Title: Knife-wielding attacker slashes face of U.S. ambassador in South Korea (VIDEO) Source:
Reuters URL Source:http://www.reuters.com/article/2015 ... bassador-idUSKBN0M02OL20150305 Published:Mar 5, 2015 Author:James Pearson and Ju-min Park Post Date:2015-03-05 16:06:01 by Murron Keywords:None Views:3793 Comments:34
Knife-wielding attacker slashes face of U.S. ambassador in South Korea
(Reuters) - U.S. ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert underwent two-and-a-half hours of surgery after he was slashed in the face by a Korean nationalist in an attack at a breakfast forum in Seoul on Thursday to discuss Korean reunification.
Lippert, 42, was bleeding from deep wounds to his face and wrist but was able to walk after the attack. Doctors said later his condition was stable after "very successful" surgery that required 80 stitches in his face as the White House expressed optimism for his quick return to his duties.
The assailant was caught and identified by police as 55-year-old Kim Ki-jong. In 2010, Kim tried to attack the Japanese ambassador to South Korea by throwing a piece of concrete and was given a suspended jail term, according to police.
The attack was a protest against joint military exercises by South Korean and U.S. troops, which Kim said interfered with reconciliation between North and South Korea, according to police following an interrogation.
Police are considering whether to charge him for attempted homicide, a police official involved in the case said.
Witnesses and police said Kim used a small fruit knife in the attack, which took place in a government arts center across the street from the heavily guarded U.S. embassy on the South Korean capital's main ceremonial thoroughfare.
"We strongly condemn this act of violence," U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said. [IDn:L1N0W71N0]
U.S. President Barack Obama called Lippert to wish him a speedy recovery, a White House official said.
Obama's deputy national security adviser, Ben Rhodes, said Lippert likely would return to work quickly, telling MSNBC: "I expect he'll be back on his feet and in his job as soon as possible."
The assailant was dressed in traditional Korean clothing and shouted that North and South Korea should be reunited just before he attacked Lippert. He also shouted that he opposed "war exercises", a reference to the annual joint U.S.-South Korean military drills that began this week.
Kim visited North Korea eight times from 2006 to 2007, where he planted trees near the border city of Kaesong, a South Korean Ministry of Unification official said.
"I carried out an act of terror," Kim shouted as he was pinned to the floor by people at the event.
Kim said while in police custody he had acted alone. South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported that Kim also said he was part of a group that had cut and burned a U.S. flag on the embassy grounds in Seoul in 1985.
Kim is a member of the group that supports Korean unification that hosted the event, police said. He has also staged one-man protests against Japan over disputed islands known as Dokdo in Korean and Takeshima in Japanese, and, according to his blog, he led a protest outside a U.S. army base in Seoul last November.
"The guy comes in ... He yells something, goes up to the ambassador and slashes him in the face," witness Michael Lammbrau of the Arirang Institute think-tank told Reuters.
Doctors at Yonsei University's Severance Hospital said they treated Lippert for an 11-cm (4 inches) gash on the right side of his face and a puncture wound on his left wrist, causing nerve damage that was repaired. He will be hospitalized for three or four days, they said.
"Doing well&in great spirits!," Lippert tweeted after his surgery.
North Korea's official KCNA news agency described the attack as "deserved punishment for the warmongering United States", calling it "the knife of justice" that it said reflected the anger of South Koreans opposed to the military exercises involving South Korean and U.S. forces.
'WRESTLED TO THE GROUND'
Police were at the venue as part of routine operations but not at the request of the U.S. embassy or the organizer, a police official said.
Lammbrau said Kim shouted about Korean independence while he was being restrained. "It sounded like he was anti-American, anti-imperialist, that kind of stuff," he said.
"The ambassador fought him from his seat ... There was a trail of blood behind him," Lammbrau said.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye, speaking in the United Arab Emirates, called it an "attack on the South Korea-U.S. alliance".
Known for his open, informal style, Lippert is active on Twitter and can often be seen walking his basset hound, Grigsby, in Seoul. His wife recently gave birth to a son, who was given a Korean middle name.
