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      Your Monday Briefing: Russian Forces Attack Evacuees

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      Plus China’s new economic plan and updates on an attack on a Pakistani mosque.Good morning. We’re covering sustained shelling in Ukraine, China’s new economic plan and the fallout of a terrorist attack on a mosque in Pakistan.A Ukrainian soldier ran to check on a family after a mortar round landed nearby.Lynsey Addario for The New York TimesRussian attacks halt evacuationsAs Russian forces continued shelling Ukraine, at least three people — a mother and her children — were killed outside Kyiv as they tried to get to safety. For the second straight day, the authorities called off an evacuation from the besieged port city of Mariupol.Here’s the latest.Russian forces were struggling to advance on multiple fronts. The Ukrainian military said that it was successfully defending its position in fierce fighting north of Kyiv and that troops were also holding back Russians from the east, where President Vladimir Putin’s forces bogged down in clashes around an airport.Families are being torn apart. Some Ukrainians are finding that their Russian relatives, hopped up on government misinformation, don’t believe there is a war. Others are splitting: Wives flee while husbands are forced to stay and fight, which some Ukrainian women referred to as “a little death.”Flights: Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, repeated his calls for NATO to enforce a no-fly zone, despite bipartisan opposition from U.S. lawmakers and reluctance from European allies. On Saturday, Putin said that any countries that imposed one would be considered enemy combatants. The U.S. is discussing how to supply Polish Soviet-era fighter jets to Ukraine.Russia: The police have arrested more than 3,000 people in antiwar protests. Mastercard and Visa suspended operations there; many fast food chains remain open. Moscow has blocked Facebook and clamped down harder on independent news media than at any time in the Putin era, leading some Western outlets, including Radio Free Europe, to suspend operations.Analysis: The war poses a serious threat to the American-led liberal world order. But the West adapted: In days, it threw out its decades-old playbook and isolated Russia with unparalleled sanctions and penalties.Arts: Cultural institutions are pressing Russian artists to distance themselves from Putin. Film festivals are split on whether to ban Russian movies. Technology: Hackers are conducting simple but effective cyberattacks against Russian and Ukrainian websites. TikTok, flooded with misinformation, suspended livestreaming and uploads from Russia.A shopping district in Shanghai in January.Aly Song/ReutersChina’s new economic planChina detailed a plan to expand its economy, labeling stability as its “top priority.” The changes come as the national leader, Xi Jinping, is poised to claim a new term in power.Despite global uncertainty over the coronavirus pandemic and war in Ukraine, China’s leaders sought to project confidence and calm. The annual government work report delivered on Saturday did not even mention Russia’s invasion.The implicit message appeared to be that China could weather European turbulence — and focus on keeping its people content and employed before a Communist Party meeting in the fall, when Xi is increasingly certain to extend his time in power.Details: Beijing is calling for heavy government spending and lending. Social welfare and education outlays are both set to increase about 10 percent this year. China’s military budget will grow by 7.1 percent to about $229 billion — a signal that Beijing is preparing for an increasingly dangerous world.Domestic policy: The plan suggests that China is prioritizing economic growth, with an expansion goal of “around 5.5 percent,” over domestic consumer spending. Beijing has been trying to move the economy away from dependence on debt-fueled infrastructure and housing construction.A funeral on Saturday for some of the people killed in the Friday attack.Khuram Parvez/ReutersISIS bombs Pakistani mosqueThe Islamic State’s regional affiliate, Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K, claimed responsibility for bombing a Shiite mosque in Peshawar, in northwestern Pakistan. The attack killed at least 63 people and wounded nearly 200 others.Pakistani police said on Saturday that they had identified the suicide bomber and the network behind the attack. ISIS-K and Pakistani security officials both said the bomber was an Afghan national. The Islamic State, a Sunni Muslim terrorist group that considers Shiites heretics, has claimed several previous attacks in Pakistan. This was the biggest and deadliest yet, and one of the worst terrorist attacks in Pakistan in years.Background: ISIS-K formed in Afghanistan in 2015 and opened a Pakistan chapter in 2019. Security officials say the group continues to operate from Afghanistan but has been displaced by the Afghan Taliban. Officials believe that about 1,600 of its fighters escaped when the Taliban overran a prison outside Kabul in August.Other bombings: Last fall, the group carried out bombings at Shiite mosques in Afghanistan, killing and wounding dozens.THE LATEST NEWSAsiaNews coverage in Seoul last week of a North Korean missile launch.Jung Yeon-Je/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNorth Korea launched a ballistic missile off its east coast on Saturday, its second test in a week, South Korean officials sad.Women’s marches have gained steam in Pakistan, and opposition has risen.The snowboarders Cécile Hernandez and Brenna Huckaby are putting in strong performances at the Paralympics, despite a dispute over whether they should be allowed to compete.CoronavirusA group of truckers protesting Covid-19 mandates encircled Washington, the U.S. capital, on Sunday morning.South Korea reported high turnout in early voting for its presidential election, but apologized to coronavirus patients for a lack of preparation that resulted in long wait times.The U.S. Food and Drug Administration rejected an Indian-made coronavirus vaccine from the pharmaceutical company Bharat Biotech for children 2 to 18.What Else Is HappeningFrance’s president, Emmanuel Macron, finally announced he would seek re-election. He is leading in polls by a wide margin.German authorities gave Tesla approval to begin production at its first major assembly plant in Europe.Younger Asian American leaders in the U.S., grappling with how to respond to a series of attacks, want to rely less on traditional policing solutions.A Morning ReadA circular golden meditation chamber in Auroville.Rebecca Conway for The New York TimesThe new leadership of Auroville, an experimental Indian commune founded in 1968, wants to turn it into a utopian model city. Backed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the authorities are fighting residents who cherish their trees, tree houses and take-it-slow tradition.The Saturday Profile: A Texan bombshell married an Italian prince. Now, she is fighting his sons for the crumbling Roman villa — listed in January for a whopping $531 million — where she continues to live after his death.Russia-Ukraine War: Key Things to KnowCard 1 of 3Evacuation efforts under attack. More

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      South Korea reports high turnout in early voting, but apologizes to coronavirus patients for a lack of preparation.

