The United States, in the midst of its war with Iran, is running short on air defense systems. This is demonstrated by this week's announcement to relocate these systems from South Korea to the Middle East. Seoul's conservative government has protested the decision, which exposes it to an attack from North Korea and raises serious questions about Donald Trump's commitment to his long-standing ally. Specifically, the Pentagon is moving the two most advanced types of air defense systems in the world: the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) missile system and the Patriot missile batteries. The Pentagon has seven THAAD systems, two of them in Asia: one on the island of Guam in the Western Pacific, serving as a deterrent against China, and the one previously located in South Korea, to prevent a North Korean attack. The remaining systems are currently distributed among five air defense regiments, one of them in Israel.

A South Korean court has sentenced former South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol to life imprisonment after finding him guilty of abuse of power and leading an insurrection. due to the declaration of martial law in the country on December 3, 2024. The president, who declared a state of emergency live on television, unleashed one of the deepest institutional crises in the country's democratic history. Although the South Korean Public Prosecutor's Office requested the death penalty, the judges did not support the request, as the country has a moratorium on capital punishment. de facto Regarding this conviction, no executions have been carried out since 1997.

The Mercat de les Flors is hosting one of the most important events of its season from this Friday until Sunday. The Korea National Contemporary Dance Company, South Korea's leading dance company and Asia's only national dance company, is coming to Barcelona for the first time. And it's doing so with the show JungleA piece directed by Kim Sungyong, featuring twelve dancers on stage who give shape and movement to an abstract and impressionistic tableau inspired by contemporary jungles.

Every two years, at FemCAT we organize a trip to benchmarking An international trip with a very specific objective: to learn best practices. We don't travel to copy models, but to understand how other countries face the major challenges of our time and to extract useful lessons for Catalonia. This November 2025, we traveled to South Korea, and one of the most powerful reflections of the trip concerns one of our main bottlenecks: housing. South Korea is a country of nearly 100,000 km² with 50 million inhabitants. Catalonia, with 32,000 km², has just over 8 million. This puts the Korean population density at around 500 inhabitants per km², double that of Catalonia. This comparison is especially relevant considering that both territories share a similar geography, with a significant portion of the land consisting of hills and mountainous areas unsuitable for construction. The difference, therefore, is not so much physical as it is one of political and strategic decision-making.

In the midst of the COP30 sessions, South Korea announced that it aims to shut down the country's 61 thermal power plants, responsible for 33% of energy production, within 15 years. The world's fourth-largest coal importer, accounting for 8% of total exports, has set closure dates for 40 power plants, with the remaining 21 slated for closure by early 2026. Kim Sung-hwan, South Korea's Minister of Climate, Energy, and Environment, stated from Brazil that the closures are not only for climate reasons but also to increase competitiveness and create thousands of jobs. South Korea is the second Asian country, after Singapore, to join the Powering Past Coal Alliance, an initiative that brings together some sixty countries, mostly developed nations. An hour after the announcement, the minister participated in an event in Belém with his Australian counterpart, Chris Bowen. Australia has seen its presence in the South Korean market reduced by competitors such as Russia and Indonesia, but it still exports almost 10% of its coal to the Asian country, with a value of around AU$2.3 billion (approximately €1.3 billion) in 2025, according to the auditor.

This week, the Paral·lel 62 venue hosted a K-pop concert that sold out 1,500 tickets in a minute. K-pop is highly produced Korean music, with spectacular choreography, captivating videos, and the singers' commanding stage presence, perfectly aligned with Korean dramas and films. This latest concert is a clear example of that. soft power. "Soft power" uses culture, in this case music, to project South Korea as a key strategic power in the future of international affairs and as a country entirely distinct from North Korea. Since 1963, the two Koreas have used sonic propaganda as part of their psychological warfare strategy, and K-pop has been the most lethal weapon lately, since June 2024, when North Korea launched balloons filled with garbage and South Korea blasted K-pop over loudspeakers. And I say it has been the most destructive music because it has led young people in North Korea to pirate these addictive and highly exportable songs.

