South Korea imposed heavy security yesterday for a summit with Southeast Asian leaders following North Korean nuclear and missile tests that frayed nerves across the region.
The summit was planned months ago, but North Korea’s underground nuclear test and a series of short-range missile launches last week threatens to steal the limelight from economic and diplomatic matters.
The summit venue of Seogwipo — on the island of Jeju off the southern coast — is the city farthest away from North Korea. Still, the nervous South Korean government is taking no chances, positioning a surface-to-air missile outside the venue aimed toward the North.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Some 5,000 police officers, including approximately 200 commandos and special vehicles that can analyze sarin gas and other chemicals, have been deployed nearby, security authorities said in a press release.
Marines, special forces and air patrols also kept watch.
Leaders of the 10 members of ASEAN began arriving for the two-day summit, which officially begins today and commemorates 20 years of relations between South Korea and the bloc.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak planned to use yesterday for individual meetings, including with Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and ASEAN Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan.
But concerns about North Korea’s most recent bout of saber-rattling loomed.
South Korean officials said on Saturday that spy satellites had spotted signs that North Korea may be preparing to transport a long-range missile to a launch site.
North Korea has attacked South Korean targets before, bombing a Korea Air jet in 1987 and trying to kill then-president Chun Doo-hwan in Myanmar in 1983.
But Pyongyang has largely abandoned such overt tactics in the past two decades.
The UN Security Council is still weighing how to react to North Korea’s belligerent moves that have earned Pyongyang criticism from the US, Europe, Russia and even North Korea’s closest ally, China.
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Saturday that North Korea’s progress on nuclear weapons and long-range missiles was “a harbinger of a dark future” and had created an urgent need for more pressure on the reclusive communist government to change its ways.
Gates, speaking at a meeting of defense and security officials in Singapore, said that Pyongyang’s efforts posed the potential for an arms race in Asia that could spread beyond the region.
ASEAN consists of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
In addition to the summit, a gathering of South Korean and Southeast Asian business leaders began yesterday with addresses by Lee and Abhisit, who both called for further cooperation to overcome the global economic crisis.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese