foto gallery of 2018 winter olympics, with historical and geopolitical background

1. WINTER OLYMPICS
KOREA 2018

5. Mascots in PyeongChang

16. OLYMPIC VILLAGE

20. The opening stadium
was constructed
especially for this event
The 35,000-seat stadium
is pentagonal in design.
Built on an 80,000
-square-metre
The cost is ₩86 billion ($78
million) for the temporary
stadium,
which will be dismantled soon
after.
The approximate
elevation is 740 metres (2,430 ft)
above sea level.

21. OPENING CEREMONY – NATIONS PARADE

22. SOUTH KOREAN DELEGATION

23. NORTH KOREAN DELEGATION

24. AMERICAN DELEGATION

25. RUSSIAN DELEGATION – due to the “doping scandal”
the national delegation was banned,
but certain athletes were allowed to participate as individuals.

26. Morocco’s one man delegation

27. UK DELEGATION

28. Pita Taufatofua bears the banner of Tonga,
and also his chest in the biting breeze

29. BOTH NORTH AND SOUTH DELEGATIONS PARADED TOGETHER
WITH A SIMPLE UNITED KOREA IN BLUE
ON WHITE BACKGROUND AS THEIR FLAG

30. North and South Korea sponsored
a united team for women’s hockey

31. N Koreas representation
in the Winter Olympics
was welcomed as an
opportunity to thaw out
the cold relations

32. Tension had grown between
USA and N Korea since
they continue with tests
of ballistic misiles

34. Leaders of N + S Korea and Japan
Shinzo Abe, Moon Jae-in & Kim Jung -on

35. Moon Jae-in of S Korea , Trump – US, Shinzo Abe of Japan,

36. The N Korean leader
sent his sister
Kim Yo Jung
to S Korea to prepare
for their
sports delegation

37. Kim Jung-on sent his sister as representative
to prepare for the N Korean delegation to the olympics.

38. Mike Pence, vice president USA and the sister of Kim Jung-on
at the inauguration ceremony
Happily an agreement was arranged, and the North Korean delegate
took her place alongside the US vice President

39. Cheer leaders for North Korea

40. In 1945, with the surrender of Japan, the United Nations developed plans for
a trusteeship administration, the Soviet Union administering the peninsula north of
the 38th parallel and the United States administering the south.
The politics of the Cold War resulted in the 1948 establishment of
two separate governments, North Korea and South Korea.
A brief history of the North South Korean conflict

41. The aftermath of World War II left Korea partitioned along the 38th parallel, with the north
under Soviet occupation and the south under US occupation supported by other allied states.
Consequently, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, a Soviet-style socialist republic,
was established in the north while the Republic of Korea,
a Western-style regime, was established in the South.

42. The Korean War broke out when Soviet-backed North Korea invaded South Korea,
though neither side gained much territory as a result.
The Korean Peninsula remained divided,
the Korean Demilitarized Zone being the de facto border between the two states.

43. In June 1950 North Korea invaded the South, using Soviet tanks and weaponry.
During the Korean War (1950–53) more than 1.2 million people died
and the three years of fighting throughout the nation
effectively destroyed most cities.[158]
The war ended in an Armistice Agreement
at approximately the Military Demarcation Line.

45. Since the 1960s, the South Korean economy has grown enormously
and the economic structure was radically transformed.
In 1957, South Korea had a lower per capita GDP than Ghana,
and by 2008 it was 17 times as high as Ghana's.

46. North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, is a one-party state,
now centred on Kim Il-sung's Juche ideology, with a centrally planned industrial economy.
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea, is a multi-party state with a capitalist market economy,
alongside membership in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
and the Group of Twenty. The two states have greatly diverged both culturally and economically
since their partition, though they still share a common traditional culture and pre-Cold War history.

47. According to R.J. Rummel, forced labor, executions, and concentration camps
were responsible for over one million deaths in North Korea from 1948 to 1987;
others have estimated 400,000 deaths in concentration camps alone.
Estimates based on the most recent North Korean census
suggest that 240,000 to 420,000 people died as a result
of the 1990s famine and that there were 600,000 to 850,000
unnatural deaths in North Korea from 1993 to 2008.

48. N Korean military parade, main square Pyongpeng

49. The S Korean president, welcomed
the decision of N Korea to participate

50. The N Korean delegation cross the border
to participate in the Winter Olympics

51. Some 230 Cheerleaders from N Korea
met their counterpart from the South

52. N Korean cheer leaders
in perfect synchronization

53. N Korean cheer leaders

55. OPENING CEREMONY

60. Traditionally the Olympic flame is brought from Greece,
the ancient origin of the Games

66. The olympic torch arrives from Greece to Korea

70. THE OLYMPIC TORCH TRAVELLED THE WHOLE COUNTRY OF SOUTH KOREA
PROMOTING THE WINTER OLYMPIC GAMES

74. THE EVENTS

85. SPEED SKATING

88. FIGURE SKATING

91. CURLING

92. Hopefully the Winter Olympic Games of Korea
will help the cause of peace and friendship between nations.