The World : U.S. to Close Korea Center

The American cultural center in Kwangju, South Korea, target of nearly 30 anti-American attacks since 1980, will be closed and moved, the U.S. Embassy in Seoul announced. “We’re concerned about the threat to human life, especially in that building . . . . It’s not sufficiently defensible,” an embassy spokesman said. The spokesman said that Washington and South Korea are negotiating on where it will be relocated. The decision to move was announced nine days before the anniversary of a civilian uprising in Kwangju on May 18, 1980, that was suppressed by then-President Chun Doo Hwan. About 200 people were killed in that incident, by official count, but residents say many more died.