Thursday's event was hosted by the Korean Council for Reconciliation and Cooperation. The group later issued a statement in which it condemned the attack and apologized to the governments of the United States and South Korea.
The annual U.S.-South Korean military exercises routinely provoke an angry response from North Korea, which denounces them as a preparation for war.
A South Korean defense ministry spokesman said the drills, due to run for eight weeks, would continue as planned.
Lippert was a U.S. Senate aide to Obama and served in the U.S. Navy in Afghanistan and Iraq, winning the Bronze Star. He was chief of staff for former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel before taking up his post in Seoul in November.
In 2010, Kim tried to attack the Japanese ambassador to South Korea by throwing a piece of concrete and was given a suspended jail term, according to police.
I see it's not just Americans that are soft and weak.
Now kill him... he no longer has value to society... and is a danger to all. Something you should have realized with the concrete incident.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
"Known for his open, informal style, Lippert is active on Twitter and can often be seen walking his basset hound, Grigsby, in Seoul. His wife recently gave birth to a son, who was given a Korean middle name".
FWIW
January 22, 2015 8:15am
U.S. envoy to Seoul gives Korean middle name to his newborn son
SEOUL, Jan. 22 (Yonhap) -- U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert said Thursday that he has given his newborn son the Korean middle name of Sejun, literally meaning "clean and excellent."
Lippert said on his Twitter account that his son who was born Monday in Seoul has been named as James William Sejun Lippert, saying that the Korean middle name was based on a concept of "saju," or the four pillars of destiny -- the year, month, day and hour of birth that are believed to decide a person's destiny or fate.
The name Sejun means wishing "to become an exceptional person as a result of leading an honest and clean life," according to the U.S. Embassy in Seoul.
The envoy said that James William comes from his father and his wife Robyn's grandfather's name, adding that his son can be called "JW" or Sejun.
Lippert, 42, has become the first U.S. ambassador to Seoul whose wife has given birth on Korean soil during his tenure.
Lippert arrived in Seoul on Oct. 30 with his pregnant wife and their dog named Grigsby as the youngest U.S. ambassador to South Korea. He has pledged to make efforts to deepen and broaden the Seoul-Washington alliance.
He has been actively engaged in social networking services (SNS) by posting remarks and photos of his daily life.
("We sing about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about whether or not He exists". ~ Jeff Foxworthy)
If any retard and deformed person has shown to be a threat to society, by slashing and stabbing his peers, then of course. Kill it.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
You of course are free to coddle, house, feed and contain every drooling, dangerous psychotic retard, in your house. I have no problem with the bleeding heart libtards stepping up to the plate if they aren't strong enough to see them killed... but don't ask me to pay to keep such a waste of flesh alive.
Your weakness will not be at my expense, if I can help it.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Of course. Jesus will judge how we treat the insane and the aborted.
Swell. Maybe you can get Jesus to fund Kim Ki-jong's defense costs, court costs, investigative costs, incarceration costs... and victims medical cost... AFTER he tried killing someone in 2010 with a piece of concrete.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Just because Id rather not protect the criminal and stupid, by regulating society with welfare, parole, probation, seat belts, motorcycle helmets and chocking hazard warnings on toys, does not make me a eugenisist.
I want Mother Nature to take her course, along with the help from an executioner, after a trial by peer, to chlorinate the gene pool that liberal people like you have created with your sympathy and tax and spend ideology.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
If any retard and deformed person has shown to be a threat to society, by slashing and stabbing his peers, then of course. Kill it.
I guess this leaves me out...I mean really people, their knife, my glock?
But I would not hesitate to shoot to 'Kill it' either, if it continued it's suicidal attack on me, or my family.
("We sing about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about whether or not He exists". ~ Jeff Foxworthy)
But I would not hesitate to shoot to 'Kill it' either, if it continued it's suicidal attack on me, or my family.
EXACTLY.