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      South Korea’s National Election Commission released an apology on Sunday for poor planning during special early voting hours for coronavirus patients that resulted in unexpectedly long waits at polling sites and, according to local media reports, some patients fainting.“We are very sorry for causing an inconvenience to the Covid-19 patients during the early-voting period,” the statement said.It was unknown how many people were involved, but at least one person with Covid had to be hospitalized.South Korea is experiencing a sharp spike in coronavirus cases, its worst wave of the pandemic. Lawmakers and health officials had agreed last month to revise election laws to allow voters infected with the virus to cast a ballot in the country’s contentious presidential election.Under the new rules, the general public could vote early all day on Friday and Saturday, but virus patients and those in quarantine were allowed at the polls only during a limited window on Saturday. People with the virus were permitted leave home to vote starting at 5 p.m. and needed to walk, drive or take a cab to a polling station by 6 p.m. But having so many show up at the same time caused lines of over an hour at some polls, and in many cases, outside in the cold weather.More than 1 million people in South Korea were in in-home treatment for Covid on Saturday, the health authorities said. The nation was reporting an average of more than 208,000 new cases a day, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.According to the election commission, the two-day early-voting period had a 36.93 percent voter turnout, which was more than a 10 percentage points higher than the early-voting turnout in the 2020 parliamentary elections. More

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      South Korea Prepares for Another Covid-Era National Election

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      SEOUL — South Korea, which is experiencing its largest Covid-19 wave yet, will set aside a 90-minute window just for voters with the coronavirus to cast their ballots at polling stations next month.The recent surge in coronavirus cases had raised questions about how the country’s tight presidential election would be held. Lawmakers agreed this week to reserve 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. on March 9, Election Day, for voters with Covid. The rest of the electorate will vote from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.“Protecting everyone’s right to vote is paramount,” Dr. Jung Jae-hun, a professor who is a Covid-19 policy adviser to the prime minister, said in an interview. “It’s entirely possible to do so while preventing outbreaks.”The National Election Commission reported on Thursday that interest in voting in the upcoming election was at its highest since 2012, demonstrating that the surge in coronavirus infections might not dampen turnout.Lee Jae-myung of the ruling Democratic Party and Yoon Suk-yeol of the opposition People Power Party are neck and neck.About 44 million eligible voters reside in South Korea, according to the election commission. But at the rate that infections are going, as many as one million might have Covid by Election Day, according to Dr. Jung, who is also a professor of preventive medicine at Gachon University near Seoul.The government’s health protocols require people with Covid to remain in isolation at home. The special time window on Election Day would allow them to leave for the purposes of casting their ballot.The daily caseload in South Korea was 93,135 on Thursday. By comparison, in the last nationwide election of the coronavirus era, in 2020, the government reported fewer than 40 new ​infections a day. More

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      The Myths and Realities of South Korea’s Green New Deal

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      The Green New Deal is a progressive wish list that combines the reduction of carbon emissions with investments in Green technologies and Green jobs. In the United States, the Green New Deal has largely remained aspirational: a non-binding resolution that has not yet come to a vote in Congress.

      In South Korea, on the other hand, the Green New Deal is a policy reality. In 2020, the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) put its version of a Green New Deal at the center of its platform. When South Korea held its parliamentary election that April in the middle of a worldwide pandemic, that platform helped propel the liberal DPK bloc to a landslide victory and a legislative super-majority. Emboldened by this victory, the liberal Moon Jae-in administration officially made the Green New Deal a part of government policy several months later.

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      It wasn’t the first time that a South Korean government tried to address these problems. “When we heard about the Green New Deal in 2020, I asked myself, ‘Haven’t we seen this policy before?’ We had a pretty similar policy in the Lee Myung-bak administration that was called Green Growth,” remembers Lee Taedong, a political scientist at Yonsei University. Beginning in 2008, the conservative Lee Myung-bak government had indeed promoted a green stimulus program that addressed the twin crises of climate change and economic stagnation.

      For President Moon’s government, which took office in 2017, the Green New Deal was not just an electoral ploy. South Korea was facing a reputational crisis. Successive governments had stressed the importance of addressing climate change. But the country was, as of 2018, the seventh-largest emitter of carbon in the world.

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      “South Korea is the ninth-largest consumer of energy in the world, and 95% of that energy is imported from outside,” notes Hong Jong Ho, an economist at Seoul National University. “It has the highest nuclear power plant density in world and the lowest renewable proportion among the 38 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.”

      Contributing to South Korea’s dirty profile was its export of coal-fired power plants. “Along with Japan and China, South Korea was a lead financer of coal projects, mainly in Southeast Asia,” explains Kim Joojin, the managing director of the Korean NGO Solutions for Our Climate. “Because of abundant financing, countries like the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam had a lot of new coal-fired power plants in their future that were really straining the global carbon budget.”

      Korean climate activists have worked hard to narrow the gap between the government’s rhetoric and its actual behavior. A key part of Korea’s climate action community are young people. “It’s limited how much pressure we can exert, as youth, on the government,” points out Kwon Yoo-Jung, an activist with Green Environment Youth Korea (GEYK). “But we have to communicate that we are aware of the financing of coal-fired plants abroad and we’re not proud of it and it has to stop, even though the government is not doing this in front of us but in other countries.”

      Thanks to a sustained campaign of civic activism, the South Korean government finally announced this year that it would no longer finance overseas coal-fired plants. The Moon government also pledged in the lead-up to the Glasgow climate summit that it would, by 2030, reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 2018 levels on the way to becoming carbon neutral in 2050. It has also promised to increase wind and solar energy production by more than double by 2025.

      One of the chief sticking points in the country’s overall energy transition, however, has been South Korea’s singular focus on rapid economic growth. In the early 1960s, South Korea’s per capita GDP was comparable to that of Ghana or Haiti and 40% of the population lived in absolute poverty. But in the space of little more than a single generation, South Korea became a wealthy country and, by 1996, had joined the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Fossil fuel, almost all of it imported, was an essential ingredient of that economic success.

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      Today, the country struggles to define a different kind of economic success and a different approach to energy policy. South Korea’s Green New Deal is the latest attempt to square the often-conflicting demands for growth and environmental action. It has proved to be simultaneously an inspiration for other countries and a lightning rod for criticism of Korea and the Moon administration.

      Origins of the Green New Deal

      In 1998, the Kim Dae-Jung administration began to organize South Korea’s first serious response to climate change with a top-level committee on the topic and a comprehensive national plan. Not much came of it. It wasn’t until a decade later that Korea became more proactive.

      Lee Myung-bak had built a reputation as the head of Hyundai’s engineering and construction division. As mayor of Seoul, he developed a new profile as something of an environmentalist when, among other things, he removed an old elevated highway in the capital to restore an old waterway. Nicknamed the “bulldozer,” Lee entered the presidential office with the potential to combine both economic growth and sustainability.

