Chronologies
China - Korea
Chronology from Oct 2002 to Dec 2002
: Hyundai Motors China and Beijing Automotive Holding Company Limited launch sales of the EF Sonata in China, with expectations to sell over 80,000 units in 2003.
: Roh Moo-hyun elected next president of the Republic of Korea.
: ROK Ministry of Construction and Transportation announces that Korean Air will resume direct flights to Taipei after a decade following the rupture of diplomatic relations with Taipei.
: Representatives from Korea, Japan, and China gather in Tokyo to discuss details of the proposed professional soccer championships involving the three Northeast Asian countries.
: Police in South Gyeongsang Province, South Korea said yesterday they broke up a 20-member human smuggling ring suspected of sneaking Chinese and ethnic Koreans from China into the country.
: A fishing vessel carrying 55 ethnic Koreans and other people from China is caught by maritime police off the western coast while attempting to smuggle migrants into the country. On the same day, Seoul’s Guro Police Station arrests eight ethnic Koreans from China for blackmailing and assaulting fellow Korean Chinese in the Seoul metropolitan area.
: Shinsegae Co. establishes a joint venture with Shanghai Join Bui Co. to open the Shanghai E-mart Super Center Company, a discount consumer goods chain of stores. On the same day, Ahnlab Inc. (www.ahnlab.com), a leading computer virus vaccine developer in Korea, announces a contract valued at $2.38 million with SUNV, a Chinese software provider, to export anti-virus engine and vaccine software programs.
: China imposes punitive duties against five categories of Korean steel products, including hot-rolled plates, cold-rolled plates, color plates, electric plates, and stainless cold-rolled sheets through May 23, 2005.
: The South Korean prosecutor’s office announces that it is tracing the assets of two former consular officials stationed in China after they had been indicted along with other government employees and brokers in a bribes-for-visas scandal.
: Korea and China reach an accord on the fishing quota for 2003, giving Korean vessels an extension of the same 60,000 ton limit inside China’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) while the quota for Chinese vessels fishing in the Korean EEZ is reduced from 109,600 tons to 93,000 in 2003.
: The Cabinet approves a regulation allowing ethnic Koreans from China to work in service industries, under F-1 visas for “visiting and joining families,” even if they have no kin in Korea. The visa will allow ethnic Koreans from China to stay for up to two years, with unlimited extensions.
: Twenty North Korean refugees who had sought refuge in the South Korean consulate in Beijing since mid-September arrive in Seoul.
: A North Korean delegation holds discussions with Chinese counterparts in Beijing regarding the fate of Sinuiju Special Administrative Region head Yang Bin.
: In a protest letter to the presidential office of Cheong Wa Dae, Chinese democracy activist Wei Jingsheng expresses regret over the ROK Justice Ministry’s alleged threat that Xu Bo would face deportation unless he stops actively promoting democracy in China.
: Yang Bin, chosen by North Korea (DPRK) to administer North Korea’s special administrative region, is detained by Chinese authorities on suspicion of tax evasion.
: The South Korean Ministry of Commerce, Industry, and Energy announces that the Korea Industrial Complex Corp. (KICC) signed an agreement with Dandong City to build an industrial complex by 2003 exclusively for Korean manufacturing companies.
: South Korea arrests 162 people on charges of smuggling Chinese-made narcotics into Korea and selling them to domestic drug users in the country’s biggest-ever drug bust.