Cabinet OKs Iraq Troop Dispatch (S Korea to send 3,000 to Kirkuk, Iraq)

[VolcanoJen]

http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/200312/kt2003122316433910230.htm

Excerpt:

Deployment of the nation's contingent of 3,000 troops to the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk will begin in April until the end of next year to help rebuild the war-devastated Middle Eastern nation, officials said on Tuesday.

The Seoul government finalized the decision during a Cabinet meeting at Chong Wa Dae.

The Defense Ministry plans to refer the proposal, signed by President Roh Moo-hyun, to the National Assembly, which is likely to endorse it since the major political parties have been supporting the plan.

Seoul officials recently visited Washington to coordinate the matter with U.S. officials, who complied with the former¡¯s plan to station the troops in Kirkuk, according to a Chong Wa Dae official.

[wingnut]

1. ROK troops are badass

nobody to mess with.

[TheLastMohican]

3. I guess Iraqi resistance doesn't differentiate

whose troops it is going to kill. Koreans or Latvians they are as good of a target as anyone else. This is the fate of all occupiers whose presence in the occupied land was never ratified by the people of Iraq.

[chenGOD]

2. I guess $11 billion was the price the S. Korean govt. set?

http://taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2003/06/07/2003054290


I wish the South Korean govt. would have stuck with their plan to only send non-combat troops.

Long time between now and April, maybe there will be enough of an outcry for the govt. to change their mind.

[Barrett808]

4. Kirkuk -- ground zero of the civil war

Ethnic clashes rock Kirkuk
By Marwan Ibrahim in Kirkuk
Wednesday, 24 December , 2003, 04:38

Kurdish and Arab students clashed on Tuesday in the northern Iraqi oil city of Kirkuk as US troops rounded up suspected anti-US insurgents and radical Islamists.

An Iraqi policeman was wounded during clashes between Kurdish and Arab students in Kirkuk, 255 kilometres (155 miles) north of Baghdad, where ethnic tensions are on the rise.

The policeman was trying to separate the fighting students and three Kurdish students and one Turkman were arrested following the tussle at Kirkuk's Technical College, according to Police Captain Athir Ghazi.

The fight erupted after Kurdish students refused to allow the Iraqi flag to be raised. The college's dean then asked students to lower all Kurdish, Turkmen and Iraqi flags, but the Kurdish students refused and students came to blows.

(more)

http://sify.com/news/international/fullstory.php?id=13344032