      Shortly after becoming president in 2008, Lee unveiled his “Green Growth” program. “Lee Myung-bak’s policy vision was one of Green competitiveness,” explains Lee Taedong. “He wanted to make South Korea the seventh-largest economy by 2020 and the fifth-largest by 2050.” The new president also pledged considerable government funds — 56.9 trillion won or about $60 billion — for the mitigation of climate change and the securing of energy independence. Another $30 billion was allocated to creating new engines of economic growth, while $30 billion more went into improving quality of life and enhancing the country’s international standing.

      The Green Growth program aimed to decouple growth and carbon emissions by reducing fossil fuel use, expanding green infrastructure and growing the economy, albeit sustainably. Expanding nuclear power was a key part of the Green Growth plan, to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and lessen the country’s reliance on imports. Nuclear energy currently provides between one-quarter and one-third of the country’s electricity.

      Lee also imagined that South Korea could become a green growth leader in the international community. He attracted the Global Green Growth Initiative, an intergovernmental development organization, to establish its headquarters in Seoul in 2010. That same year, the UN organization devoted to assisting the Global South in addressing climate change, the Green Climate Fund, also set up shop in Seoul.

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      Central to the Green Growth program was separating growth from its usual connection to increased carbon emissions. “Some European countries achieved decoupling of economic growth and greenhouse gas emission,” Lee Taedong explains. “Those that engaged in an emission trading system are more likely to achieve decoupling.”

      South Korea under Lee Myung-bak did not, however, achieve decoupling. The country’s economy grew modestly during his five-year term, but its greenhouse gas emissions also continued to rise. Nor did the Green Growth plan achieve much in the way of economic equity. “One big part of Green Growth was the aim to create jobs,” Lee Taedong continues. “However, there is no measure or report of how many jobs were created.”

      Another criticism of the Green Growth initiative was all the money that went into construction projects. “We spent a lot of money,” Lee points out, “but we didn’t get a lot of environmental goods from it. For the future, we need to consider how we steer these stimulus funds to make sure that we build up real green infrastructure.”

      Elements of the Green New Deal

      South Korea’s most recent parliamentary elections took place in April 2020. The ruling DPK, along with its partner Platform Party, won 180 out of the 300 seats. With the Green New Deal as a centerpiece of its platform, the DPK increased its parliamentary delegation by 57 seats and gained a legislative supermajority.

      The ruling party’s Green New Deal manifesto contributed to its electoral success. “The key concepts of the Green New Deal manifesto were to achieve carbon neutrality and achieve a carbon-zero society vision by 2050,” explains Kim Joojin. “It promoted market mechanisms including RE100 [a global initiative bringing together the world’s most influential businesses committed to 100% renewable electricity] and allowed more renewable energy producers to supply renewable energy to more consumers. It prohibited coal financing by public institutions. It talked about reforming the power sector and how that sector has not been helpful in terms of renewable energy deployment, which is still an ongoing problem.”

      In July, after considerable discussion of the need for a pandemic-related economic stimulus, the government announced the Green New Deal as official policy in July 2020. But, as Kim points out, the new initiative was not focused on climate issues. It devoted only $65 billion to the reduction of carbon emissions by about 12 million tons by 2025. “That’s about $5,000 per ton,” he says. “The current price of carbon is $33 ton, so reducing carbon emissions was not really part of the discussion.”

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      Instead, the focus was on infrastructure — such as zero-energy buildings, restoring ecosystems and creating safe water management systems — as well as Green innovation with renewables, electric vehicles and other Green technologies. “My intuitive sense is that it’s really a repackaging of already existing policies,” Kim continues. “So, there was a lot of criticism coming from the public, especially young people, who were asking, ‘Is it a Green New Deal or a Grey New Deal?’”

      The price tag for the program is 73.4 trillion won or about $62 billion. The funding is thus less than what the earlier administration devoted to the Green Growth initiative.

      Another key element of the program is the creation of 659,000 jobs by 2025. Lee Taedong warns that the Green Growth initiative didn’t follow through on its job promises. “We don’t want to see the same outcome from the Green New Deal. If we don’t see clear evidence, this policy won’t be worth very much,” he suggests.

      The Green New Deal is part of a larger government stimulus package that includes a “Digital New Deal” and a stronger social safety net. It is intriguing that the Korean government separated out the environmental component of its stimulus package from the equity elements and the high-tech digital projects. It is also interesting that, although the investments into digital infrastructure are less than half of those going into the Green New Deal, they were projected to create many more jobs (903,000) by 2025.

      Many environmental activists in Korea view the Green New Deal as necessary but insufficient. Six youth organizations held a press conference two months before the government released the program demanding that the government detail how South Korea would reach net carbon zero in 2050, that it protect and retrain workers in carbon-intensive industries, and that it create a mandatory educational curriculum for climate change and the environment. In addition, the groups demanded that the government phase out coal by 2030 and increase the share of renewable energy.

      When it was launched, the Green New Deal reflected only a small portion of these demands. Still, one of those youth groups, the Green Environment Youth Korea (GEYK), participated in a video commending the Korean Green New Deal. “We considered the Green New Deal a milestone,” explains GEYK activist Kwon Yoo-Jung. “We wanted our youth to understand why it was so important, to make sure that they understand that it’s a Green New Deal not a Grey New Deal.”

      Korea’s Overall Energy Picture

      Lee Myung-bak had hoped that his Green Growth program would catapult South Korea to the very top ranks of the global economy. By 2020, South Korea had risen from 16th place to the 10th spot, just ahead of Russia. The country hadn’t become the seventh-largest economy in the world as Lee had hoped, but it was still an impressive achievement.

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      That growth was accompanied by increased carbon emissions, which peaked finally in 2018. Traditionally, Korean economic growth has been associated with heavy industry: car manufacturing, shipbuilding, steel production. And that industry has drawn heavily on the energy derived from fossil fuel.

      Currently, Korea is home to three of the largest oil refineries in the world, all located near the zones of heavy industry in the southeast: the SK energy complex in Ulsan, the GS-Caltex refinery in Yeosu and the joint project of Aramco and Hanjin also in Ulsan. South Korea also has three of the top seven coal-fired power plants in the world at Taean, Dangjin and Yeongheung. These and other facilities have helped make South Korea a leader in the production of fine particulate matter (PM) — a key element of air pollution — with the highest PM2.5 concentration in the OECD.

      These fossil fuel interests form a powerful lobbying force in Korean society that has made a transformation of the energy infrastructure very difficult. “The industry-related stakeholders, including academics in government, are very powerful, their lobbying power is very strong,” notes Hong Jong Ho.

