Most Popular
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Who's lying? Hybe vs. Min conflict continues to intensify
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Seoul should engage Kim Jong-un’s elites for change, ex-North Korean diplomat says
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Most teen sex offenders get away with slap on wrist
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Ex-Trump official calls for S. Korea to raise defense spending to 3 or 3.5% of GDP
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Man sentenced to 1 year, 8 months for stealing from elementary school classrooms
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Same-sex couple denied insurance clearance despite landmark ruling
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FM champions multilateralism, stresses S. Korea's vision as 'global pivotal state'
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Panmunjom tours for select Korean nationals may resume in October
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Young Poong says no better offer for Korea Zinc
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Thousands rally in Seoul to call for Yoon resignation
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LG sells 1.6m G5 phones globally
LG Electronics said Thursday its flagship smartphone G5 shipments have exceeded 1.6 million units globally since its launch a month ago. “We will see more than 3 million shipments in the second quarter,” the company said during a conference call when it reported a 65.5 percent surge in operating profit to 505.2 billion won ($440 million) in the first quarter from a year ago. Even though strong sales of home appliances, especially more lucrative premium models, elevated the company’s profits over
TechnologyApril 28, 2016
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Samsung SDI’s loss widens to over W700b in Q1
Samsung SDI said Thursday it posted 703 billion won ($ 614 million) in operating loss in the first quarter this year.Its total revenue, however, grew 7.6 percent on-year to 1.3 trillion won during the period, the battery-making arm of Samsung Group said in a regulatory filing.Its operating loss represents a 2,007-percent and 452-percent increase from a year and a quarter earlier, respectively.The firm said the larger operating loss was mainly attributable to 1.1 trillion won in one-off costs ref
TechnologyApril 28, 2016
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[Editorial] Talk of coalition
Talk of forming a coalition government has become a topic in politics since the April 13 general election, which relegated the ruling party to the second-largest party and which did not give any party a majority control of the parliament. The proposal for a coalition government comes mostly from members of the People’s Party, a splinter opposition group that emerged as the third-largest party by winning 38 parliamentary seats. The proposal is apparently aimed at increasing political clout of the
EditorialApril 28, 2016
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[Editorial] Pain of restructuring
The founding families of Korea’s chaebol have both positive and negative public images. In hard times, the negative image tends to overwhelm the positive one. Chaebol families are often identified as the main culprit when their businesses go bad to the point of bankruptcy or government-aided bailouts. To make matters worse, they often try to avoid responsibility – both legal and moral – and are caught trying to protect their own personal wealth. So they become the target of public criticism, whi
EditorialApril 28, 2016
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[Christopher Balding] Winning friends a costly business
For years now, China’s been lavishly courting friends across the developing world. Chinese leaders, in pointed contrast to their Western counterparts, traverse the globe with bursting wallets, doling out aid, cheap loans and infrastructure deals in an effort to procure both influence and raw materials. Commodity-dependent countries get cheap financing for development, despite their often dodgy credit ratings; China gains diplomatic clout and a bargain on those commodities. Both sides win — that
ViewpointsApril 28, 2016
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[Iman Pambagyo] ‘Sin tax’ on palm oil and plain packaging on tobacco
Two of Indonesia’s top export products face unprecedented regulation in international export markets. In both cases, the measures are intended to curb consumption of consumer goods in order to address public health or environmental concerns. The commonalities don’t end there. In both cases, the measures violate international trade rules and are based on one-sided assumptions and unscientific predictions. One of these products is palm oil, which may face a discriminatory tax environment in Franc
ViewpointsApril 28, 2016
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‘Facebook TV’ tunes in fresh challenges
Facebook has dramatically upped the technology ante with a feature enabling users to become live broadcasters, even receiving and responding to feedback in real time. Despite being a communications marvel, Facebook Live also poses all sorts of problems. The impact is sure to be significant, but to what extent the impact is negative remains to be seen. Mark Zuckerberg, the social network’s founder, knows he’s on to something big, and it’s probable that Facebook’s rivals will seek to emulate the f
ViewpointsApril 28, 2016
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Mother who killed newborn gets probation term
A mother who threw her four-month-old baby out of a window “in a fit of rage,” resulting in his death, was given three years in prison with four years’ stay of execution on Thursday. This is a stock image. The woman in this photo is not the mother in the article. (123RF)The Daegu court decided that although the mother’s actions were demeaning to the value of life, it had to be taken into consideration that she had suffered from extreme post-labor depression and would live with the guilt for the
