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Also
known as the "Land of the Morning Calm", it is neighbored
by China to the west, Japan to the east and borders
North Korea to the north. Its capital is Seoul, a major
global city and a leading international financial centre
in Asia, being the second largest metropolitan city
in the world.
Korea
is one of the oldest civilizations in the world, first
inhabited as early as the Lower Paleolithic. Following
the unification of the Three Korean Kingdoms under Silla
in 668 AD, Korea went through the Goryeo and Joseon
Dynasty as one nation until the end of the Korean Empire
in 1910. After liberation and division, South Korea
was established in 1948 and has since become one of
the two most advanced democracies in Asia. It is also
a founding member of APEC and the East Asia Summit,
being a visa waiver and major non-NATO ally of the United
States. South Korea is now working towards a peaceful
reunification with North Korea.
In
1945, the Soviet Union and the United States agreed
on the surrender and disarming of Japanese troops in
Korea; the Soviet Union accepting the surrender of Japanese
weaponry north of the 38th parallel and the United States
taking the surrender south of it. This minor decision
by allied armies soon became the basis for the division
of Korea by the two superpowers, exacerbated by their
inability to agree on the terms of Korean independence.
The two Cold War rivals then established governments
sympathetic to their own ideologies, leading to Korea's
current division into two political entities: North
Korea and South Korea. The ensuing conflict between
the two was largely a proxy-war.
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