      This is not just a domestic problem. South Korea has also been a key player in promoting fossil fuels around the world. Until recently, it was financing coal-fired power plants, particularly in Southeast Asia. Its shipping yards also produce many of the vessels that transport fossil fuels. For instance, South Korean companies have a virtual lock on the production of liquefied natural gas (LNG) tankers, manufacturing 98% of them in 2018 and securing 94% of orders so far this year.

      “The Korean Export-Import bank provides a lot of money for oil and gas financing,” explains Kim Joojin. “In fact, it’s 13 times higher than coal financing.” South Korea is no longer financing overseas coal projects, but it didn’t join the 20 countries that agreed in Glasgow to end public financing of all overseas fossil fuel projects by the end of 2022. Earlier, the Asian Development Bank made a similar pledge, so Korea is increasingly out of step with the region as well. “There’s a discussion in Korea as well as in Europe about whether gas can be considered Green, and behind that is a strong gas lobby,” Kim continues. “COP26 struck a critical blow against coal. The next climate discussion will be gas.”

      Given the power of fossil fuel interests, it’s not surprising that South Korea has such a dismal record of incorporating renewable energy into its overall electricity generation. “In 2020, renewables in South Korea were only 7.2% of its energy,” explains Hong Jong Ho. “The OECD average is over 30%. Germany and the UK are close to 50%, while Denmark and Austria are around 80%. Even Japan and China are close to 20%.”

      Most of South Korea’s electricity production is derived from coal, liquefied natural gas and nuclear energy. “South Korea has the highest nuclear power plant density in world,” Hong continues. “Korea is the only OECD country with over 90% of its electricity coming from the traditional three sources (nuclear, coal, natural gas).”

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      Moon Jae-in ran on an anti-nuclear energy platform but has since embraced nuclear power as a way to reduce carbon emissions and maintain economic growth. But nuclear energy is not carbon-neutral. When factoring in the entire life cycle of a nuclear power plant — construction, operation, transport of spent fuel, decommissioning — such facilities produce three to four times as much carbon emissions as solar panels across their life span.

      Another important aspect of Korea’s energy market is the pricing. “The energy market is so distorted,” Hong Jong Ho points out. “No country in the OECD has this type of energy price system. The government totally controls the price of energy.” Electricity is generated by the Korean Electricity Power Company (KEPCO), whose six subsidiaries effectively form a monopoly and which favors through its pricing the coal, gas, and nuclear facilities. The market power of KEPCO keeps the prices of renewable energy inflated and discourages the entrance of private actors into the renewable sector.

      The overemphasis of coal, gas, and nuclear also has employment implications. “If you can expand the renewable energy sector alone, we can create a lot of jobs in the coming years,” Hong continues. “Compared to nuclear or coal, the renewable sector can create many more jobs.” According to his calculations, a moderate transition scenario would create 24,000 jobs by 2050, an advanced scenario would generate 270,000 jobs, and a 100% renewable future would create 500,000 jobs. In comparison, about 490,000 Koreans are currently employed directly and indirectly in the auto sector.

      The resistance to renewables doesn’t come only from the coal, gas and nuclear lobbies. Farmers are often uncomfortable with on-shore wind power while fisherfolk are often opposed to off-shore wind. It’s not just a question of livelihoods. It’s often a question of values.

      “The older generation, including my parents, endured prolonged poverty in the 1960s,” Hong recalls. “Their goal was the modernization of Korea. They all know that fossil fuel and nuclear have been the driving source of energy to have the rapid economic growth in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. They are so accustomed to this idea of supply-oriented, centralized generation. On the other hand, renewable wind and solar are very different, with distributed generation and an emphasis on demand management, energy efficiency and reducing energy consumption. This is an idea very different from what the older generation has become accustomed to.”

      Hong laughs when he thinks about how his parents view his work. “Whenever I talk to my parents, my father scolds me. ‘Your idea is wrong,’ he says. ‘How can wind and solar generate enough electricity to continue to power our economic growth in Korea. That’s absurd!’”

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      The focus on overcoming poverty, dealing with political disruptions and ensuring that Korea becomes an advanced industrialized country has meant that “Koreans generally focus on the present,” Hong adds. “The future is not something they have the presence of mind to consider. But the climate crisis is a long-term problem that requires a consistent policy to be successful.” Still, the situation is changing. “The Korean people are slowly trying to understand the circular relationship between economy, climate and jobs,” he continues, “and familiarize themselves with the virtuous cycle between climate, economy and more employment.”

      One hopeful sign is a statement on June 5, 2020, from 226 local government heads — mayors and provincial governors — that declared a climate emergency and called for a transition to a sustainable society. Since there are only 229 local autonomies in Korea, this list represents virtually all the heads of local governments.

      “Irrespective of political party or whether they’re liberal, conservative, or progressive, they all joined together to say that the climate emergency is a critical issue,” Hong points out.

      Overseas Coal Financing

      Over the years, South Korea has financed coal-powered plants in India, Morocco and Chile. But it has focused on Southeast Asia where it financed three projects in Indonesia and seven in Vietnam. This kind of financing was long considered a natural extension of South Korea’s own coal-powered industry.

      But that picture began to change about four years ago. Civic pressure on industry and government was enormous. “There were ads in publications with global circulation, like one that said, ‘President Moon, is this really Korea’s idea of a Green New Deal?” Kim Joojin recalls. “And there was one in the Financial Times that read, ‘Samsung, make the right call on coal.’ There were demonstrations in front of big institutions.”

      Young people were a major part of that civic pressure. Established in 2014, the Green Environment Youth Korea (GEYK) is an organization of around 60 youth activists who are working to ensure that youth are at the forefront globally to press for climate justice. In a busy district of Seoul, they participated in a campaign of chalk painting on the sidewalk devoted to phasing out coal as well as a social media campaign that bombarded key players — Hanabank, KEPCO, the Blue House — to communicate that citizens were not happy with their policies. Back in 2017, they were involved in a coal-ending bicycle trip from the city of Cheonan to Dangjin, where the largest coal plant in the world at the time was located.

      Embed from Getty Images

      “This plant was not something to be proud of,” says GEYK activist Kwon Yoo-Jung. “It was something to be ashamed of given the impact of the coal-fired plants on community health.”

