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The Korea Times

Entertainment & Arts

SCMP
Asia

The Korea Times

Opinion

Columnists

2. John Burton

Samsung's testing times

It is somewhat ironic that Lee Jae-yong, the de facto head of the Samsung group, has borne the brunt of populist public anger against the family-run conglomerates, or chaebol, unleashed by Choigate and its exposure of alleged corrupt ties between business and government. Since taking over leadership of the group after his father’s heart attack in 2014, Lee has done more than any other chaebol boss in restructuring holdings to the benefit of shareholders. This has primarily consisted of selling off some struggling businesses while forging entry into new sectors, such as automotive electronics...

2017-01-25 15:36

Trump's Korea contradictions

What is fascinating in analyzing the forthcoming Trump presidency is how many of his policy goals contradict each other, which makes it harder to achieve any or most of them. North Korea provides a perfect case in point.

2017-01-11 15:56

Trump's tax threat

When he was campaigning as a candidate for the U.S. presidency, Donald Trump vowed that on day one of his administration you would declare China to be a currency manipulator, which gives the U.S. the authority to restrict Chinese imports by slapping tariffs on its products.

2016-12-28 17:08

Bright side of Choigate

Although Koreans are complaining that Choigate has brought the state of the country’s democracy to its lowest point since 1987, there are also reasons for hope that it could trigger important and positive changes.

2016-12-14 16:18

Echoes of Watergate

I was a university student in Washington D.C. in the early 1970s and so witnessed at first hand the unfolding of the Watergate scandal that brought down the administration of Richard Nixon.

2016-11-30 16:50

Trump's North Korean test

North Korea represents a Rorschach test for President-elect Donald Trump on how he will conduct his foreign policy.

2016-11-16 16:26

Why Samsung should worry

If I was at Samsung Electronics, I would be worrying about how the issue of exploding batteries with the Galaxy Note 7 has become comic fodder for late night TV shows in the U.S. “There was a terrible terrorist attack last weekend in New York, New Jersey. No one died, that’s the good news. And, boy, were we lucky because the bomb was made from acid, ball bearings and electronic igniters. It was either that or a sackful of Samsung phones,” Bill Maher joked on his HBO show, Real Time.

2016-10-05 16:58

Where are Seoul-Beijing ties heading?

The recent explosion of North Korea's fifth and biggest nuclear bomb raises a key question of the whether the test will bring South Korea and China closer together or further apart. The test has hardened President Park Geun-hye’s determination to deploy the U.S. advanced missile defense system, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), with a majority of Koreans supporting the decision. Park recently said the deployment was an “inevitable defensive measure,” adding there would be no need for THAAD if Pyongyang abandoned its nuclear weapons program.

2016-09-21 16:50

Challenging the chaebol

One of the main themes in postwar Korea has been the debate over the chaebol as a source of both economic progress and social inequality because of their business dominance. They have also become the cause of national embarrassment because of financial scandals that often led to top executives or members of the family owners being convicted of crimes or sent to jail.

2016-09-07 15:34

Keep calm and carry on

Will Korea be the next Asian country after Japan to embark on an unconventional monetary policy to boost the economy? Some are predicting that the Bank of Korea could cut its base rate from the current 1.25% to 0.75% by the first quarter of next year.

2016-08-24 17:08

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