Less than a decade ago, South Korea was still often compared to Thailand or other Southeast Asian countries in business terms. The truth is that the Republic of Korea has experienced what they call an "economic miracle," achieving the title of the world's seventh largest exporter in 2021. With a cutting-edge technology industry and an administration characterized by its speed (pali-paliThanks to its industrialization and collaboration with the private sector, South Korea has positioned itself in recent years as one of the world's major industrial powers, with companies like Samsung, LG, SK Telecom, and Hyundai in its portfolio. It has a higher GDP per capita than Spain, at €33,491 according to official 2024 data, and its unemployment rate is below 3%. The lessons that South Korea can offer Catalan companies are numerous and include a strong commitment to industry as the main economic driver, world-class infrastructure, an education system focused on research and innovation, and a deep pride in their country and its culture. HallyuA concept that encompasses everything related to Korean culture and has placed them on the global map.

It will soon be a year since the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature was announced: Korean writer Han Kang, who also became the first from her country to receive this award. The news, perhaps unexpected in our latitude, took on the tone of a national celebration in South Korea. In a way, this award represented the recognition of the strength of Korean culture today in one of the fields where it had not yet achieved the echo that music, film, and audiovisual media have enjoyed for years. Given this landing of Korean culture in the West, it is interesting to ask what makes it so attractive and how it has achieved such an international impact.

Naver, South Korea's leading online marketplace, has reached an agreement to acquire the Catalan object-buying platform Wallapop for €377 million. The transaction values the app at €600 million, a figure that would increase to €650 million after receiving this capital injection. As both companies explained in a statement, the agreement has the support of "the vast majority" of shareholders and is expected to be completed in the coming months, once the relevant regulatory approvals are obtained. Naver already controlled nearly 30% of Wallapop's capital after entering the market in 2021, and will now hold 100%.

South Korea votes this Tuesday in a quest for institutional order and economic stability. The presidential elections aim to end the period of chaos unleashed in December when Former President Yoon Suk-yeol declared martial law for hours and was removed from office.This sparked a serious political crisis.

The brand new Gata Maula publishing house has just published his third book, At dusk, by Hwang Sok-yong (Changchun, 1943), a polysemic title that refers both to the twilight of life and to the opportune moment to put out fires, or also to the state of traffic between day and night.

The decision of the Constitutional Court of South Korea to ratify the Constitutional Court of South Korea was greeted with an outburst of joy on Friday. the dismissal of President Yoon Suk-yeol for imposing martial law last DecemberThe ruling of the country's highest court, adopted unanimously, confirms the process ofimpeachment against Yoon and puts an end to four months of political instability. The Constitution requires new presidential elections to be called within sixty days: the most likely date is June 3, according to the local news agency Yonhap. Until then, the current Prime Minister, Han Duck-soo, will continue to serve as interim president.

In the epilogue of the comic Work and live (Garbuix Books, 2025), French author Fabien Toulmé (Orléans, 1980) recalls his teenage self's conversation with a career counselor who couldn't understand why, despite getting good grades in math and physics, he preferred drawing to engineering. At the time, Toulmé was convinced by the arguments, but later changed professions to pursue what he truly loved: comics. Partly for this reason, Toulmé is now publishing a book, halfway between a sociological essay and a diary, in which he travels to different countries around the world to understand how we relate to work.

Surely if you live in Barcelona or pass by often you have seen an increase in Korean barbecue restaurants or hot can Chinese. Today we'll focus on the first, the barbecue. Personally, I think it's a very fun type of meal, suitable for groups or families. In fact, a group of four people above would be the ideal size.

Coinciding with the fourth wave of feminism, far-right parties have gained strength around the world, forcing women to build strategies of disobedience. From Africa to the Americas, and also in Europe, where hate speech and anti-women's rights rhetoric grows with each election, partly thanks to the power of social media.

BTS fans are beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. After the South Korean Ministry of Culture decided not to give the singers of the K-pop group BTS a break from completing their military service, fans of this globally successful band have seen how singer after singer temporarily left the group. to meet their obligations to the state. Eighteen months after leaving the group, JIN has been the first to return from the army. And to celebrate, an event was organized in which JIN hugged a thousand fans.

Kim Jong-un has intensified war rhetoric at a time when he has made closer collaboration with Russia. American experts warn that the situation on the Korean peninsula is the most dangerous since 1950. We must see if we are just facing a new verbal provocation from the North Korean leader or if he is really preparing the country for a war.