      In 2017, debate over coal financing began in the Korean parliament. “In 2018, two Korean pension funds announced that it would make no new coal commitments,” Kim Joojin continues. “In 2020, KEPCO, the national utility finally decided to no longer sponsor coal projects. Samsung said it would not do any more coal financing in the future. Also that year, there was a national debate around the Korean-financed projects in Indonesia and Vietnam. Those projects eventually went forward, but close to 100 financial institutions committed to not financing coal projects. Coal became a no-go zone in our financial sector.”

      As part of their activism, GEYK members went to the areas overseas where the coal plants were planned under the banner, “People Live Here.” South Korean activists linked up with residents in Indonesia who were protesting the plants. “Due to the impact of the coal plant emitting so much air pollution, they can’t continue their way of living,” Kwon Yoo-Jung notes. “This is a moral question as well. Local residents had no say in the decision-making process, even though they suffer all the impact from the project. The community faces severe health issues. People are moving out of village.”

      Furthermore, she explains, the coal-fired plant in Indonesia will soon become a “stranded asset,” because electricity from solar energy will be cheaper to produce than electricity from coal three years after the plant comes on line.

      The pressure campaign culminated in April 2021 at a summit convened by US President Joe Biden when Moon Jae-in announced no more coal-financing projects in 2021. It was part of a trend. “Japan made a similar announcement at the G20 in the United Kingdom the following June,” Kim Joojin notes. “At the UN General Assembly in September, Xi Jinping said that China would no longer finance coal. There’s some discussion about how specific these commitments are and what they will cover, but the heads of the state of these economies were saying that coal financing was wrong.”

      As a result of these announcements, “Indonesia and Vietnam had to dramatically cut their coal portfolios, especially new coal projects,” he adds.

      Phasing out coal is an integral part of reforming Korea’s energy sector. The official date for a phase-out is 2050, though the National Council on Climate and Air Quality, chaired by former UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon, has recommended an earlier date of 2040 or 2045. “Five years ago, there was not much discussion of whether coal is the right thing to do,” Kim continues. “There were 11 coal-fired plants commissioned in 2016-17, and seven began construction. But then came efforts from provincial governments, and the social license of coal power dramatically changed.”

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      “The reality is that our government can provide a more ambitious coal phase out, for instance, in the 2030s,” he points out. “But what’s bogging down our government is how to compensate the already made investments. The same discussion is taking place in Germany around coal phase-out, but here in Korea, at least there is practically no coal mining.”

      Korea has made a commitment to net zero carbon in 2050. But with such a large coal portfolio, meeting the goals in the near term will be difficult. Cutting carbon emissions by 40% by 2040 “relies on overseas offsets and carbon sinks that are not considered policies with the most environmental integrity,” Kim notes.

      With its Green New Deal, South Korea is addressing both climate change and economic equity. But the effort is not yet commensurate with the challenge. Quoting Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, a poet from the Marshall Islands who addressed the UN Climate Summit in 2014, Kwon Yoo-Jung concludes: “We deserve to do more than just survive. We deserve to thrive.”

      *[This article was originally published by FPIF.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      Kim Jong-un orders hotline with the South to reopen as he condemns ‘cunning’ US

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      North KoreaKim Jong-un orders hotline with the South to reopen as he condemns ‘cunning’ US North Korean leader said Biden offer of dialogue is ‘a facade’ and blamed the US for ‘hostile policy’ Justin McCurry in Tokyo and agenciesWed 29 Sep 2021 21.34 EDTLast modified on Wed 29 Sep 2021 21.55 EDTKim Jong-un has condemned a US offer of dialogue as a “facade”, state media reported, but said he had ordered officials to restore communication lines with South Korea to “promote peace”.Speaking in parliament on Wednesday, the North Korean leader accused the US of continuing a “hostile policy” against his nuclear-armed country, despite the Biden administration’s offers of negotiations without preconditions.Talks between Pyongyang and Washington have been at a standstill since the collapse of the February 2019 Hanoi summit between Kim and then-president Donald Trump over what the North would be willing to give up in return for sanctions relief.Under Joe Biden, the US has repeatedly offered to meet North Korean representatives anywhere, at any time, without preconditions, while saying it will pursue denuclearisation.But Kim condemned the declarations as “nothing more than a facade to mask their deception and hostile acts and an extension of hostile policy from past administrations”, the official Rodong Sinmun newspaper reported.Kim also said South Korea “still follows the US,” and that “mutual respect must be guaranteed and unfair views and double standards attitude dropped” before the countries could declare an official end to the 1950-53 Korean war, which ended with a truce but not a peace treaty.Nonetheless, he expressed a willingness to restore North-South telephone and fax lines in early October, while urging Seoul to abandon its “double-dealing attitude” and “hostile viewpoint”. Inter-Korean relations, he said, were at a “crossroads of serious choices” between reconciliation and a “vicious cycle of confrontation”.‘Pushing the nuclear envelope’: North Korea’s missile diplomacyRead moreKim’s comments are an apparent effort to drive a wedge between Seoul and Washington as he wants South Korea to help him win relief from crippling US-led economic sanctions and other concessions.Under the Biden administration, “the US military threat and hostile policy against us have not changed at all but have become more cunning”, he said in a lengthy address to the Supreme People’s Assembly, the North’s one-party parliament.The United States said Wednesday it bears “no hostile intent” towards North Korea and remains open to the idea of negotiations. “We hope the DPRK will respond positively to our outreach,” a State Department spokesperson said, adding that Washington supports “inter-Korean cooperation” as aiding stability on the peninsula.North Korea has been largely biding its time in recent months as it assessed the Biden government and focused on domestic issues.Kim’s influential sister, Kim Yo-jong, was appointed to the country’s top government body, amid a raft of changes approved by the Supreme People’s Assembly. Her official rank has risen and fallen over time, but her new position on the State Affairs Commission is by far the most senior post she has held.Nine members of the commission were dismissed, including one of its vice-presidents, Pak Pong-ju, and diplomat Choe Son-hui, a rare senior woman in the North’s hierarchy who has played a key role in negotiations with the United States.North Korea has been behind a rigid self-imposed blockade since early last year to protect itself from the coronavirus pandemic, with the economy suffering as a result and trade with key partner China dwindling to a trickle.Kim’s speech was the latest in a series of actions with international ramifications this month.This week, it tested what it said was a hypersonic gliding missile, and earlier this month announced it had successfully fired a long-range cruise missile, after holding a scaled-down military parade.The North’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes are banned under UN Security Council resolutions, and it is subject to multiple international sanctions as a result.North Korea says it fired new hypersonic missile into seaRead moreThe UN security council will hold an emergency meeting Thursday on North Korea, at the request of the US, France and the United Kingdom, diplomatic sources told AFP Wednesday.North Korea has not shown any willingness to give up its arsenal, which it says it needs to defend itself against a US invasion.At the UN general assembly this month, the South Korean president, Moon Jae-in, repeated his call for a formal declaration of the end of the Korean war.Seoul is also spending billions on military development as both Koreas build up their weapons capabilities in what could become an arms race on the peninsula, with ramifications for neighbouring Japan, China and the wider region.This month, the South successfully test-fired a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) for the first time, making it one of a handful of nations with the advanced technology, and this week, it held a ceremony to launch its third submarine capable of carrying SLBMs.TopicsNorth KoreaUS politicsSouth KoreaKim Jong-unnewsReuse this content More

