This event is made possible by generous support from the Korea Foundation and other friends of the Korea Program.

Common sense states that foreign policy rarely becomes an issue in South Korea’s elections. However, given the unusually high anti-China sentiment among the South Korean public today, some view that it may become an “unspoken agenda” that every South Korean voter is cognizant about. As Seoul and Beijing mark their 30^th diplomatic anniversary this year, their mutual attraction appears visibly moderated. Is it a temporary setback in the neighboring countries’ relationship? What choices will Kim Jong-un make under strategic competition between the U.S. and China? The panel will examine the factors that will shape and influence the future prospect of the Seoul-Beijing ties and the relationship between North Korea and China.   

Speakers:

Seong-hyon Lee is a Senior Fellow at the George H. W. Bush Foundation for U.S.-China Relations and a visiting scholar at the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. His research focuses on contemporary relations between China and South Korea. Lee received a bachelor’s degree from Grinnell College, a master’s degree from Harvard University and a PhD from Tsinghua University.

Sheen Woo, Special Policy Advisor to the South Korean Ambassador in China, joined the Korea Program at Shorenstein APARC as a 2021-22 visiting scholar. He is a specialist in China-North Korea relations with expertise in Chinese aid and sanctions against North Korea. He has worked at and with a variety of organizations including NGOs, start-ups, art centers, and state-run think tanks in Korea and China. While at APARC, his research focus is on the development and changes of China's aid to North Korea. He holds a PhD in Management Science from Tsinghua University.

Gi-Wook Shin, director of APARC and the Korea Program, will moderate the discussion.

This event is part of Shorenstein APARC's winter 2022 webinar series, New Frontiers: Technology, Politics, and Society in the Asia-Pacific.

While North Korea’s nuclear capabilities often make headlines, the DPRK increasingly poses a risk that is more difficult to see, in the form of sophisticated cyber attacks. Neighboring South Korea, one of the most digitized nations in the world, must closely monitor and defend against North Korea’s cyber threat, as attacks can disrupt economic, social, and defense infrastructures. This panel will discuss what kind of cyber threat North Korea poses to South Korea and beyond, how South Korea addresses the North Korean cyber attacks, and what other countries can learn from their response.

Speakers:

Jenny Jun is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Political Science at Columbia University and Nonresident Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Cyber Statecraft Initiative. Her current research explores the dynamics of coercion in cyberspace. Her broader interests include cyber conflict, North Korea, and security issues in East Asia. Jenny is a co-author of the 2015 Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) report North Korea’s Cyber Operations: Strategy and Responses, published by Rowman & Littlefield. She has presented her work on North Korea’s cyber operations at various panels and has provided multiple government briefings and media interviews on the topic. She received her MA and BS each from the Security Studies Program (SSP) and the School of Foreign Service (SFS) at Georgetown University.

So Jeong Kim is a principal researcher at the National Security Research Institute where she joined in 2004. She currently leads the cybersecurity policy team and provides recommendations on cybersecurity policy and regulatory issues. She was involved in drafting South Korea’s National Cyber Security Strategy published in April 2019, in the 4thand 5th UN Group of Governmental Experts as an adviser, and in the MERIDIAN process as an advisor and organizer. Her main research area is in national cybersecurity policy, international norm-setting processes, confidence building measures, critical information infrastructure protection, law and regulations, and cybersecurity evaluation development. She received her PhD in Engineering from the Graduate School of Information Security at Korea University in 2005.

Gi-Wook Shin, director of APARC and the Korea Program at Stanford University, will moderate the discussion.

This is a joint event with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C.

Event Time: October 28, 12:00 PM (PDT)/3:00 PM (EDT)
Please register for this event at the CSIS event website, https://bit.ly/3DC4zI3.

While North Korea’s nuclear weapons and the security threat it poses have occupied the center stage and eclipsed other issues in recent years, human rights remain important to U.S. policy. The edited volume, The North Korean Conundrum, explores how dealing with the issue of human rights is shaped and affected by the political issues with which it is so entwined. In this book launch event, contributors of the book will discuss the relationship between human rights and denuclearization, and how North Koreans’ limited access to information is part of the problem, and how this is changing.

Speakers:
Victor Cha is Senior Vice President and Korea Chair at CSIS; Vice Dean for Faculty and Graduate Affairs & D.S. Song-KF Professor of Government at Georgetown University. He left the White House in 2007 after serving since 2004 as director for Asian affairs at the National Security Council (NSC). At the White House, he was responsible primarily for Japan, the Korean Peninsula, Australia/New Zealand, and Pacific Island nation affairs. He was also the deputy head of delegation for the United States at the Six-Party Talks in Beijing and received two outstanding service commendations during his tenure at the NSC. He was the 2019-20 Koret Fellow for the winter quarter at Stanford.

