“We, progressives, have to carefully examine what is holding us back from moving forward. It is no longer simply due to confrontation within the progressive group, between those advocating National Liberation and those seeking People Democracy.”Sim Sang-jeong of the Justic Party, a left-leaning poli

Park Geun-hye has been considered front-runner in the women's group. The first daughter of former president Park Jung-hee began her political career in 1998 when she was elected as lawmaker in a by-election. She became leader of a major political party in 2004, marking the second of such a case in h

A female president has become a new mantra in the Korean politics ahead of the presidential election set for December this year. Both the ruling and opposition parties have high-profile female candidates who are considered no less competent and qualified in terms of leadership than their male counte

In the presidential election slated for December, the birth of the nation's first female president has become a major focus of concern among Korean voters. Officially recognized preliminary presidential hopefuls include Rep. PARK Geun-Hye, former supreme representative of the Grand National Party (G

The National Assembly passed a bill for 'A Gender Sensitivity Budget System' last September, which called for taking into account features peculiar to each gender at the time of planning and executing a budget. The system to be put into practice in 2007 will be directly reflected in the bills for bu

Legal grounds on which a husband raping his wife could be subject to criminal punishment would be in place in June at the earliest if a revision bill of an act on special cases of domestic violence is passed by the extraordinary session of the National Assembly. The bill makes a clause on sexual vio

Responding to the aspiration of Korean women, the Ministry of Gender Equality (MOGE), which set sail in January, 2001 as a central administrative agency to plan and coordinate gender policies, is said to be reorganized as the Ministry of Gender Equality & Family(MOGEF) on June 23. The reorganization

Political parties are bent on seeking ways to have more women win seats in local elections in 2006. Rep. You Seung Hee of the Uri Party proposed a ‘duo-seat system’ which would allow each voter to choose one male candidate and one female candidate at a time in each lower-level electoral district. Th

Justice Minister Kang Kum-sil has promised to take the lead in resolving women's issues such as abolishing the hoju system and legislating the Anti-Prostitution Act, drawing attention to the outcome of her promised efforts. Minister Kang said that a Family Act Revision Committee with participati

The KWAU Hoju Abolishment Campaign HQ has started a declaration relay for the abolishment of the hoju system. The relay began with the 'Declaration for Hoju Abolishment by the Legal Circle' on May 28, and will move on to a similar declaration by the arts circle, and further on to a declarati

9:50 in the morning of May 27, in room 601, the Department of Bill Registration of the National Assembly. It was something she did on a regular basis, but this time, New Millennium Democratic Party (NMDP) member Lee Mi-kyung's hand shook a little as she handed in the revision bill. Fellow legisl

The Special Task Force for the Abolishment of the Hoju System (Task Force) headed by the Vice-Minister of Gender Equality held its first general meeting and division meetings on May 16 at the Central Government Complex in Sejong-no. This signals the official launching of the Special Task Force made

The government is finally seeking to put in place a system of gender cognitive budget analysis in making national policies. The system will include guidelines for analyzing and evaluating by gender the effects of policies closely related to women such as education, welfare and employment policies.Mi

Women legislators in Korea and Japan have decided to join hands in urging the Japanese government to resolve the issue of comfort women.Assemblywomen, including Lim Jin Chul and Cho Bae Sook, President and Secretary of the Women’s Committee of the National Assembly respectively, met with the delegat

The Ministry of Gender Equality is accepting 'applications for redress of gender discrimination' as well as funding some 10 billion Won to women starting their own business.According to the Ministry, applications from the metropolitan area accounted for 59% (80 cases) of the total applicatio

# Scenes of North Korea in 2003According to the South Korean government's estimate, the amount of food needed to feed the North Korean population for the grain fiscal year of 2003 (Nov. 2002 ~ Oct. 2003) is 6.32 million tons, up 60 thousand tons from last year. North Korea's total production

Korean voters chose to put New Millennium Democratic Party's (NMDP) candidate Roh Moo Hyun in the presidential office to lead the nation in the 21st century. President elect Roh was elected the new president, garnering 12 million 14,277 votes out of 24 million 561,916 votes (48.9%) at the 13,471

“Keep a tight reign on the president’s relatives.” (Mrs. Roh) “Harmonize traditional and newly-required roles.” (Mrs. Chung) “Focus on elevating women’s status and meeting childcare needs.” (Mrs. Kwon) The wives of presidential candidates were as confident in their pledges as their husbands.New Mill

An opinion has been raised regarding the public budget to finance women employment policies. The opinion is that such budget decisions need to be assessed from the viewpoint of gender-equal allocation.Womenlink Korea opened a ‘Women Policies and Budget Assessment Workshop’ on November 12 on the 11th

The women groups in Korea are going to invite presidential candidates to a TV debate series to talk about their women-related policies for 4 days starting from November 21. The ‘Preparatory Committee for the Debate on Women Policies of the 16th Presidential Election Candidates,’ made up of over 80 w