#also i completely missed that Heir was also in dai! what!! shes the assassin specialization trainer

[sirotras]

just poking around frosty editor with veilguard is pretty neat, not all the information in the character notes can be taken as Fact of course, but its fun to see what you can get in there

based off the notes abt the inquisitor, it seems like they were at some point planned to have a more involved or direct role in the game. i get why that was probably cut for resources' sake, but i personally would have liked that

also it seems like charter was planned to be in the game, thats cool! she has an entry like most other npc's, as the liason between the inquisitor and the veilguard team

theres no way to tell when things changed over the course of development, but its neat to get a little glimpse, i think

[auroracalisto]

don’t let them see you cry chapter six, all these silent ghosts | previous chapter — the handler—the very reason for your personal slice of hell. haunting your every move… in your sleep, during the slow hours of the day. the swedish brothers—should have been strangers who show up and show you that you are more than what she told you. you are more than your mind allows you to believe. and you—the very person who will end the misery that plagues your mind. word count: 1k words tw: handler being a shit person, questionable actions made by lila, slight mention of not important character death a/n: a bit of a filler chapter, but it's more of an inside scoop on the handler and lila, and the reader's past. it's a bit short, but i thought it would be a good addition. ♡ i absolutely love lila and i know i don't go into too much detail with her actual character here, but i could just imagine how good of a sister she would be, if faced with the adversity i've placed here. lila has seen so much in her life, and her mother treats her sister badly?? nah. no way. miss girl isn't having it. also, i hope this chapter makes sense. i've re-written it five times now. i'm done. here’s the link to the story on ao3

Since she was a young girl, a part of her had always wanted to be a mother. She wanted to give the life she never had to a well-deserving child, no matter what it would take.

Having a thirst for vengeance and perfection, she never had time to find the perfect partner. So, she set off to find a child the easy way. 

She found the perfect child—one of the forty-three children born in October 1989. She used an assassin, one long dead before Lila came along, to kill this child’s family before she took the baby. She raised her as her own, loving and doting on the child until she realized that this child she could have been killed for was nothing special.

She had no powers—nothing phenomenal had happened. Her birth was completely ordinary.

This child was ordinary, through and through, and she had been fed the wrong information.

She adopted the wrong child.

The anger she felt was undeniable. Perhaps, indescribable was the right word. She couldn't believe this.

How dare she be wrong?

How dare someone as prolific and pristine as she, do something wrong? 

This was not good. Someone had to pay. The assassin didn’t last long as the Handler filed a bogus report on the man, but one that was quickly taken care of. And as for the child—now, she was screwed. She couldn’t just abandon the child. She knew her as her mother. A part of her ached to give this child exactly what she had set out to do, but the rest of her screamed, this would never be right.

Not for what she needed. Not for the future she had planned out for herself, long ago.

She didn’t want it.

No, deep down in her heart, she knew she would never want this child. She couldn't help it. 

And instead of showering this child with the affection she deserved, she chose to find another one. She would be far more careless, nearly causing a mortally cosmic by-product for the Commission. However, she adopted Lila—the right child. A child who truly was one of the forty-three children, and not just a child who was born the same day. She raised Lila as her rightful heir, while young Y/n never quite understood what she did wrong.

She never knew why her mother hated her so much.

But the child lived in her mother’s shadows, accepting what she was given. She saw how Lila was treated, and although she was jealous at times, her mind had convinced her that it was just how her mother was—she couldn’t show love the same way to different people.

At times, Y/n had herself convinced that she must have done something terrible to her mother. She was convinced that there was something wrong with her—some kind of imperfection that she would never truly unravel.

A mystery that would stay under wraps.

Years of Lila questioning her mother went by, trying to figure out what was so different between the two of them. Lila was only answered with a threat—"ask again and you’ll be treated the same way.”

One she remembered quite often was, “She will never be you.”

Lila didn’t often speak with her sister about it, terrified that she would trigger something deep within her mother. But she would have done anything to get you out of there.

She did what she could—convincing you to get in trouble, trying her hardest to keep your mother from hurting you. She wanted you to do anything bad enough that would potentially have your mother send you away. At least, then, you would be away from all of the hell she caused you.

It was her fault that you had those scars on your neck—but it was also because of her that you weren’t hurt even worse by your mother.

And it was her fault that no one was paying attention when you snuck out into the Commission hallways, each and every time. She would say something about how no one would be around to catch you if you wanted to walk around. She would tell you to be careful, and that she would keep your mother busy for a while. 

When you were caught, guilt riddled Lila culpable. It was her fault, after all. But because of Lila, who was grateful for her influence on your mother, she had gotten you to the sixties, away from your mother and away from the Commission.

She missed her sister more than anything. Lila would have done anything for you, even if you would never know it was because of her. She did her best to keep you safe, going as far as keeping your mother distracted up until the point she was sent out for yet another mission of her own—to destroy the Umbrella Academy. 

Your mind would forever ridicule you and haunt you because of what your mother did, while she would live without a care in the world for you. If she could have gotten rid of you sooner, she would have, but Lila seemed to take a liking to you. She couldn't have hurt her daughter in such a way. She wouldn't have been able to live with herself (okay, maybe she would have, but anyone could tell that she would have told Lila the opposite).

Without her unexceptional daughter, the Handler could focus on what she was put in this timeline to do. At least, for the time being, that would be ending the Umbrella Academy and Five Hargreeves—the only person who knew the truth about both of her adoptions and the very person who would bring forth the end of the world.

Lila wasn't there to influence her any more than she already had. The Handler jumped on every opportunity that now laid itself out in front of her.

Assigning the Swedes to kill the Umbrella Academy should have gone swimmingly. Things should have gone by swiftly, coming to an end as soon as she had sent them there (like their missions normally did).

But of course, nothing ever goes as planned. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that one out.

Unfortunately, there were some people in the world who never gave up, even when the universe shouted at them to stop. The Handler was one of them. She never quite knew when to stop, and perhaps that would be her downfall. 

next chapter

[onlyanidala]

onlyanidala fic archive

These are fics with titles J-P.

A-D     E-I     R-T     U-Z

searchable desktop version available here

more anidala fics can also be found in our fic tag!

the link for each fic can be found by clicking the title!

Title: just a bliss Author:  stranestelle Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  A lightheaded Anakin Skywalker wakes up to the heavenly vision that is Padmé Amidala. Can you blame the man for wanting to kiss his wife on the spot? Well you can, when the whole thing is witnessed by a room full of senators caught in a hostage situation... and she'd really rather they had waited for later.

Title: just carry me home tonight Author: gemma Status: complete Rating: R Summary:  "I – I didn't mean to, it's only that… Well, the Force, it lets me feel… What you feel, and I know this wasn't exactly what you imagined for your wedding night, so I…" His flesh hand rose to scratch his neck awkwardly, "I suppose I just wanted to make this special for you…"

Title: king of my heart Author:  catiiasofia & misschrisdaae Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  Anakin Skywalker's holiday to the small country of Naboo takes an unexpected turn when he unknowingly foils an assassination attempt meant for Padmé Naberrie, the nation's Crown Princess. Saving a Princess is crazy enough. The only thing crazier... well, actually, there are a few things. Things Anakin is well on his way to experiencing.

Title: lights in the valley outshine the sun Author: elizabeth7 Status: complete Rating: G Summary:  What would happen if Padme survived and Darth Vader finds out? Padme & Anakin Darth Vader.

Title: look into my eyes it’s where my demons hide Author: shelivesfree Status: WIP/Unupdated Rating: T Summary:  Each time he comes back to her, a little piece of him is missing... left out there, in the field, with his brothers. She can see it in the way he smiles and it doesn't reach his eyes. In the way he cries to himself when he thinks she's not awake. And all she can do is hold him.

Title: lost Author: pinkeastereggs Status: complete Rating: G Summary:  “I feel lost." “Lost . . . what do you mean?” Padme couldn’t help but frown, searching for any signs on her husband’s face that could give her an insight to what he meant. But Anakin was just frowning to the side, seeming conflicted about something. He seemed distant, his eyes filled with an emotion that the young wife couldn’t begin to describe. How long had Anakin had this look in his eyes? Had she been oblivious to it before now or was this something new? Anakin and Padme have a heart-to-heart when he admits to feeling lost and frustrated with the Jedi Council. With truths about his relationship with Palpatine coming to light, Padme fights to talk some sense into her husband.

