{"id":777,"date":"2011-10-18T08:01:49","date_gmt":"2011-10-18T08:01:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=777"},"modified":"2021-06-07T15:28:28","modified_gmt":"2021-06-08T01:28:28","slug":"sung-chul-yang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2011\/10\/18\/sung-chul-yang\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Korean ambassador uses lessons learned at M\u0101noa"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> < 1<\/span> minute<\/span><\/span>

\"Sung<\/p>\n

Born in the southwestern region of South Korea, Sung Chul Yang<\/strong> was 10 years old when the Korean War erupted. Dead bodies littered the ditches. Shell casings were his toys. “We lived in a world where death and destruction were simply routine,” he recalled.<\/p>\n

Coming to believe that war is “a tragic merry-go-round,” he has devoted his professional career to efforts toward reconciliation and peace between North and South Korea.<\/p>\n

While pursuing his master’s degree at the University of Hawaiʻi<\/span> at Mānoa as an East-West Center grantee in 1965, he sought to understand different points of view and the cultures of his fellow grantees, skills that would later serve his as an ambassador.<\/p>\n

Yang earned a PhD<\/abbr> from the University of Kentucky and spent 30 years as a university professor in the United States and South Korea before his election to the Korean National Assembly.<\/p>\n

An internationally renowned expert on Korean politics and diplomacy, he served as the Republic of Korea’s ambassador to the U.S. from 2000 to 2003.<\/p>\n

Today Ambassador Yang lives just outside Seoul and chairs the advisory committee of the Kim Dae-Jung Peace Foundation. He continues to advocate for reconciliation and peaceful reunification, citing a Korean proverb: “In 10 years, even mountains and rivers change.” There is no better alternative, he insists, and no lasting peace for East Asia without it. <\/p>\n

Read the 2003 M\u0101malama<\/em> profile<\/a><\/p>\n

.<\/p>\n

Adapted from East-West Center: Fifty Years, Fifty Stories<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

University of Hawaiʻi<\/span> alumnus and former academic and diplomat Sung Chul Yang works for peaceful reunification of North and South Korea.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[90,9],"class_list":["post-777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-alumni","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t