North Korea, Charlottesville, Pakistan: Your Monday Briefing
Called Gwangbokjeol ("the day the light returned") in the South
and Chogukhaebangŭi nal ("Liberation of the Fatherland Day") in the North, the holiday is what is known in the West as V-J Day, or Victory Over Japan Day.
For the 70th Liberation Day in 2015 — amid renewed military tensions with the South — Pyongyang created its own time zone.
North and South Korea have agreed on very little in recent decades,
but this week their shared past means the two countries have a rare holiday in common: Independence Day.
_____ • Pakistan’s Independence Day celebrations were marred by a suicide attack on a military truck in the southwestern city of Quetta, above,
that killed at least 15 people, including eight soldiers, and wounded at least 40 others on Saturday.
_____ • In Vietnam, activists say a government report — possibly posted by accident —
confirms their fears of high rates of executions, forced labor and deaths in custody.
_____ • President Trump is trying again to enlist China as a peacemaker in the bristling nuclear-edged dispute with North Korea.
The government of South Korea was established on the same day three years later, and the peninsula was divided.