Title: madam president Author: skywalkersamidala Status: complete Rating: R Summary:  Between late nights and headaches and mountains of paperwork and fierce opposition from her political opponents, President Padmé Amidala already had enough on her plate. And then she just had to go and fall for one of her bodyguards, a relationship which would ruin her reputation and his career if anyone were to find out about it. Also, someone's trying to kill her.

Title: make the world a little colorful Author: estrangedlestrange Status: WIP Rating: G Summary:  The morning after meeting her soulmate, Padmé woke up and saw color for the first time. In the midst of a political crisis, Padmé had just met a gungan, two Jedi, and a slave boy and his mother. She, like any rational young woman, assumed the padawan learner was her soulmate. Ten years later, after having accepted that she would never be with her soulmate, Padmé, reunited with both her supposed soulmate and the slave boy, she realized how wrong her assumptions were. The slave boy, Anakin, who had looked at her with wide hopeful eyes and asked if she was an angel, was her soulmate.

Title: the masterplan Author: stranestelle Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  In the midst of the endless galactic conflict, Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala have made a shocking discovery that brings more questions than answers. And maybe, just maybe, an end to the never-ending war. Sequel to Give Me A Signal.

Title: mother knows best Author:  catiiasofia & misschrisdaae Status: complete Rating: M Summary:  A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.... Shmi Skywalker Palpatine had ruled the Galactic Empire on behalf of her son, Anakin, since the death of his father. For his part, the next Emperor has been content to leave politics to his mother and engage only in military exercises. All that is about to change as Padmé Naberrie, former Queen of Naboo, comes seeking aid for her charity, Amidala's Crusade, and Anakin's long-dormant crush comes surging back. What should be a perfect match is opposed by a mother determined not to lose her son and convinced hers is the only way...

Title: no colors in our skin Author:  JTHM_Michi Status: Abandoned Rating: T Summary:  Anakin grew up knowing that his masters called him the wrong words. They all called him “girl” or “girl-child” and it was just another way for them to dehumanize him. He didn’t know that, of course, not in those words, but it was true enough. His mother was always very clear with him, from the first time he came to her and asked her if she knew which master had taken his “boy parts”, that just because his masters called him a girl didn’t make him one. a.k.a. the Transgender Anakin Skywalker Verse

Title: no heroes on the high seas Author: spellcleaver Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  When Luke's aunt and uncle are executed by order of the Emperor's right hand, Lord Vader, he flees his home to search for his sister and the mother he never knew. But then Obi-Wan Kenobi stows away aboard the same ship, Vader gives chase, and Luke is dragged into a conflict that his family are at the very heart of. Gen.

Title: nos cedamus amori Author: skywalkersamidala Status: complete Rating: M Summary:  Anakin is a gladiator and a slave. Padmé is the wife of the Roman emperor's heir. Circumstances should never even allow them to meet, let alone fall in love.

Title: of mutated worlds Author: gemma Status: WIP Rating: M Summary:  Nobody saw the end of the world coming. It happened overnight, no warning, no escape. They came from the shadows, biting, paralysing, and killing little by little until they were the majority. One day, everything was normal and then, suddenly, Padme Amidala Naberrie woke up in hell.

Title: of options and comlinks Author: estrangedlestrange Status: complete Rating: G Summary:  In that moment it seemed like there were only two options: help Master Windu arrest the Chancellor and secret Sith Lord or heed to Sheev Palpatine’s begging and turn against the Jedi. But then, in a split second, a third option revealed itself.

Title: order 66-S Author: disco shop girl Status: complete Rating: M Summary:  The order was to exterminate all Jedi: Past, Present and Future. Captain Rex has a different plan. Order 66-S: to save General Skywalker.

Title: parent-teacher conference Author: skywalkersamidala Status: complete Rating: G Summary:  Anakin has to meet with the twins' second grade teacher after Leia punches a classmate in the face. But he hadn't counted on Ms. Amidala being quite so pretty.

Title: pas de deux Author:  catiiasofia & misschrisdaae Status: complete Rating: M Summary:  When Padmé Amidala and Anakin Skywalker meet at their mutual friends' house party, the sparks immediately fly, resulting in a one night stand that both of them want to be the start of something more. Except it turns out that Padmé works at the ballet company Anakin just took over. And Anakin is in the middle of a very heated divorce as he tries to gain custody of his daughter Leia. With pressure coming at them from their private and professional lives, making their fledgling relationship work will prove the biggest role of a lifetime.

Title: the path of the dark Author:  catiiasofia & misschrisdaae Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  Vader triumphs. Padmé resists. Series:Three Paths Not Followed. Series: The Darker Path.

Title: perfect Author: skywalkersamidala Status: complete Rating: G Summary:  The war is over, Luke and Leia are five years old, and Anakin and Padmé finally have the peaceful life and big family they've always dreamed of. But their life is about to get a little less peaceful and their family a little bigger.

Title: perfect strangers Author:  catiiasofia & misschrisdaae Status: complete Rating: R Summary:  Anakin Skywalker meets a masked angel at a Halloween costume ball, and the two of them hook up for the best night of his life. But when the morning comes, she is nowhere to be found. Padmé Amidala forgot to get the name of a guy she hooked up with at Halloween before running out for work on November 1. A few weeks later, she realizes she's pregnant. Two perfect strangers, certain their paths are never going to cross again. Oops.

Title: pipe dream Author: skywalkersamidala Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  Padmé's new plumber is the most attractive human being she's ever laid eyes on, so naturally, she keeps faking plumbing emergencies so she can keep seeing him.

Title: pocket full of sand Author: philthestone Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  “I’m Leia Skywalker,” she says, and there is something unfathomably life-changing about that little declaration. “We’re here to rescue you!” Luke remembers the circumstances of his mother's arrest with a frustrating amount of clarity. AU series where Anakin never falls, Padme is a spy in the senate, and the dynamic duo of Force Sensitive twins don't know they're related.

Title: purgatory Author: helent Status: complete Rating: T Summary:  A newly dead Anakin Skywalker wakes in a new world - given the appearance of his 23 year-old self. However, the self-sacrifice that ended his life has also given Anakin an unexpected boon that he isn't sure he can accept. Worse, it comes with conditions that might just be impossible to meet. A moment of redemption is one thing, but a full reformation another entirely.

[mandyizzym]

Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4)

by Sarah J. Maas

“She looked at them, at the three males who meant everything—more than everything. Then she smiled with every last shred of courage, of desperation, of hope for the glimmer of that glorious future. “Let’s go rattle the stars.”

OH MY DAAAAYZZZZ!! THIS SERIES JUST GETS BETTER AND BETTER!  I won't lie, I was dubious it wouldn't live up to the previous book, but I enjoyed it just as much.  I have really fallen in love with Sarah J. Mass.

Finally, Aelin embraces who she truly is, Aelin Galathynius, Queen of Terrasen.  Back in Rifthold, she has a few scores to settle and it's not going to be pleasant.  With her young prince entrapped in his own hell by his father and a cousin who would lay his life on the line for her, she needs to get to work and quickly.  With her heart missing her fae Prince and seeing the captain of the guard again, can Aelin deal with the shadows of her past and work to free those she loves?

I absolutely adore our team, I have fallen in love with every single one of them and I couldn't put the book down it actually killed me when I had to go to work for my long shifts so I had 3 days before I could pick it up again, but I managed to finish it within 2 days!  I was gripped, with a warrior queen hell-bent on raising hell, a group of badass witches, Fae & Shapeshifters, it's my kind of storyline.

We see Celaena finally turn into the queen that she is, I must admit though, does hair dye really change someone that much that no one notice who she is?!  The Kings Champion?  One of the deadliest assassins eveeeer!!  I'm not buying it but hey whatever.

I was completely in love with Manon and Asterin here, they have gone through so much together and when Asterin finally opened up to Manon, oh to holy gods the tears were real!  I was breaking my heart.  Also, the whole Manon and Elide relationship was so unexpected and it gripped me.  Elide was such a little lamb I just wanted to hide her away.