And like in this case, if the victim doesn't vaporize this dangerous subject, like you or I would have, I would hope our justice system would after a trial by peer
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
And like in this case, if the victim doesn't vaporize this dangerous subjects, like you or I would have, I would hope our justice system would after a trial by peer
His mommy, his teachers, and his government, all of them said knives and guns were dangerous, he swallowed It all, hook, line, and sinker, so he never carried either one. Poetic Justice!
GATLIN SAID: "...hope our justice system would after a trial by peer..."
So would I, maybe twenty years ago.
I believe our prayers will soon be our only hope left, because without them, we are all lost, with 'HIM', there is no hope. ~JMHO
("We sing about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about whether or not He exists". ~ Jeff Foxworthy)
I understand you are against the death penelty, Hillary.
You a PETA member too? lol
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
If Jeb Bush came up and slashed your face. Would you give him a blue ribbon? I like how anti-abortionists love to kill people they find no utility in. I am glad I left the GOP behind.
Why not just answer the question.
The guy in the article attacked someone with concrete (trying to kill them?)
Now he slashes someones face (trying to kill them?)
If someone attempts murder not once but twice what should the penalty be.
I'm for the death penalty I suppose. Since I would be for it if someone killed a member of my family. I am a little against it. Just because I wouldn't want them to get the wrong person.
I believe our prayers will soon be our only hope left, because without them, we are all lost, with 'HIM', there is no hope. ~JMHO
lol...major correction!
'Without HIM', there is no hope. ~JMHO
("We sing about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about whether or not He exists". ~ Jeff Foxworthy)
I like how anti-abortionists love to kill people they find no utility in. I am glad I left the GOP behind.
I hate how liberals like to let murderers live and kill innocent kids. Then they call them fetuses to try and relieve their conscience.
I am not a liberal and I am not against the death penalty - the mentally ill being killed because they are mentally ill I am against. It's OK - it backs up my disregard for American Protestantism.
the mentally ill being killed because they are mentally ill I am against.
Unfortunate for you, nobody ever suggested that... not even the poster you were calling "Adolph"
I only suggested "killing it" because it's a dangerous, repeat attempted killer. Retarded or not.
So... I'm left to wonder why you put out an anti death penelty plug...
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
To: Pericles the mentally ill being killed because they are mentally ill I am against. It's OK I'm not for killing anyone simply because they are "mentally ill".
Nobody ever even came close to suggesting that... I think this poster is a bit "sensitive"
lol
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Then it shouldn't be too difficult to cut and paste anything I posted that directly said... kill retards because they are retards.
Every post lends to killing CRIMINALLY DANGEROUS PEOPLE... after a trial by peer. And they deserve it.
You're sypmathetic weakness caused you to jump at your conclusion... based on nothing I insinuated.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Now kill him... he no longer has value to society...
Nice of you to cut and paste just half of my quote.... How about the WHOLE QUOTE.
"Now kill him... he no longer has value to society... and is a danger to all. Something you should have realized with the concrete incident."
You are guilty of deception in the 1st degree, should be a felony on a forum like this... To Wit; on 3/8/15 at 10:40 pm, the above named defendant did willingly, intentionally and unlawfully attempted to deceive the readers of Liberty Flame, by posting only a partial quote. The defendant did so with the intent to make another poster appear wrong, allowing the defendant to not have to admit their own wrongness.
You should be banished from the Internet for what you've done.
Cops do the same thing to avoid ADMITTING they are wrong... and when you lie... it always makes it worse. It's not hard to ADMIT YOU WERE WRONG.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
The man, who seems insane, did not kill anyone yet you propose his death. Barbaric scum.
He tried to kill two people. One he stabbed and slashed... the other he attacked with a block of concrete. DOES HE HAVE TO KILL before your bleeding heart can stomach his demise?
Frankly, I came to this forum to debate with honest people. I don't care if they are libtards or conservatives. You have some liberal qualities that you purposely keep in the closet, to deceive. You couldn't even be straight with Stone.... and you certainly weren't honest with your cut and paste of my quote. I have no interest conversing with a closet anyone. When you come out of the closet, let me know. We can continue debates then. Until then, continue to hide your Liberalism behind the libertarian venue of this forum.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