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      in World Politics

      US and South Korea Renew Commitment to Promoting Democracy

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      The summit in May between Joe Biden and Moon Jae-in delivered numerous positive outcomes that advanced the United States and South Korea as a future-oriented alliance. The two allies redoubled their cooperation in areas that are becoming more and more crucial globally, including emerging tech, climate change and space policy.

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      The expanded multidimensional collaboration marked meaningful progress in the transition of the US–South Korea relationship from that of a traditional military alliance to a more versatile, modernized partnership. But perhaps even more noteworthy was the joint commitment to strengthening regional governance and championing human rights, especially women’s rights. 

      Making a Statement

      To begin with, the Biden and Moon administrations reinforced their common vision of promoting regional governance centered on liberal values in the Indo-Pacific. Broad-brush commitments from the 2019 joint statement by the US and the Republic of Korea (ROK) — such as encouraging regional digital transparency and advancing openness, sovereignty and the rule of law in the Indo-Pacific — solidified into more explicit terms during the recent meeting in Washington.

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      For instance, both sides agreed to oppose all activities that undermine, destabilize and threaten the rules-based order; uphold freedom of navigation and stability in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait; support open and inclusive regional multilateralism, including the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad); and build clean 5G and 6G telecommunications networks. The allies also established the KORUS Global Vaccine Partnership, a tangible step toward strengthening regional leadership and governance through public health and vaccine distribution.

      For Washington, getting South Korea to acknowledge and emphasize the importance of liberal norms in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, as well as demonstrate mutual support for the Quad, was a welcome change. Out of fear of damaging strategic ties with China, its largest trading partner and an important broker of regional diplomacy with North Korea, leaders in Seoul have largely avoided publicly siding with the US on China-related issues.

      South Korea’s traditional wariness is based on experience. In 2016, after Seoul deployed the THAAD missile defense system, which China perceives as a vehicle for US strategic surveillance of Chinese interests, Beijing imposed informal economic boycotts against South Korea and cut off bilateral defense talks. Against this backdrop, the Biden-Moon statement from the summit, which contains language that can be viewed as contrary to Chinese interests (such as supporting the Quad and upholding liberal norms around disputed East Asian seas), signaled that Seoul is growing more confident in standing up for its own values and supporting a free and open Indo-Pacific, regardless of Beijing’s preferences and despite the possibility of retaliation. 

      Human Rights

      In addition to regional governance, human rights marked another issue where Washington and Seoul renewed commitment at the summit. The joint statement comprised several pledges that soundly reflected the alliance’s devotion to human rights. This included expanded financial aid for Northern Triangle countries, commitment to aiding North Korean citizens, support for the ongoing democratic movement in Myanmar, and standing for justice against racism and hate crimes targeting Asian Americans. But particularly eye-catching was the alliance’s unusually strong emphasis on empowering women and enhancing gender equality.  

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      The Biden-Moon statement acknowledged “women’s full participation” as the key to resilient democracy and presented several important commitments for women’s empowerment. The two presidents mentioned exchanging best practices to reduce the gender wage gap, empowering women in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), and combating abuses against women, including domestic violence and cyber-exploitation.

      When it comes to workplace equality, both allies stand well below the average for member states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on issues like gender wage gap disparity and female leadership (or the glass ceiling phenomenon), with South Korea ranking last. Tied to this is gender disparity in STEM, which limits greater labor diversification and which has also been a concern for both the United States and South Korea. Violence against women is a challenge both societies face.

      These are all vital areas of improvement for both countries to elevate their state of gender equality and overall democracy. The specific mention of these issues in the joint statement is encouraging for women’s rights advocates. 

      Falling Short

      Despite this promising turn, shared awareness of gender equality issues does not mean much if not put into action. Inconsistent progress on this front has been a problem for both allies. Women’s empowerment was a key goal at the summit in 2015 between Barack Obama and Park Geun-hye. But while the US remained committed to these shared objectives, South Korea fell short. While things have improved in South Korea, with its gender equality ranking rising from 118 to 102 under Moon, the US saw a backslide under former President Donald Trump, going from 45th to 53rd place globally, according to the World Economic Forum.

      Embed from Getty Images

      However, under the Biden administration, which prioritizes gender equality, the US will likely make significant progress in the future. Promoting gender equality is an indispensable element of the universal human rights agenda. As two sophisticated democracies championing human rights, both the US and South Korea are responsible for making enduring efforts to empower women. Under any administration ruled by whichever political coalitions, the value of women’s rights should not be undermined. 

      On top of striving to tackle gender inequality at home, the US and South Korea should lay out more concrete bilateral initiatives and build a high-level communication channel to discuss progress regularly and hold each other accountable for tangible progress toward their commitments. Gender inequality remains a longstanding obstacle to regional growth in Asia. At the regional level, the US–ROK alliance could revisit and expand on its pledges from the 2020 East Asia Summit regarding women’s economic empowerment and participation in security and peacekeeping issues.

      After all, the Biden and Moon administrations’ renewed cooperation on regional governance in the Indo-Pacific and gender equality established a good framework for the US–ROK alliance to expand its influence and spread democratic values throughout Asia. Both sides should make sure to diligently implement the commitments going forward.