Lysandra really surprised me throughout the book, I thought things were going to go the other way and Aelin would be hurt once again.  I was forever on my toes and I must admit women in this book absolutely kick ass!!  Kaltain taking control blew me away I was loving the second part of the book so hard I didn't know who I was crushing on more the women or the men!

I can't forget our leading males.  Rowan, Aedion, Dorian and Choal, my my my what a lovely bunch to pick from.  Dorian always has a special place in my heart, he was a winner from the start but then Choal was such a sweetheart.  Aedion really gets you in this book so much so that you can just imagine how hot a character in a TV Series/Movie would have to be to play him.  Then we have our Rowan who appears just in time, by the heavens sweet Rowan!  I don't know who I love more.

The book is written extremely well, there was plenty of character growth and the chemistry between the characters was amazing.  It really was a great read, I nearly loved it as much as I loved Heir of Fire and I can't wait to carry on with the series!

“They joined hands.  So the world ended.  And the next one began.”

[benjenstcrk-blog]

ᶰᵒʷ ᵐʸ ʷᵃᵗᶜʰ ᵇᵉᵍᶤᶰˢˑ  omfg. so. do you guys want to read something that i wrote? it’s not benjen related, it’s essentially about a high born OC i created before i ever joined the GOT fandom. but this is what inspired me to write as benjen stark! it’s honestly a little cringey and unrealistic, but i really enjoyed writing it! it’s clearly inspired by certain aspects of the show and other  characters stories. 

but the main reason it made me want to write as benjen was because the girl, she was in love with beej. <3 i could honestly write a novel about the thought of benjen stark having a childhood sweetheart.

ANYWAY. read it!!!! feel free to tell me what you think —– yes i realize it’s unrealistic and pretty well impossible, because this character i wrote pretty much gets along with everyone. but keep in mind this was BEFORE i joined the fandom! and if you think about the love story between the girl and benjen, it’s adorable.

Growing up the youngest Baratheon, sister of Robert, Stannis and Renly Baratheon was not an easy life. She was constantly picked on by her older brothers and she was always stuck inside learning how to be a proper lady, when all she wished for was to be outside, learning to wield a sword and defend herself like her brothers.

“That is not the life for a lady, you will stay inside and mind your Septa.” Her father, Lord Steffon Baratheon would tell her. She loathed him at times for that, but he was never cruel to her. He and her Lady Cassana loved her dearly.

Hells, even her brothers were not cruel with her, her heart was simply longing for elsewhere.

However, as often as she possibly could, whatever way she possibly could, she practiced the stances she saw her brother take, and imagined herself fighting her enemies. She would often sneak outside and bother the stable boy.

Sometimes, she would even have to bully him into practicing with her. “I can’t m’lady I can’t fight with a Lady.” Mycha would say, little blue eyes bulging out of his head. “You will fight with me,” she would threaten, “or I’ll tell my father you hit me.”

She hated being in King’s Landing, in Storm’s End, she always longed for the days when they gathered up and visited the Stark’s in Winterfell.

Lyanna Stark, the only daughter of Rickard Stark was her best friend. She sent Raven’s to her all the time. She, was also her brother Robert’s betrothed, when they were to come of age. As much as her brother was annoying and pompous, she knew that he would be loving and true to Lyanna, so she didn’t mind it that much.

It was always a pleasure seeing Brandon, the eldest Stark child. He was noble and strong, she admired him greatly Eddard, the second eldest Stark, was the only sensible man she ever got to talk to. And she did that, talked to him a lot, she would spend hours talking to him, whenever she could manage to find him away from Robert. He and Ned were best friends, and practically inseparable.

But then, there was Benjen Stark. Benjen was the youngest Stark, and the most handsome in her eyes. He was always telling jokes and lighting up the room. She adored getting to see Benjen, for several reasons.

Firstly, because he treated her like just a regular human being, and not a “lady”. Not that he was disrespectful to her, she simply meant that he treated her normal, and didn’t expect her to act like whatever she was supposed to be. They would sneak summer wine and talk for hours on end without stopping.

Secondly, and mostly, it was because when they were younger, he taught her to properly wield a sword. They would practice every waking minute they possibly could. Being the youngest siblings, it was easy to sneak away unnoticed. Every moment she practiced with Benjen she felt herself getting better and better, she hated the thought that she would ever have to leave.

One time, when they were a bit older, the Stark’s came all the way to Kings Landing to visit her and her family, she beat Benjen in combat. When they had left Winterfell that last time, she had continued practicing. This time, occasionally with the stable boy, but still in secret. She wanted to be ready for the next time she saw Benjen, and she was.

And at that moment, as she stood overtop him, wooden sword pressed to his chest, she knew she was truly in love with him. They shared their first kiss in that same moment. Her second youngest brother, Stannis caught them kissing and immediately went running to father.

Surprisingly enough she wasn’t scolded for what she did. She simply was told that she was not allowed to be with Benjen because Robert was to marry Lyanna and that would make their houses related.

But that didn’t stop their young love. Upon the return of the Stark’s to Winterfell, she and Benjen wrote to each other constantly, professing words of loving and sharing stories of laughter and hope. She couldn’t wait until they got to see each other again.

When next they saw each other, they did not hide their love. They would walk hand in hand, they would steal kisses in the dark, and the day she bled, he made her a woman.

They talked in secret about getting married, having children, perhaps even running away together. Their wild dreams didn’t seem like they were so unattainable, since Eddard had gotten married to Catelyn Tully of Riverrun, started having children… Everything seemed possible.

Until one fateful day. Lyanna was murdered, Brandon was murdered and Lord Rickard was murdered. Nobody knew what to do. Everything was completely inside out.

She wept for days, mourning her childhood best friend, and Robert, her eldest brother completely lost his mind.

Shortly thereafter, she knew that her life was no longer meant to be with the Baratheon’s. She had to leave. First of all, very cautiously, she wrote a letter to Benjen requesting he met her just outside of Winterfell.

Just before everybody went to bed, she ordered them to meet with her. Father, mother, and three brothers. Everyone was busy and hardly had time for this, but she promised to keep it brief. She explained to them that she had to leave. She wasn’t sure where she was going, but there was no place in Kings Landing anymore. Her father fought with her for a while about it, and her mother cried, until her eldest brother stood and spoke up. “She’s a free spirit father, let her go.” And with tears in all of their eyes, she kissed them all gently and fled into the night.

The road was hard, but eventually she did meet up with Benjen. Both were changed. They were truly grown now, and filled with grief. She held him so tight she never wanted to let him go. Before he even let her explain why she was running off, he had a deep sadness in his eyes.

He told her he was joining the Night’s Watch, but she understood why. Even though she understood why, she felt heartbroken. He was so stricken with grief from the loss of his brother, father and sister and he was not the next in line to be heir, there was nothing left for him in Winterfell, he needed a purpose and his was in Castle Black.

Since she knew it meant that he would never marry her, never bare her children, never get to see her again… They spent their last night together, in a barn.

That morning she saw him off, kissing him harder than she ever had in her life. “I’ll never forget you. You are my one and only love.” He said to her. “I couldn’t forget you if I tried.” She whispered softly back.

And there, was when her journey truly began.

She traveled the King’s Road for a long time, managing to keep out of as much trouble as she could, until one night, in the Vale, she ran into a group of men from Braavos, the free city. These were men that were not to be messed with, but that did not stop her.

Time on the road and loss had hardened her.

But she was no match for the Braavosi men. They captured her and brought her to Braavos, and tortured her for years. But through this torture, they taught her to use her senses to fight. She combatted man upon man, blindfolded, with a wooden stick. She failed so many times, until she finally got good enough that she beat everyone.

Their leader, Jaqen H’gahr took particular interest in her. At first, she believed it was because he was cruel and took advantage of her, but she learned that he was training her, because he believed in her strength. “If a girl wants to become powerful, she must become no one.” Was the best piece of advice anyone would have given her.

