democracies such as Korea is essential to protect multilateralism and strengthen global cooperation. We were not there merely to occupy a seat or join a commemorative photo. I felt that the international community now actively seeks Korea's participation to find a co

1d agoBy Kim Hee-sang
Korea's role at G7 summit in Evian
Desk Columns

FAKE NEWS The fine line between policing facts and silencing critics

New revisions to the Information and Communications Network Act, which will take effect in July, will hand Korea one of the most decisive legal tools yet devised against online falsehoods. For a country that has watched deepfakes and manipulated clips spread faster than fact-checkers can debunk them, this is surely a step worth welcoming. But it also deserves to be implemented with care, so that a sound principle does not curdle into overreach. The revision targets influential online information producers, such as YouTubers with more than 100,000 subscribers or creators averaging over 100,000 monthly views. If such creators knowingly spread false or fabricated information and cause harm, they now face punitive financial damages of up to five times the loss incurred. Large platforms, defined as those with over a million daily users on average, must also establish formal reporting and response systems for disinformation. The case for action is persuasive. The Hyundai Research Institute has estimated that fake news costs the Korean economy roughly 30 trillion won annually, about 1.9 perce

2d agoBy Park Jin-wan
[FAKE NEWS] The fine line between policing facts and silencing critics
Tribune Service

Trump is losing his war on offshore wind power

New York Attorney General Tish James, along with AG counterparts in 17 other states, have prevailed over Donald Trump’s capricious attempts to derail offshore wind energy projects all around the country by imposing a moratorium on approvals and even the issuance permits or leases for already-approved projects. Having lost before a federal trial judge in Boston, the administration abandoned its own appeal, likely recognizing that it had no ability to actually defend this on the merits. We’ve no doubt that the administration undertook these efforts not for any real specific economic or environmental or military reasons but simply as another plank in its obsession with owning the libs, which makes it worth pointing out that this antipathy towards renewable energy and wind in particular harms everyone — liberals, conservatives, MAGA, in red states and blue states, in cities and suburbs and rural areas. Nobody is happier or safer or healthier for having higher prices at the pump, dirtier air, more reliance on volatile international energy imports or uncertain supply chains and the loss

2d ago
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