"The Controversy Over South Korean Wartime Operational Control: The Real Issues"

Speaker: Nam-soo Park, 2014-15 Visiting Scholar, Lieutenant General (Ret.)

South Korean Lt. Gen. (retired) Nam-soo Park will address the controversy in South Korea (ROK) over the indefinite, “conditions-based” postponement last year of Seoul’s planned reassumption of wartime operational control (opcon) over its own forces. Since the Korean War, the U.S. commander in South Korea has been assigned wartime operational control over most South Korean military units, but U.S. and Korean leaders agreed in 2007 that Seoul would resume wartime opcon over all its forces by 2012. That decision was based on progressives’ concerns that U.S. exercise of opcon over South Korean forces diminished Seoul’s sovereignty and disadvantaged it in negotiations with North Korea. Conservatives and some military leaders, however, pushed for postponement in the belief that ROK military forces were not adequately prepared for the change and that it might increase the likelihood of a further reduction in U.S. forces in South Korea. Lt. Gen. Park will share his views on this controversy over opcon change.

"The Use of Domestic and International Law: Against North Korean Subversion and Human Rights Violations"

Speaker: Dong Hyuk Chin, 2014-15 Visiting Scholar from Kim & Chang Law Firm

Visiting scholar Dong Hyuk Chin will discuss issues of criminal law related  to North Korea, including the application of the controversial National Security Law in South Korea in the case of individuals and organizations suspected of supporting Pyongyang, and the international community's consideration of the North Korean regime's human rights violations and crimes against humanity. Chin is a former South Korean prosecutor with experience handling cases involving the National Security Law; he also established comprehensive plans for national security-related administration while serving in the Public Security Affairs Division of the Ministry of Justice and District Prosecutor's Office. In his talk, he will review the South Korean Constitutional Court's recent dissolution of a political party accused of supporting North Korea; share his personal experience prosecuting a criminal case involving the National Security Law; and discuss the United Nation's Commission of Inquiry into North Korea's human rights situations and the UN General Assembly's referral of North Korean crimes against humanity to the International Criminal Court.