He taught her to forget who she was. “If a girl tells a man who she is, a man will let her fight without a blind fold.” He would say to her. She would jab at him with her stick. “A girl is no one.” “If a girl tells a man who she is, a man will give her letters from her family.” Another jab, missing him. “A girl is no one.” She would repeat. “If a girl tells a man who she is, a man will let her see Benjen Stark again.” That one made her pause. She would stop, her heart breaking into a thousand pieces. But after many attempts, she struck Jaqen. “A girl. Is. No. One.” She growled fiercely, removing her blindfold and looming over him.

She threw her stick at him, and left to her room.

That night, while she slept, she was visited by Jaqen. He attacked her and she fought back fiercely and nimbly. She got him on his back, and snarled at him. “A girl is no one, how many times must she tell a man?”

He smiled up at her, and explained to her that she was his best student. That there was more to her than anyone else he had ever met. She had a special gift in her. She knew she had Benjen to thank for that, but she couldn’t tell Jaqen that.

He then proceeded to explain to her that they were an elite group of assassins called the Faceless Men, and she was going to become one. “If a girl wishes.”

She agreed. What that meant, was countless days and hours of training in combat. Eventually, she even learned how to change her face, though she did not see the need of it.

She became a woman to be feared. She no longer had any feelings inside her other than to kill and get the job done quickly. She prayed to the Many Faced God now, and the Many Faced God, killing, and Jaqen H’gahr was all she knew anymore.

Jaqen began to fill the void that was in her heart, but not completely. She would make empty love to him all the time, but just to make sure she was still alive.

Years passed, after killing many men, and making much money, she broke her allegiance to the Faceless Men. Whatever debt she owed them had been paid of many moons ago, and she no longer wanted to be a part of this. “Who is a girl?” “A girl is someone who wants to go home. A girl has no home now, but she’s going to make a new one.” She confessed. With little fighting, she managed to be freed of her service to the Faceless Men, and she got all her letters from home handed back to her, along with her sword and they supplied her with a new horse.

Although a girl became no one, she couldn’t help but think about how her brother was married to Cersei Lannister now, with three children. Ned Stark was still happily married to Catelyn Tully and they had five children, and a bastard son. Her mother and father were dead now, and she had nobody to return home to anymore. But she didn’t care.

Her letters were all from Ned and Robert, in all honesty, she just wished she had heard from Benjen at least once. Tears rolled down her face, but no emotion showed other than that.

But the letter that broke her truly, was the letter from Ned saying that Benjen was missing. Hadn’t been found for months. Though her heart was hardened she wept heard for her lost love. Her one and only true love. Come and see me in Kings Landing, if you ever come out of hiding, little lady. Was the last line in that letter, and so, she set off for there.

In a fury of rage sailed to Westeros, and when she reached shore, she didn’t stop riding until she reached Kings Landing. She nearly killed herself and her horse alike, but she made it. “I’m here to see my – my brother. His Grace Robert Baratheon.” She said breathlessly to a blonde haired man, who was no doubt Jamie Lannister – the King slayer.

They didn’t believe her of course, so they captured her and dragged her to the King. Either way, it worked for her.

Her inner thighs were bleeding from being chaffed from her saddle, but the minute the king saw her, his face softened. “Sister.” He whispered under his breath before he commanded everyone out of the room.

Immediately he stood and gave her a huge hug. He had gotten so fat, but she couldn’t even begin to joke about it. She just began to weep into her brother’s chest. “B – B – Ben,” was all she could manage to say. He stroked her hair and held her close shushing her quietly.

After she calmed down, he demanded she tell him where she went off to. She explained to him that she truly couldn’t or they would kill her. But she did tell him that she was in Braavos.  He huffed and puffed for a while, but eventually he sighed and shook his head. “Ned and two of his girls are here too, we’ll put you in a pretty dress, get you cleaned up and we’ll feast and drink like we never have before.” She managed to crack a smile, before she was escorted to be dressed, cleaned and bandaged.

Once she was cleaned up, she was introduced to the Queen and her children. She didn’t particularly like the Lannisters, but she played kind on behalf of her brother. She also got to see Ned Stark again, who was now Hand of the King.

She hugged Ned so tightly, and nearly started to cry, she wanted to say how sorry she was about Benjen, but she knew Ned already knew. He then introduced her to his children Sansa, who was beautiful like Catelyn and Lyanna, and then Arya. “You remind me of myself when I was your age. I didn’t think being a lady was any fun either.” She chuckled warmly as she caressed the young girl’s cheek.

The feast truly was like no other. “To my sister, the little shit.” Was what they toasted, but in her heart, she was toasting Benjen Stark. She would find him.  She feasted well that night, and drank her fair share of summer wine. She hadn’t had southern food in so long, she was actually happy to be back in King’s Landing.  She laughed, and listened to stories and shared her own, meeting all kinds of new people. She didn’t trust a single one of them, but Gods it was good to see Ned Stark.

Perhaps it was becoming Faceless that made her weary of everyone, or perhaps it was that everyone was not to be trusted in Kings Landing, she wasn’t sure yet. But stumbling out of the dinner hall, on the way to her chambers she literally ran into a giant man. She was about to apologize when he turned and said “watch where you’re going bitch.” Quickly he took back his words and bowed politely when he realized who she was. “Apologies my lady, it’s not usually noble women bumping into men in the dark.”

She laughed, and shook her head. She knew how it was in Kings Landing. She knew this man from when she was younger, she recognized him from the burn on the entire left side of his face. He was Sandor Clegane. She asked him who he was anyway, just to make sure. He nodded and said “I go by the Hound now.”

She crinkled her nose and shrugged. They talked all night long. She had the strangest bond with him. A man that was known to be cruel and harsh to people, he seemed to be gentle with her. Perhaps it was because she was just as hardened as he was.

Upon her return to her chamber, the liquor started to wear off and she began to feel a deep sadness consume her. She realized then, that truly, she would never again see Benjen Stark.

Just as tars began to form in her eyes, a knock came at her door, it was Eddard. He looked about as happy as she did. They talked the rest of the night, until it was nearly morning. The two of them fell asleep sitting up next to each other.

Upon waking, she decided that she was going to go out and find Benjen. She had to.

Immediately, she told Eddard. He didn’t think she should, but he knew that there was no changing her mind. But when she told Robert, he was beyond furious. He threw the biggest fit. “I lost my sister once, I’m not losing her again!” she felt hot tears of sadness and anger begin to well in her eyes. “Benjen knows the Haunted Forest better than any other man,” she spat back “he has to be alive somewhere.” Robert continued on raging like a madman. She just sat and listened, there was nothing he could say that would change her mind, and there was nothing she could say that would change his.

She spent the rest of that day with Eddard’s children, learning about them and getting to know them. She also go to see her brother Renly before she left as well.

But, the next morning she was off.  She left at dawn, feeling incredibly good about everything. “You’re not scared to go North of the wall?” the Hound asked her on her way out. “Nothing scares me anymore.” She said, with a warm smile, and just like that, with a small kick to her horse she was off.

[adleryoung]

As I made hurried preparations for a trip down the river to the Gladsome Antglade, I thought about the sequence of events that had led up to this point.

In my capacity as Right Hand of the King, I welcomed two Vulpitanian thaumaturgists to Albric Tor - supposedly so they could research Elfin fertility in an effort to enable the mismatched pair of King Estmere and Queen Edessa to produce an heir.  However, I subsequently learned that the contract (drafted by members of the Sisterhood in the King's Cabinet) actually instructed the SALVs to produce a sire for the King.  My intelligence-gathering network (consisting mainly of Ixies and a potted plant) informed me that the SALVs were attempting to change history so that my half-brother Estmere (already part lowfolk due to his mother having gone through Evan Klive's dastardly Ferifax Arch before Estmere was ever born) would have never been an elf at all.  This would undermine, perhaps completely negate, the legitimacy of the Imperial throne and pave the way for ... I wasn't sure what, but Vulpitanian revolt seemed like a good possibility.

