South Korean CEO’s 4-year jail term over plant fire that killed 23 spurs anger

“How can South Korea’s law be this weak? Twenty-three people died!” Those were the words of Chinese mother Li Shun-ji after South Korea’s Supreme Court upheld a reduced four-year prison sentence for Aricell CEO Park Soon-kwan last Tuesday over a 2024 factory fire that killed 23 workers, including Li’s then-24-year-old daughter, Yan Jing-jing. The blaze at the lithium battery manufacturer’s factory in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi province, killed 17 Chinese nationals, one Laotian national and five South...