      *[Fair Observer is a media partner of Young Professionals in Foreign Policy.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in Elections

      Colombia’s Troubles Put a President’s Legacy on the Line

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      SEOUL — Iván Duque swept into Colombia’s presidency in 2018 as a young, little-known technocrat riding a surging right-wing movement. He tapped public anger against a peace deal that he said had treated the country’s deadly insurgents too softly. And he warned that the proposals of his left-wing opponent could stifle steady growth.Three years and a global pandemic later, it is Mr. Duque who is presiding over high unemployment and an angry electorate — and who is on the defensive about the steps he has taken to tame persistent violence by militants.Mr. Duque contends his policies have opened opportunities for the middle- and low-income classes, encouraged entrepreneurship and paved the way for Colombia to return to its prepandemic growth. He also touted social policies that could address issues of police conduct and social inequality that led to violent clashes this year, killing dozens.Mr. Duque after he won office in 2018, riding a surging right-wing movement. Three years into his term, he is presiding over high unemployment and an angry electorate.Andres Stapff/Reuters“The three pillars of our overall plan of government, which were legality, entrepreneurship and equality, have been producing results,” Mr. Duque said last week in an interview in South Korea with The New York Times. “Obviously, they were affected by the pandemic. But I think we have demonstrated our resilient spirit.”Mr. Duque’s legacy — and that of his patron, the firebrand former President Álvaro Uribe, who still dominates Colombian politics — is on the line. Colombian voters go to the polls in May, when Gustavo Petro, a former presidential candidate, previous mayor of Bogotá and a onetime guerrilla member, could become the country’s furthest-left leader in its history at a time when leftists are again claiming victories across South America.Mr. Duque can’t run again because of term limits, and his party’s candidate hasn’t been determined. Still, his government faces some of the lowest approval ratings of his presidency. Colombia’s economy, trade and investment from abroad were hit hard by the coronavirus, which exacerbated long-running social tensions over stark wealth inequality and police conduct.Colombia’s economy, trade and investment from abroad were hit hard by the coronavirus, which exacerbated long-running social tensions.Federico Rios for The New York TimesHe has also come under increased pressure to tame Colombia’s armed insurgencies and hasten the fulfillment of the government’s peace deal with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by the Spanish acronym FARC, despite his criticism of the terms of the deal on the 2018 campaign trail.In South Korea, Mr. Duque was seeking trade and investment opportunities, such as expansions by Korean manufacturers and increased sales of Colombian coffee, avocados and bananas. He even cited the filming of a South Korean movie — Mr. Duque has long championed creative investments in areas like the arts and research — in Bogotá.The president is trying “to get South Korean investors interested in playing big ball,” said Sergio Guzmán, of the Bogotá-based consulting firm Colombia Risk Analysis.The challenge for Mr. Duque, Mr. Guzmán added, is that a victory by Mr. Petro could undo what he and his predecessors had accomplished.“He’s a weak president,” said Mr. Guzmán. “He’s a lame-duck president. He’s a president whose most important legacy will be for his successor not to be able to undo his own policies.”FARC rebels in the mountains of Colombia in 2018. Mr. Duque has come under increased pressure to tame Colombia’s armed insurgencies.Federico Rios for The New York TimesMr. Duque disputed that, saying that his efforts — including wage subsidies and a proposal to widen university access — could help put the economy back on track. Though a protégé of Mr. Uribe, the charismatic leader who revved up the government’s offensive against FARC nearly two decades ago, Mr. Duque never fully fit the populist mold. Born into a politically prominent family, the 45-year-old president worked for years in development banking. He speaks in clipped, think-tank English: “I will give you very concise numbers,” he said at one point before doing exactly that.He was elected after campaigning on increasing economic growth and changing the terms of the peace accord with FARC, but he quickly ran into challenges. In 2019, frustration over the lack of opportunities and possible pension changes sparked mass protests. So did a tax proposal this year meant to close a fiscal hole exacerbated by the pandemic.Mr. Duque’s tax proposal had merit, said Luis Fernando Mejía, director of the Colombian research institute Fedesarrollo, but he seemed unable to sell it to the public.The firebrand former President Álvaro Uribe, who still dominates Colombian politics.Federico Rios for The New York Times“It was a very, very good reform,” he said, “but he was not able to consolidate political capital and to create an adequate strategy to push through a reform that I think had been very important.”Mr. Duque is also trying to thread the policy needle in a polarized time, making it increasing difficult to please both his party’s base and unhappy voters.The tax protests became part of broader unrest over inequality and police violence. Some police used brutal and deadly force on demonstrators.In the interview, Mr. Duque cited his efforts to increase scrutiny on the police and to equip them with body cameras. But he said some of the demonstrators had been spurred by “people producing fake news” and other instigators to elevate the violence.His trickiest balancing act may be enacting the peace accord with FARC. In 2019, his effort to alter the terms, including tougher sentencing for war crimes, failed on legal grounds. Internationally, he is under intense pressure to carry out the accord, but domestically, his party and other conservatives continue to criticize it.Students protesting against changes to the tax code in Bogotá, the capital, in 2019.Juan Barreto/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesJust weeks ahead of the deal’s five-year anniversary, more than half of its measures have not been applied or have barely begun, according to the Kroc Institute at the University of Notre Dame, an independent entity charged with oversight of the deal. Opposition groups and some of the electorate say Mr. Duque missed a critical window to push it forward.Mr. Duque and his supporters point to the accord’s time frame, which calls for its tenets to be enacted over 15 years. In the interview, he said that he had done more than his predecessor, Juan Manuel Santos, to put in place the peace deal’s landownership overhauls and development plans that would give poor farmers and former rebels jobs and opportunities.“We have been not only implementing, but the issues that we have been implementing are going to be decisive for the evolution of the accords,” he said, adding, “We have made a good progress.”Mr. Duque must balance competing interests overseas, as well. Tensions have risen between the United States — Colombia’s longtime ally — and China, a growing source of business for the country. China, Colombia’s second-largest trading partner after the United States, has invested in mines in the country and successfully bid on engineering contracts.A temporary hospital set up in April to house Covid patients in Bogotá.Federico Rios for The New York TimesMr. Duque said that the Chinese companies had won the work in open bids and that relations with the United States remained warm. “We try to build our relationship with our partners based on investment and trade and common opportunities. But usually I have to highlight that in the case of the United States, our alliance has been existing for almost 200 years, and we will continue to see the United States as No. 1.”With the United States, relations hit an awkward moment last year when members of Mr. Duque’s party endorsed Donald J. Trump and Republicans in the election, provoking a rare rebuke from the U.S. ambassador.“I think that was unwise,” Mr. Duque said. “I think that should have not been done.”These examples of polarization, he said, have complicated efforts to fix deep-rooted problems. The world is polarized, he said, as people “connect demagoguery and populism with violent sentiments and algorithms and people producing fake news and manipulating the truth.”He added, “That’s why we have concentrated in our administration not to promote polarization, but to move the country to the right direction.”Gustavo Petro, center, during a protest against tax changes in 2019. A former presidential candidate, he could become the country’s furthest-left leader in its history.Juan Barreto/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesCarlos Tejada More

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      South Koreans Now Dislike China More Than They Dislike Japan