I had to stop this Unseelie plot!  Unfortunately, other forces arrayed themselves against me.  The Sisterhood, it seems, wanted the SALVs to succeed - since they have never considered Estmere to be a proper elf and favor me, a full-blooded descendant of Irenaeus, to occupy the throne instead.  The Vulpitanians have always had their own inscrutable Plans; they can never be trusted under any circumstances.  A pair of Scuti possessing the bodies of Alice Chetsweeks and Mara Supial attempted to capture me, but when that failed they decided to help me in my attempt to simultaneously thwart the Vulpitanians and the Sisterhood, and save my brother the King.  Alice told me a very upsetting tale of how the first Scuti had been born when the first High King, Irenaeus, had tried to preserve his severed tail with powerful magicks.  The Scuti bore royal blood!  (If the story was true..)

Meanwhile, Queen Edessa seemed to have perpetrated a bizarre phony assassination attempt against me, and then spearheaded the prosecution after I was caught sneaking out of the SALVs' laboratory.  The Vulpitanians had been asleep, thanks to my clever application of special herbs & spices to their meal.  While I was there, I jumbled up their chemicals and broke a clay tablet with the name of the Old Crow engraved on it.  In a scrying bowl which showed me the Vulpitanians' dreams, I saw Rotnev Nidab take a gem from inside the tablet and feed it to a Scuti.  I found that gem and stole it, along with a Scuti in a jar.

After I was arrested, but before I was interrogated, I managed to give the gem to one of my Ixie daughters.  I could only hope she took it somewhere safe.  Oddly, when questioned by the Prosecution during my trial, Rotnev stated that nothing important was missing from the lab.  The trial dragged on, without the Prosecutor making much headway in proving the nebulous semi-treasonous charges against me.  My Defense Floozy assured me things were going well for us, until Estmere got bored and declared Trial By Floozy.  My counsel lost the pole-dancing contest, which rendered a technical Guilty verdict.  The Queen wanted me executed, but Estmere declared I should be exiled to a diplomatic listening post on the edge of the Antglade.

"So now here I am, cast out of the Capital in disgrace," I thought glumly as I surrendered my Hand regalia to the bailiff and accepted a bundle containing the uniform of an Antglade Border Agent.

The trip South was delayed by a full day due to Gaps which entirely cut off all routes from Albric Tor to Gladsome Antglade.  Queen Edessa absolutely refused to allow me and my small entourage to travel overland, whether by coach or foot or boat.  It would have required a sojourn through lowfolk country to bypass the Gaps, which - according to her - provided too ample an opportunity for me to escape.

She and Sir Ravenmad put their heads together and spent most of the evening in the Map Room, poring over old navigation codices and charting Gap distribution until they had calculated a route using ancient elvish Gates.  The next morning I was handed a scroll containing detailed directions.  The courier gave a copy to Ms. Thomson, along with a simple scrying device with which she was required to check in at regular intervals.  If Thomson failed to scry at the appointed time, or if we deviated from the route, then troops would be sent after us, with instructions to kill.  We were also told that the route would only work in one direction.  To return to the Capital would require calculating another route, and none of my party knew enough about the old Gate network to do that.

After six Gate jumps we arrived on a low hilltop just upstream from the start of the Antglade.  We walked a mile or two along a jungly, half-overgrown path until we entered a clearing and beheld the Gladsome Antglade Diplomatic Listening Post.

It was an extremely tiny one-and-a-half story building with a veranda running all the way around it, all of which was in much better condition than I expected - considering that it had been abandoned for years since the previous Border Agent disappeared.

"Cute lil' place," SALV Fofox commented.  "It just needs like, a vixen's touch and it'll be totally perfect."

"It's so small," I murmured, staring at the building and absentmindedly fanning myself.  "There can't be but just one room inside.  Is the Agent supposed to work AND live there?"

Thomson merely stared in gloomy silence at the tiny shack.

"Let's go in and look around," Fifi suggested brightly.  "There's probably like, lots of cleaning up to do if it's been empty for so long."

"You're taking this remarkably well," I observed.

"Well, um, YEAH," she smirked.  "I like, volunteered, remember?  If I'm gonna be like, your duly appointed SALV then I'm totally gonna take my responsibilities like, all serious and stuff."

"What do your letter of rank stand for?" I asked curiously.

"Check it out!  I got promoted to Special Adjuvant Lamprophonous Vedette.  How cool is that?"

"Nice," I said, not having a clue what any of that meant.

"Now c'mon!  Let's check out the Post!  We gotta sweep and dust, and I've got like tons of motivational posters to put up."

We climbed the front steps and opened the door.

The shack was, as I suspected, a single room.  One half of it contained a small kitchen with a washbasin and a wood-burning stove.  The other half was almost filled by a bulky desk with a chair on either side of it.  A skeleton with a small axe embedded in its skull slumped in one of the chairs.

"That solves the mystery of what happened to the previous Agent," Ms. Thomson observed grimly.

"Does," I gulped.  "Does anybody else suspect .. foul play?"

"Nah, head-axings happen all the time," Fifi remarked dismissively.  "I'll get that pile of bones out of here when I clean.  OOH!"  She pointed excitedly upward, into the half-loft above, where a hammock was strung precariously between the roof beams.  "Just big enough for two!  Looks like that's where we'll be sleeping, Adler muh man."

"How dare you presume to share His Highness's hammock?" Ms. Thomson objected, brandishing her parasol for emphasis.  "That is MY responsibility."

"Nuh-uh," Fifi fired back.  "I've been deputed by the Republic of Vulpitania to monitor this Cute & Dangerous Offender, which means I totally gotta keep my eyes and whatever else I can on him at all times.  Which means especially at night, coz when it's dark it's like, prime sneakin-around time."

Before this argument could develop further, we were interrupted by a shrill whistle and a hoarse voice calling "HOWDY IN THAR!"

We ran out onto the back veranda to see a rickety-looking wooden flat boat sliding among the weeds in a shallow marsh just a few yards away from the back of the Listening Post.  Karen the Boatperson stood in the prow and solemnly grappled her pole as she maneuvered the boat into position.  Two figures hunched behind her on the floor of the boat.  The stern was taken up by a huge ornate wicker throne, upon which sat Duchess Catherine O'Daisies, languidly fanning herself in the sticky swamp air.

"Well, well, if it ain't Prince Adler his own self," she purred.  "How you been, sugar?  I heard you was comin, so I figured I'd get myself all gussied up an' pay a formal call.  I reckon you ain't seen me in my Regalia, have you?  Whatcha thank?"

"It's um .. impressive," I stammered.  She seemed to be wearing a suit of bright red flannel underwear with frilly lace at the collar, wrists, and ankles.

"You seem a lil' anxious," the Duchess observed with a note of concern.  "Somethin' the matter?  All tuckered out from the trip, maybe?  Or, I bet I know what it is - you done met your predeceaser in thar.  Heh heh.  Paid him a lil' ol' personal call too.  But don't you worry none.  Head-axe ain't catchin', an' yer much too purty anyway.  For now all I done is brung ya some presents.  Here's your very own personal Antglade Spy to watch ever'thang you do an' report back to me, an' here's your official Antglade Attache to staff the other side o' that thar desk."

"It will be an honor spying on you, Your Highness," Lemmy said with a tip of his hat.  "And it's nice to see you again.  I can't wait to get all caught up on what's been happening."

The small raccoon femme simply nodded at me and said nothing.

"I also brung ya a shackwarmin' gift," the Duchess continued.  "It's a genuine usquebaugh-cured lowfolk ham.  Dee-licious!  Lemmy, tote that thang on into the Station now.  The Prince and I got matters to discuss.  I'm real, REAL interested, Adler honey, to hear how you done got the Vulpitanians an' the Sisterhood an' the Queen all mad at ya at the same time.  Specially the Queen, that's extry fascinatin'.  Seems like you 'n me's got more in common than either of us figured, so let's us just set a spell an' chew the fat."

She smiled ingratiatingly from her chair as Lemmy splashed out of the water and lugged an enormous misshapen ham across the lawn.  The small raccoon femme clambered out of the boat and waded through the marsh weeds after him.

"The Station sets on neutral territory," the Duchess explained after a long pause.  "I ain't allowed to leave the Antglade, but I can come set on your back stoop."

I blinked at her for a few additional seconds.

"You gotta invite me, honey," she clarified.