Robert King served as the special envoy for North Korean human rights issues, an ambassadorial-ranked position, at the Department of State, from 2009 to 2017. He is a senior advisor to the Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a senior fellow at the Korea Economic Institute, and a board member of the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea in Washington, D.C. Ambassador King was the 2019-20 Koret Fellow for the fall quarter at Stanford.

Nat Kretchun is Vice President for Programs at the Open Technology Fund (OTF), a congressionally funded non-profit organization that supports the development and deployment of anti-censorship, privacy, and security technologies for populations living under repressive information censorship regimes.

Moderator:
Gi-Wook Shin, Director of Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center and the Korea Program; the William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea, Stanford University

To watch the recording of the event, click here.

This event is made possible by generous support from the Korea Foundation and other friends of the Korea Program.

This event is part of Shorenstein APARC's spring webinar series "The United States in the Biden Era: Views from Asia."

Many Koreans were relieved by Biden's victory but were left wondering where his policy toward China and North Korea would be heading. Under Biden, Koreans expect better alliance management but are concerned that North Korean nuclear issues may not get much attention. They also watch his China policy closely, as the US-China conflict puts South Korea in a difficult position of having to choose one or the other. In light of the upcoming Biden-Moon summit, two leading experts of national security and trade in South Korea, Congressman Taeyong Cho and Professor Dukgeun Ahn of Seoul National University, will discuss these issues in a moderated conversation with APARC and Korea Program director Gi-Wook Shin.

Speakers:

Taeyong Cho is a Member of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea. He serves in the Committee on Foreign Affairs and Unification as well as the Committee on Intelligence. He is a member of the conservative People Power Party, the largest opposition party. Before being elected to the National Assembly in 2020, he served in government for 37 years, mostly in the Foreign Ministry. He served as Deputy Director of the Presidential Office of National Security and as Vice Foreign Minister. He also served as Korean Ambassador to Australia and to Ireland. After retirement in 2017, Ambassador Cho taught at Yonsei University as visiting professor and spent a year in Tokyo as visiting fellow at Keio University. He wrote regular columns in major newspapers and spoke at forums in Korea and abroad. He received B.A. in political science from Seoul National University and studied at Oxford University, Foreign Service Program. 

Dukgeun Ahn is Dean of International Affairs and Professor of International Trade Law and Policy at Seoul National University. Professor Ahn has taught at various universities including Columbia University, Singapore National University, University of Barcelona in Spain, World Trade Institute in Switzerland as well as regularly at the World Trade Organization (WTO) for government officials. He served, among others, as Commissioner of the Korea Trade Commission, Member of National Economic Advisory Council and Chair for CPTPP Strategy Forum. Professor Ahn was President of the Korean Association of Trade and Industry Studies in 2020 and the Korean Society of Trade Remedies in 2019-2020. He holds a Ph.D. in economics and J.D. (Member of New York Bar) from the University of Michigan.

This is the third event in a three-part series on North Korea Human Rights hosted by APARC's Korea Program in the spring quarter.

Two experts in North Korea human rights issues, Minjung Kim of Save North Korea and Keith Luse of National Committee for North Korea, will discuss the range of humanitarian assistance to North Korea as well as challenges non-government organizations face from South Korea, the U.S. and North Korean governments in providing assistance.

Speakers:

Minjung Kim is Associate Executive Director at Save North Korea (SNK), a non-government organization focusing on human rights in North Korea; and a Vice President at Future Korea Media, a bi-weekly journal focusing on national security and politics in South Korea. Since joining SNK as a founding member 22 years ago, she has been managing various projects from producing mid-wave radio programs, bringing North Korean defectors into South Korea, helping them adjust socially and culturally, to sending leaflet-balloons and hidden cameras into North Korea. Kim is also a visiting researcher at Georgetown University and a research fellow at the Yonsei Institute for Modern Korean Studies. She is a Ph.D. candidate at Yonsei Graduate School of International Studies.

Keith Luse is Executive Director of the National Committee on North Korea (NCNK), an organization dedicated to promoting principled engagement between the United States and North Korea. NCNK members include representatives of US non-governmental organizations providing humanitarian assistance to North Korea. Other members are former US Ambassadors, nuclear scientists, and members of the academic community. NCNK members specialize in matters related to nuclear nonproliferation, Korean War POW/MIA/human remains; human rights and families divided by the Korean War, among other topics. Luse has made five visits to North Korea. The first occurring in 2002 on behalf of Senator Richard Lugar, then-Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee focused on monitoring and accountability regarding the distribution of U.S. food assistance. Subsequent trips for Senator Lugar were during his tenure as Chairman and later Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Yong Suk Lee, deputy director of the Korea Program, will moderate the discussion.