Tag: South Korea

Korean Peninsula a ‘powder keg that needs true peace’

August 9, 2017 South Korea North Korea, Seongju, South Korea, USA

A plaque showing the countries who were involved in the Korean War 1950 - 1953 can be seen at the North-South Korean border. (Photo: Open Doors International)

As the tension between the US and North Korea increases, the Korean Peninsula itself “is a powder keg ready to explode and cause another war”, warned Archbishop Hyginus Kim Hee-jong, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea, at an interfaith meeting in Seongju, South Korea, to commemorate the end . . . Read More

Pakistan expels South Korean for ‘illegal preaching’ after murder of Chinese ‘missionaries’

June 21, 2017 Pakistan Balochistan, China, Islamic State, Lee Zingyang, Meng Lisi, Quetta, South Korea

Pakistan has ordered a South Korean man to leave the country, accusing him of involvement in “illegal preaching activities”, after two of his students at an Urdu-language school were abducted and killed by the Islamic State group, which claimed they had been secretly preaching Christianity. “Investigations have revealed that [Juan . . . Read More

South Korea denies claims Chinese nationals killed in Pakistan were missionaries

June 15, 2017 Pakistan Balochistan, China, Islamic State, Lee Zingyang, Meng Lisi, Quetta, South Korea

A South Korean official says there is “no evidence” that two Chinese nationals, whose abduction and murder in Pakistan has been claimed by the Islamic State group, had secretly travelled there to work – with a South Korean – as Christian missionaries. Pakistan’s interior ministry had claimed Lee Zingyang, 24, . . . Read More

US Christian arrested for ‘hostile acts’ against North Korea

May 8, 2017 North Korea Donald Trump, Hyeon Soo Lim, Kim Dong Chul, Kim Hak Song, Kim Jong Wook, Kim Jong-Un, North Korea, Otto Warmbier, Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, South Korea, Tony Kim

A fourth US citizen has been detained in North Korea, as he prepared to leave the country after working for several weeks at the Pyongyang University for Science and Technology, which trains the children of North Korea’s elite and which numbers Christians on its staff. The North Korean state-run news agency KCNA said . . . Read More

Escaped North Korean risks her life to visit Christian family she left behind

April 3, 2017 North Korea China, South Korea

It was a shock to Myoung-Hee* when she discovered that most of her family were Christians. Although it was four decades ago, she remembers it well. One night her father stumbled into the house, pale and weak, and she wondered if he was ill. Before he spoke, Myoung-Hee’s mother sent . . . Read More

South Korean pastors arrested for helping North Korean defectors

March 16, 2017 South Korea China, North Korea, Seoul, South Korea, USA

North Korean soldiers patrol the Yalu River on the Chinese-North Korean border

Two South Korean pastors have been arrested by Chinese police for giving protection to North Korean defectors in China, reports the South Korean news agency, Yonhap. The anti-North Korean campaign group, Justice for North Korea, said that the two pastors were helping defectors at risk of being repatriated. The pastors . . . Read More

China expels South Korean missionaries

February 14, 2017 South Korea China, Kim Jong-Un, North Korea, South Korea, USA

Thirty-two South Korean missionaries were expelled from China’s border region with North Korea last month, reports The Guardian. The 32 were based in China’s north-eastern Yanji region and many of them had worked there for more than a decade, South Korean media have reported. South Korea’s foreign ministry says it has . . . Read More

Korean church leaders ‘can broker peace’

November 18, 2016 South Korea North Korea, South Korea

Church leaders from North and South Korea have stressed the importance of dialogue between the two countries’ Christians for brokering peace. At a conference last week, church leaders from both nations agreed that a new peace treaty must be drawn up to replace the “insufficient” Armistice Agreement of 1953. The . . . Read More

Animation highlights N. Korea religious violations

August 31, 2016 North Korea Communism, North Korea, South Korea

Claims reported today in by South Korea that North Korea has executed a top official from its own cabinet highlight the risks of falling foul of the communist dictatorship – also faced by groups such as Christians. Their fate is usefully explained in a from the International Coalition to Stop . . . Read More

Korea: Still divided 70 years on

August 14, 2015 South Korea Missionaries, North Korea, Pentecostals, Protestants, Pyongyang, Religious freedom, South Korea

On 15 August 1945 the Korean peninsula was divided along the 38th parallel: Russia and Japan to temporarily administer the North, the USA to administer the South. This arbitrary division of Korea exactly 70 years ago has resulted in the very different halves of the peninsula we see today – . . . Read More

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