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      There is growing anti-China sentiment in South Korea, particularly among young voters. Conservative politicians are eager to turn the antipathy into a presidential election issue.SEOUL — The list of election issues set to define South Korea’s presidential race next year is long. The runaway housing prices, the pandemic, North Korea and gender inequality are a start. But an unlikely addition has also emerged in recent weeks: China.South Korea’s decision ​​to let the American military deploy a powerful antimissile radar system on its soil​ in 2017 has been the subject of frequent criticism from China. And last month, a presidential hopeful, Yoon Seok-youl, told the country to stop complaining, unless it wanted to remove its own ​radar systems near the Korean Peninsula.Political elites here are usually careful not to antagonize China, the country’s largest trading partner. But Mr. Yoon’s blunt rhetoric reflected a new phenomenon: a growing antipathy toward Beijing among South Koreans, particularly young voters whom conservative politicians are eager to win over.Anti-Chinese sentiment has grown so much this year that China has replaced Japan — the former colonial ruler — as the country regarded most unfavorably in South Korea, according to a ​joint ​survey by ​the polling company ​Hankook Research​ and the Korean newsmagazine SisaIN. In the same survey, South Koreans said they favored the United States over China six to one.Over 58 percent of the 1,000 respondents called China “close to evil” while only 4.5 percent said that it was “close to good.”Yoon Seok-youl, a conservative politician, on television during a press conference in Seoul in June. He has been openly critical of China.Ahn Young-Joon/Associated PressNegative views of China have deepened in other advanced countries as well, but among the 14 nations surveyed last year by Pew Research Center, South Korea was the only one in which younger people held more unfavorable views toward China than previous generations.“Until now, hating Japan was such a part of Korean national identity that we have a common saying: You know you are a real Korean when you ​feel hateful toward Japan for no particular reason,” said Jeong Han-wool, a chief analyst at Hankook Research​. “In our survey, people in their 40s and older still disliked Japan more than China. But those in their 20s and 30s, the generation who will lead South Korea in the coming decades, tipped the scale against China.”South Korea elects its next president in March, and observers are watching closely to see how younger people vote on the country’s policy toward Beijing.Conservatives in South Korea have called anything less than full-throated support of the alliance with Washington “pro-North Korean” and “pro-Chinese.” Progressives usually support reconciliation with North Korea and calls for diplomatic “autonomy” between the United States and China. Younger South Koreans have traditionally voted progressive, but millennials are breaking that pattern, and possibly turning into swing voters.An American military vehicle that was part of an antimissile radar system arriving in Seongju, South Korea, in 2017. China railed against South Korea over the deployment of the system.Reuters“We feel frustrated when we see our government act spineless while Beijing behaves like a bully,” said Chang Jae-min, a 29-year-old voter in Seoul. “But we also don’t want too much tension with China or North Korea.”For decades, South Korea has benefited from a military alliance with the United States while cultivating trade ties with China to fuel economic growth. But that balance has become increasingly difficult to maintain as relations between Washington and Beijing deteriorate.President Moon Jae-in’s conservative rivals, like Mr. Yoon, have complained that South Korea’s ambiguous policy on the United States and China made the country the “weakest link” in the American-led coalition of democracies working to confront Chinese aggression.“We cannot remain ambiguous,” Mr. Yoon told JoongAng Ilbo, a South Korean daily, last month during an interview in which he made his critical remarks about China.The conservative opposition has long accused Mr. Moon of being “pro-China.” His government has maintained that South Korea — like other American allies, including those in Europe — should avoid alienating either power. While South Koreans overwhelmingly support the alliance with Washington, the country’s trade with China is almost as big as its trade with the United States, Japan and the European Union combined.Chinese tourists in a shopping district in Seoul last year.Jean Chung for The New York Times“We cannot pick sides,” Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong has said.Yet when Mr. Moon met with President Biden in Washington in May, the two leaders emphasized the importance of preserving “peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” and vowed to make their alliance “a linchpin for the regional and global order.” Many analysts saw the statement as a sign that South Korea was aligning itself more closely with Washington at the risk of irritating China, which has called Taiwan a red line.The main conservative opposition, the People Power Party, has already begun harnessing young voters’ anti-China sentiment to secure electoral wins.In April, young voters helped deliver landslide victories for the party in the mayoral races in South Korea’s two largest cities. Last month, the party’s young leader, Lee Jun-seok, 36, said his fellow South Korean millennials would fight against Chinese “cruelty” in places like Hong Kong and Xinjiang, where China has been accused of genocide.Older Koreans, while often anti-Communist, tend to respect Chinese culture, which influenced the Korean Peninsula for millenniums. They have also looked upon the country as a benign giant whose rapid economic growth was a boon for South Korean exporters. Younger South Koreans tend not to share that perspective.President Moon Jae-in of South Korea with President Biden during a press conference at the White House in May.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesMost of them grew up proud of their homegrown economic and cultural successes. And as China’s foreign policy became more assertive under President Xi Jinping, they began to see the country’s authoritarianism as a threat to free society. They have also been critical of China’s handling of the coronavirus, its expansionism in the South China Sea and fine-dust pollution from China that regularly blankets Seoul.“They have grown up in a liberal environment the earlier generations built through sweat and blood, so they hold an inherent antipathy toward illiberal countries,” said Ahn Byong-jin, a political scientist at Kyung Hee University in Seoul. “They root for politicians who criticize China.”Nowhere has South Korea’s dilemma between Washington and Beijing been magnified more dramatically than over the deployment of the American antimissile radar, known as the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD.When South Korean officials agreed to the deployment, they called it a necessity in defending against North Korea. China saw it as part of a continuing threat from the United States military presence in the region, and retaliated by curbing tourism to South Korea and boycotting the country’s cars, smartphones, shopping malls and TV shows.South Korean students demonstrated in support of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, outside the Chinese Embassy in Seoul, in 2019.Ed Jones/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHa Nam-suk, a professor of Chinese politics and economy at the University of Seoul, has monitored how deepening animosity toward Beijing has played out on and off campuses in recent years, as cash-starved South Korean universities began accepting more Chinese students.South Korean and Chinese students clashed over whether to support young pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong, he said. They have also gotten into spats online over K-pop and kimchi. In March, many young South Koreans forced a TV station to cancel a drama series after it showed an ancient Korean king dining on Chinese dumplings.“As they watched what China did in places like Hong Kong,” Mr. Ha said, “Koreans began asking themselves what it would be like to live under a greater sphere of Chinese influence.” More