NEWS BRIEF

[Anchor Lead]

The presidential office says a decision on when President Moon Jae-in will receive a COVID-19 vaccine will be made in accordance with his schedule related to the Group of 7 summit scheduled in June. The office added that Moon is willing to have the AstraZeneca vaccine administered. Spokesman Kang Min-seok said the president’s vaccination date will be decided in line with his diplomatic itinerary and schedules at the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency. He added that just like the general public, Moon will not choose what vaccine he will receive.

Harvard Law School professor J. Mark Ramseyer who has stirred up controversy with his latest claim that victims of Japan’s wartime sex slavery were willing prostitutes is also confirmed to have once argued that many members of the Japanese crime syndicate Yakuza are Koreans. He made the claim in a paper published in an academic journal in 2018 jointly with Indiana University professor Eric Rasmusen. Ramseyer, in the paper, cited a senior ranking member of a Fukuoka-based Yakuza unit as saying that 70% of its members were low-class untouchables or ethnic Koreans.

According to a diplomatic source, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin may visit South Korea on March 17 and the 18th. The two officials will each meet their Korean counterparts after which holding a 2+2 meeting of the foreign and defense chiefs of both sides gathering together is also reportedly under review. If the 2+2 meeting does take place, Seoul and Washington are expected to discuss a range of issues including North Korea, bilateral alliance and transfer of wartime operational control.