[crossedswordsrp]

The Humanist

❛ And when my prayers to God were met with indifference, I picked up a pen and I wrote my own deliverance. ❜

Full Name His Eminence Cardinal Armaud Rossignol Alias “The Nightingale” Age 56 (b. 1585) Alliance The Crown/Catholic Church Position Chief Minister to France Negative Traits Manipulative, Ruthless, Suspicious Positive Traits Ambitious, Brilliant, Passionate

Armaud was born the second son of three in a family of down on their luck aristocrats. He had the further misfortune of having been conceived while his father, a French soldier, was visiting the family homestead of Sarlat in southwestern France in the middle of the Wars of Religion. The death of his father during the Wars only served further to leave the already struggling family nearly completely bankrupt, with little more than their manor and a hereditary title of bishop of Sarlat to their name. Growing up missing and idolizing a lost father and raised to love both King and Country, Armaud had decided early on that he was to follow his father’s footsteps in becoming a soldier, while his elder brother, Jean-Michel, was to inherit the family manor and his much-loved younger brother Philippe was to inherit the diocese by becoming a monk.

However, such plans were tragically cut short when Jean-Michel, Armaud and Philippe had made a journey to Paris with their mother, who was eager to present her sons further to other members of nobility. Fate, however, was not kind to them when Armaud and Philippe – noting easily that their elder brother due to his years was the center of attention, decided to excuse themselves from court early to return to their inn. They took a shortcut through the outskirts of the Court of Miracles, where they were robbed at knifepoint by a small group of thieves. While Armaud compiled to the thieves’ demands, the more spirited Philippe resisted, and in front of his horrified older brother, he was stabbed to death, dying in Armaud’s arms.

A shattered and grieving Armaud, freshly driven with the knowledge of the transience of life, upon return to Sarlat gave up his dreams of becoming a soldier in order to secure the diocese by becoming a monk in Philippe’s place. He joined the Abbey of Saint-Sauveur of Sarlat to secure his family’s possessions. He did well there – likely much better than he ever would as a soldier – and became Bishop of Sarlat at the age of twenty one in 1606, for which he received special dispensation from  Pope Paul V. Armaud entered royal politics first as almoner (head of the religious branch of the royal household) to Queen Marie-Claire Valois, and soon after to become Secretary of Foreign Affairs in 1609, and later a Cardinal. After the death of the king’s favorite minister, Georges Delafose, the Cardinal was appointed as Chief Minister to France in 1612. Although much beloved by King Louis Valois, he was viewed with great suspicion by the Queen Marie-Claire, who saw his quick rise through politics as a sign of undue ambition, especially as the King seemed to listen to the Cardinal more than to her. Distrusting the amount of influence Armaud had with the King, she schemed for a way to unseat him.

Armaud’s deliverance from Marie-Claire came from an unusual direction in the King’s infatuation with a young girl from the Court of Miracles, Angeline Baptiste. Despite his prejudices concerning those from that rat’s nest of a place, he saw this as an opportunity to rob the Queen of political power and secure his own, and so encouraged the match. He even pulled strings in multiple systems to have a surreptitious divorce settled between the King and the Queen and an equally surreptitious marriage occur between the King and Angeline. All of this was kept out of the knowledge of the vast majority of the Court with the assistance of then-Grand Master Jean Bourbon, due to the King’s request, who wanted to father an heir by Angeline before the controversial match was released to the people. However, Angeline, kept out of the public eye, died giving birth to the true heir, and the King died himself under mysterious circumstances soon before. Seeing the death of the King as a potential assassination, Armaud acted fast to secure his future potential ace. He had the true heir sent away secretly to the down-on-their-luck Dubois family, whose matriarch Alais, eager for standing, raised the boy among her own children.

Armaud still serves as Chief Minister to France, supporting to all who view him the bastard son of Marie-Claire, and playing keen games of power with her. He is known as the one of the most powerful men in France, and he has one goal and one goal alone: to forge France into the most powerful realm the world had ever seen, a goal that would have made his father proud. Believing himself in power to be the best way to serve France, he created his own private army in 1623 – the Red Guard – as an answer to the then Queen Regent Marie-Claire’s 1622 creation of the Musketeers. He put regional governors in different counties, having them report directly to him rather than local lords, and created a cloak and dagger spy network unlike the world had ever seen. In the meantime, he keeps the former Queen Regent pacified by discovering and executing anyone considered for treason and heavily keeping an eye on the Court of Miracles. France is set on the world stage to become a giant– and Armaud believes that he is the best man to lead it there - for the good of the country.

Connections

Danièle Lavigne (Non-player character) - One of Marie-Claire’s ladies-in-waiting who had been feeding him information about the then-Queen, Armaud found himself drawn to her despite his focused ambitions. The two shared several months of mutual, quiet, and surreptitious passion. Despite the brevity of their involvement, there was a part of him that was joyful as well as conflicted when Danièle had told him that she was pregnant - seeing it as perhaps a chance to claim a part of family that had been lost. For the first time since his brother’s death, Armaud was struck with a potential choice of slowing down ---with the payment of being present in the raising of his child. However, unfortunately, that choice was never his. In late 1613, Danièle left the Palace unexpectedly without notifying him of where she was going, likely in an attempt to save him from shame. Heartbroken, unable to try to locate her lest he reveal their secret, Armaud comforts himself that she might still wear the small golden band that he had given her around her finger. Although he has long thrown himself back head-first into politics, he does still wonders what became of their child - who they are, where they are, and if they know how much they are loved.

Marie-Claire — Former Queen Regent, Marie-Claire had a child by the late King Louis Valois - but while she and Louis, her ex-husband, were divorced - her son King Alexandre Valois is a bastard. Armaud and Marie are on opposing sides, with Marie both distrusting him for the rumored role he played in her ex-husband’s divorce of her and the Cardinal’s current and heavy influence upon her son. The seemly mild mannered Armaud sees her in return as a dangerous, power-grabbing radical trying to poison the king against him – precisely the thing that would ruin France. However, both at the moment – due to their firm entrenching - must pretend courtly affability as they scheme against the other so as not to give the game away.

Philippe Donadieu – The unknowing legitimate heir to the throne is the Cardinal’s ace up his sleeve. The former Queen Regent is a problem, and so he likes to keep Philippe in reserve, scheming that one day he will take the throne instead of Marie-Claire's son Alexandre. Philippe – named by Alais after Armaud’s brother in an attempt to endear herself to the Cardinal – was kept a close eye on growing up by his adopted mother (and Armaud’s spy) Alais Dubois. Putting aside his prejudices for the good of France, Cardinal himself played the role of kindly benefactor, visiting the boy occasionally as he grew under the pretense of seeing to the family Dubois, and subtly manipulating Philippe to the join the Church where the Cardinal would be able to keep an eye on him. Not long after Philippe became a full priest, Armaud manipulated to have his monk’s vows annulled and had the boy plucked from Compiègne Abbey (Abbaye Saint-Corneille de Compiègne), and transferred to Paris the current year 1641– still acting the part of kindly father figure. He hopes to continue to introduce the boy to court and to keep him close for when he is needed.

Simone Baptiste – The adopted daughter of late revolutionary François Baptiste, Simone is also a problem, albeit a very subtle and difficult to remove one. Armaud had had little idea that Angeline had snuck out letters to her brother François concerning her marriage to the King and her pregnancy. It was indirectly Armaud, hearing of the creating of François’ movement through his spy network, that had the Court of Miracles patriarch captured by the Musketeers and executed, although the letters themselves were never found. It would not do to give the game away so early. Although Armaud suspects that the La Bande Noire movement still exists and is growing, Simone is far more subtle than her father and is keeping her wild brother in line. At the moment, Armaud merely wishes to keep an eye on the young strategist as she does in return, recognizing in her a potential future ally were he to win her to his side.

This character is portrayed by COLIN FIRTH and is TAKEN

OOC Notes: Most of the relevant plot information needed by the player is here, but it is worth mentioning that at start of game the Cardinal is the only person who definitively knows that Philippe Dubois is the legitimate heir to France. Marie-Claire, Jean Bourbon, and those connected to La Bande Noire/Black Band movement are the only living people apart from the Cardinal at start of game aware that the former King was married to Angeline or that the former Queen and King were ever divorced at all. However, Marie-Claire, the Cardinal and those connected to La Bande Noire movement are the only characters aware that Angeline had a son. Please see Alexandre Valois, Fernand Baptiste and Marie-Claire’s bios and the plot for more information.  The Cardinal suspects Marie-Claire of killing her ex-husband, the late King Louis Valois, but he has no concrete proof.

Note also that Herbert Dubois has history with the Cardinal not listed in The Cardinal’s connections. Please see Herbert Dubois’ bio for more information! He also has important connections with Hasekura Valentin, Pierre Chauveau, and Ameline de Granada Venegas, and former Captain of the Red Guard, Bertrand Rouzet.

The personal home of the Cardinal, the lavish Palais-Cardinal in the center of Paris, was completed in 1639. Cardinal Rossignol has swag, but the majority of his time is spent at the Royal Court in the Palace of Tuileries.

Please see our Influence of the Church section for important historical background information for this character.

[spynotebook]

Detail from the cover of Medusa Uploaded by Emily Devenport.

Image: Tor Books

May is here, and the month brings tons of new science fiction and fantasy books for your reading pleasure, including tales of kingdoms in turmoil, aliens battling AI in outer space, alt-history fantasies—and a new novel by some guy named Stephen King.

Bandwidth by Eliot Peper

In this near-future techno-thriller, a young political lobbyist realizes there are dangerous forces working to control the digital feed that the entire world relies upon for news updates (and everything else). It’s up to him to prevent an upcoming shadow war from causing certain devastation—but doing so may cost him the ultimate price. (May 1)

$16

From amazon

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Black Helicopters by Caitlin R. Kiernan

This is the expanded, completed version of the author’s World Fantasy Award-nominated Lovecraftian novella. It’s about a secret agent tasked with investigating strange happenings around New England that seem to be foreshadowing a horrific, chaotic invisible war. (May 1)

$13

From amazon

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The Glory of the Empress by Sean Danker

Amid a raging interstellar war, a group of soldiers develops a new weapon they hope will turn the tide in their side’s favor—not realizing their test runs in a far-off pocket of the galaxy will have unexpectedly towering consequences. (May 1)

From amazon

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Medusa Uploaded by Maggy Thomas

After she’s shoved out of an airlock and miraculously survives, a rebellious “worm” takes advantage of being presumed dead to prowl the generation starship she’s on, assassinating the powerful to try and even the stakes for everyone else. (May 1)

$11

From amazon

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The Poppy War by R.F. Kuagny

This debut historical fantasy is inspired by 20th century China; it’s about a war orphan who shocks everyone when she gain acceptance to the country’s most elite military academy—and shocks herself when she realizes she has a powerful talent for magic. (May 1)

$24

From amazon

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The Smoke Thieves by Sally Green

The complicated lives of five very different characters (a princess, a soldier, a hunter, a thief, and a servant) intertwine in a magical land on the brink of war in this first installment in a new fantasy series. (May 1)

$19

From amazon

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Song of Blood and Stone by L. Penelope

In a time of war, an outcast uses her magical gifts to heal an enemy spy, and the unlikely bond between them grows as they race to prevent an ancient evil from taking control of both their nations. (May 1)

$19

From amazon

3 purchased by readersGizmodo Media Group may get a commission

Artificial Condition: The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

The cyborg security agent nicknamed “Murderbot” returns in the sequel to the author’s All Systems Red. This time, it’s hellbent on finding out exactly why it has that ominous nickname and travels to the scene of an infamous massacre to poke into its cloudy, troubled past. (May 8)

$15

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Compulsory Games by Robert Aickman, edited by Victoria Nelson

A collection of supernatural tales from the late World Fantasy Award-winning author of “weird stories.” (May 8)

$18

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King of Ashes by Raymond E. Feist

The first book in a new saga follows two young men—one a highly skilled swordsmith; the other an assassin and spy who’s also secretly the heir to a stolen throne—whose paths converge as they become drawn into an ongoing war and the greater fight to save their world. (May 8)

$25

From amazon

52 purchased by readersGizmodo Media Group may get a commission

What Should Be Wild by Laura Fine

A young woman, the latest in her family to be cursed with the power to kill or resurrect anything she touches, spends her entire life hidden deep inside a dark forest—until her father goes missing, and she ventures into the outside world for the first time to search for him. (May 8)

$24

From amazon

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The World of All Souls by Deborah Harkness

Fans of Harness’ All Souls series (A Discovery of Witches, Shadow of Night, and The Book of Life) won’t want to miss this illustrated guide to her fantasy trilogy; it includes special features like character bios, maps, and even recipes. (May 8)

$29

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Armistice by Lara Elena Donnelly

The author’s follow-up to the Nebula-nominated fantasy thriller Amberlough returns to the intrigue-filled 1930s to follow three characters living in a politically unstable tropical country: a diplomat, a filmmaker, and a stripper-turned-revolutionary. (May 15)

$17

From amazon

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Ascendant by Jack Campbell

The Genesis Fleet military scifi series continues as a former fleet officer and a former Marine band together to fight off attacks on their newly-colonized planet—and find it’s frustratingly hard to hold onto freedom when you have limited resources and a steady stream of aggressors. (May 15)

$19

From amazon

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Buying Time by E.M. Brown

A man falls asleep one night in 2017, but wakes up and realizes it’s nine months earlier than it was the day before. The trend continues the next day, when he wakes up three years earlier, and on and on until he eventually seems to completely disappear. Where (or when) did he go? (May 15)

$15

From amazon

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By Fire Above by Robyn Bennis

The second entry in the author’s Signal Airship fantasy adventure series follows an airship captain who must battle enemy forces and bureaucracy when her hometown comes under attack. (May 15)

$27

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In the Region of the Summer Stars by Stephen Lawhead

In this new Celtic-inspired fantasy, the king’s oldest son is cast out of his tribe, so he undertakes a perilous journey to clear his name—but the magic secret he discovers may help him save his imperiled land instead. (May 15)

$24

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The Oddling Prince by Nancy Springer

In ancient Scotland, two royal brothers who were raised separately must join forces to save their family from a magical curse that threatens to kill their father and tear his kingdom apart. (May 15)

$16

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The Queen of Sorrow by Sarah Beth Durst

The author begins the final entry in her Queens of Renthia trilogy in a time of long-overdue peace—but that doesn’t last long when one queen tasks evil nature spirits with kidnapping another queen’s children, unleashing war and chaos back into the forest. (May 15)

$22

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The Soldier by Neal Asher

The author returns to his Polity worlds for this new military saga, as the discovery of a strange disc teeming with living technology threatens both humanity and their crab-like alien rivals. To ensure the safety of both civilizations, they task an android-human hybrid (and her mysterious alien associate) with protecting the mysterious disc from sinister interlopers. (May 15)

$27

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War Storm by Victoria Aveyard

The Red Queen series concludes as superpowered heroine Mare Barrow overcomes the ultimate betrayal as she plots to overthrow the Silver kingdoms once and for all. (May 15)

$14

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Wrath of Empire by Brian McClellan

The Gods of Blood and Powder epic fantasy series continues with this second entry, which picks up amid war-torn turmoil for both soldiers (and those who would raise their own armies with the help of some ancient magic) and refugees (and those who are desperately trying to help them). (May 15)

$18

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American Hippo by Sarah Gailey

This compilation brings Gailey’s acclaimed 2017 novellas River of Teeth and Taste of Marrow—alt-history tales in which wild hippos run amok in what used to be the Mississippi River region—together into one volume, along with a brand-new short story. (May 22)

$19

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84K by Claire North

A dystopian tale set in a world where crimes can be atoned for with specific dollar amounts—a set-up that doesn’t really bother the main character, an assessor at the Criminal Audit Office, until he’s tasked with a murder case involving someone who was once very dear to him. (May 22)

$17

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The Outsider by Stephen King

The powerhouse author’s latest begins with a murdered child, and eyewitnesses and forensic evidence identify a local baseball coach as the killer. But the man has a rock-solid alibi, and an impossible question emerges: Could he have been in two places at once? (May 22)

$18

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The Testament of Loki by Joanne M. Harris

Ragnarok has come and gone, but Loki’s not one to stay trapped in purgatory forever. In this sequel to The Gospel of Loki, the trickster makes his way to Earth, via the mind of a teenage girl who’s none too happy to find him lurking in her brain... or to realize all of her friends (and a dog) are also being taken over by Norse god refugees. (May 22)

$23

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Lifelike by Jay Kristoff

A teenage girl with a talent for building robots (and some frightening superpowers, as well as a disturbing past she’s blocked from fully remembering) finds herself in deep trouble with some greedy gangsters just as she meets a handsome android that makes her question everything about her life. (May 29)

$13

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The World of Lore: Wicked Mortals by Aaron Mahnke

The world of the popular podcast/TV series/book series expands even further with this illustrated guide to “the most despicable people ever to walk the earth,” including Chicago World’s Fair serial killer H.H. Holmes and the Scottish cabinetmaker who inspired Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. (May 29)

$26

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[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-11/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-10/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-8/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-7/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

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La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-5/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-4/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

ALSO

Dennis Rodman talks North Korea diplomacy before an audience of cadets at West Point

China, upset over a planned missile-defense system, is taking aim at South Korea’s pop stars and TV shows

Number of migrants caught at Mexican border plunges 40% under Trump

UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/10/la-times-south-koreas-president-is-removed-from-office-as-court-upholds-her-impeachment-3/

La Times: South Korea's president is removed from office as court upholds her impeachment

After months of political wrangling, legal drama and historic protests, a court has removed South Korean President Park Geun-hye from office.

The constitutional court that weighed her fate announced Friday its confirmation of the embattled leader’s impeachment in December by the National Assembly — a ruling that could lead to her criminal prosecution.

South Koreans anxiously awaited the decision, which was broadcast live on televisions across the nation. Lee Jungmi, the acting chief judge, said the panel unanimously agreed that Park “violated the duty to safeguard the nation.”

“The respondent, President Park Geun-hye, is expelled,” she said. “We all agree that this is a matter of safeguarding the constitution. Therefore there is no other choice than to decide the verdict.”

In recent weeks, national opinion surveys have suggested that a majority of South Koreans favored the president’s removal from office, if not arrest, amid allegations that she participated in a bribery scheme with the country’s most powerful conglomerate, Samsung Group.

Seo Seok-gu, one of Park’s lawyers, said the verdict reflected pressure from the months of massive public protests about the scandal, which often took the form of candlelight vigils, and not the law. He also said his client had been convicted in the press.

“It’s a tragic ruling, due to their inability to overcome the power of the candles,” he said of the judges. “I do not accept this ruling.”

Park’s Liberty Korean Party released a statement saying it respects the court decision. “We apologize to the citizens of our country,” it said.

The presidential office has yet to release a statement, and reactions from other political leaders were expected later in the day.

With the impeachment upheld, as many analysts predicted, Park’s controversial four-year tenure leading South Korea — a country of 50 million and Asia’s fourth-largest economy — comes to an immediate end.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who has served as head of state since Park’s suspension in December, will continue leading the nation. The attention now turns to a special presidential election in early May — a contest that could favor a more liberal candidate after a decade of rule by Park’s conservative political party.

“It will be interesting to what extent the Democrats, or the liberals, will be able to ride the anti-Park sentiment to electoral success,” said Kyung Moon Hwang, a history professor at USC who writes a regular column for a newspaper in Seoul.

With her removal, Park — South Korea’s first female president — will also be the nation’s first president removed from office through impeachment.

Park could also face criminal charges as the result of a sprawling corruption investigation that has snared several of her aides and the heir apparent to tech giant Samsung Group.

For months, prosecutors have sought to question the president on a range of potential crimes. But she has avoided interrogation, abruptly canceling a planned session last month.

Now out of office, however, Park loses the immunity from criminal prosecution that came with the presidency. Authorities could seek an arrest warrant in an effort to compel her to provide more information.

The scandal erupted in October. A team of special prosecutors recently completed a three-month investigation that led to more than two dozen indictments.

They say Park pressured the Samsung Group to make payments of about $37 million to businesses controlled by a longtime confidant, Choi Soon-sil, in exchange for help pushing through approval of a controversial merger between two of the tech giant’s affiliates.

The merger was seen as an effort to solidify third-generation dynastic control for Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the tech giant’s heir apparent. He was recently indicted on several charges, including bribery and perjury.

Park’s legal team has said the case is politically motivated, but the president has repeatedly apologized — most recently for her “carelessness.” She has said she never sought personal gain.

The allegations investigated by the prosecutors led to massive street demonstrations in recent months. Those continued Friday, as thousands gathered outside the court to express their support for Park.

The court’s ruling — the result of 171 witness statements and more than 50,000 documents — will have other consequences for the disgraced leader. She will now be stripped of the typical pension afforded former presidents, said Ryan Song, a law professor at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University.

She also must move out of the South Korean presidential complex, known as the Blue House for its distinctly colored tile roof. It remained unclear in the immediate aftermath of the court’s ruling how long she would remain there.

Born in the southern city of Daegu, a place known for its conservative politics, Park is the daughter of Park Chung-hee, a military dictator who ruled South Korea from 1963 until his assassination in 1979. She rose to power, in part, on nostalgia for his era, when the country rose from the ashes of the Korean War to the export-fueled economic force it is today. Democracy only came to the nation a generation ago.

Park emerged as a public figure when her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was assassinated by a North Korean sympathizer during an ill-fated attempt on her father’s life. She returned from university abroad and served as acting first lady while still a young woman, hosting foreign dignitaries who visited the Blue House.

Park, 65, never married, and she remains estranged from her two siblings.

She entered electoral politics in 1998 as a member of the National Assembly, representing her home district and later leading her conservative political party, then known as Saenuri, until being elected president in 2012. She had previously sought the presidency in 2007 but narrowly lost to Lee Myung-bak.

Her election in 2012 was close, with just under half of the 30 million voters in the contest siding with her opponent, Moon Jae-in, a more liberal candidate who is a front-runner in many polls in the coming presidential race to replace her.

In office, Park never developed the ability to shape South Korea’s policy like her famous father, who seized power in a coup and ruled as an autocrat. Her tenure, even before the scandal, had been marked by controversy and hurt by what some observers say was an ineffective, secretive and aloof governing style.

“She didn’t have the chops,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University. “She didn’t have the gravity, the weight, to do it.”

Many of her strongest supporters — some of whom have publicly defended her in large rallies recently, at times with violent overtones — perhaps projected onto her candidacy and presidency their nostalgia for an earlier era of political control and economic boom.

“She was a tragic figure in many ways, really a sympathetic figure, who got overwhelmed by these other forces,” said Hwang, the USC professor. “They saw her really as an extension of her father, or almost as a rehabilitation of her father.”

Park’s presidency started with controversy amid allegations that the country’s National Intelligence Service — an agency prohibited from working on domestic issues generally — had meddled in the election to help her political party.

Other than the scandal, perhaps the defining moment of her time in office was the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in which nearly 300 people — most of them high school students — perished when the vessel capsized en route to Jeju Island.

The incident, an intensely painful event for many South Koreans, led to widespread criticism of the government’s disaster response and its perceived attempts to downplay culpability over lax maritime regulations that might have contributed to the disaster.

Distraught parents pressed for a more robust investigation, and Park’s presidency never really recovered. Questions about her whereabouts during a critical seven-hour period during the disaster still haunt her public image.

Indeed, the constitutional court that heard the impeachment case demanded an accounting of the missing time — the subject of which has led to rampant speculation in the press and public.

Park ultimately refused to answer, and Friday she learned her fate, though the judges said her role after the disaster played no role in their verdict.

The court’s ruling appears to end a dramatic, six-month saga that’s roiled the country’s political and business scenes and enraged many average South Koreans.

“Someone will have to make a movie about this some day, but it would have to be a tragedy,” Kelly said.

Stiles is a special correspondent.

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UPDATES:

7:50 p.m.: This article was updated with the court’s decision and extensive background on the ousted president.

This article was originally published at 9:10 a.m.

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