Social AffairsApril 28, 2016
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[Achara Deboonme] People power pushes our neighbors forward
Most foreign visitors stepping into Junction Square in Myanmar‘s biggest city Yangon are in for a shock. The medium-sized mall is packed with imported items and boasts an ice cream parlor as well as air conditioning and a gleaming tiled floor. It looks much like any big community mall in Bangkok. Compare that with a mall in Shenzhen, China. The one I visited about five years ago shocked me with goods placed haphazardly in a poorly ventilated dusty interior. Given that Myanmar only opened its doo
ViewpointsApril 28, 2016
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[Margaret Carlson] How to be presidential, Trump-style
If in the early hours of a Saturday morning there’s a traffic jam in your neighborhood, it won’t be because it’s the opening day of the county fair. These days, it’s more likely to be Donald Trump. In Waterbury, Connecticut, this weekend, three days before the state primary, people began lining up at 4 a.m.; the doors opened at 7 for a rally scheduled for 10. The adults being led to the overflow room were as disappointed as the children finding out that that they’d been awoken early for politics
ViewpointsApril 28, 2016
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Park warns against N.K. nuke test
President Park Geun-hye on Thursday warned North Korea against carrying out another nuclear test that she said would eradicate the future of the reclusive regime. Presiding over the National Security Council, Park also ordered a regular meeting against the North’s provocation threats while she is away on a visit to Iran from this weekend.“If the Kim Jong-un regime goes ahead with an additional nuclear test despite the international community’s warning, there will no longer be a future for them,”
North KoreaApril 28, 2016
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[NEWS FOCUS] How will next U.S. president affect Seoul-Washington alliance?
Donald Trump, the flamboyant Republican front-runner for the 2016 U.S. presidential election, reaffirmed his claim that the America’s allies are not shouldering what he viewed as a “fair share” of the costs for U.S. military support.The prominent candidate’s remarks raised speculation in South Korea about the possible changes that the new U.S. administration may bring after November’s elections. Donald Trump (AFP)Democrat Hilary Clinton and Trump appear all but certain to clinch their spots as
DefenseApril 28, 2016
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Seoul-Tokyo tension rises over ‘comfort women’ statue
Tension rose between the governments of Seoul and Tokyo this week as they countered each other’s interpretation of the sex slavery deal’s mandate over the removal of a statue in Seoul symbolizing the victims.Japan’s Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Hagiuda Koichi said in a press briefing on Wednesday that the removal was part of the bilateral deal reached between Seoul and Tokyo last December to resolve the comfort women issue once and for all.Yonhap“I acknowledge that removing the statue could be
PoliticsApril 28, 2016
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New third party whip calls on Park to change
New whip of the People’s Party Rep. Park Jie-won on Thursday called on President Park Geun-hye to change her approach to administration if she wants his party’s cooperation.“If the president changes and asks for our cooperation, we will cooperate on anything, not just on (the decision) on the seat for the National Assembly speaker,” Park said in a radio interview.The People’s Party won 38 seats in the incoming 20th Assembly, rising as the game changer with casting power between the ruling party’
PoliticsApril 28, 2016
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Urban grannies: Sassy seniors emerge as key consumer group
Breaking the traditional image of senior citizens in Korea, a growing number of grannies are seeking sophisticated and elegant lifestyles as well as quality personal time of their own rather than being tied up with taking care of their grandchildren.Market insiders here are closely monitoring the rise of so-called urban grannies, classifying them as a new consumer group, capable of purchasing luxury and high-quality products.A cover of a fashion magazine featuring Carmen Dell’Orefice, a 86-year-
IndustryApril 28, 2016
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Cabinet approves May 6 holiday
The government on Thursday approved May 6 as an extra holiday to create a four-day weekend. The temporary holiday will follow May 5, Children’s Day.The decision came after a request from the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry that cited it as a way to boost tourism and domestic consumer demand.YonhapThis is the 58th extra holiday designated by the South Korean government. The Cabinet, in a meeting presided by President Park Geun-hye, said all toll fees will be exempted on highways nationwide
Social AffairsApril 28, 2016
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Seoul reiterates removal of comfort woman statue is not part of Dec. deal
South Korea reiterated Thursday that the removal of a statue symbolizing the victims of Japan's wartime sexual slavery was not part of last year's landmark deal to settle the issue of the colonial-era wrongdoing. The statue, which civic groups erected in 2011 in front of the Japanese Embassy in central Seoul, has been at the center of a historical debate between the two countries with a senior Japanese official arguing that its removal was part of the deal."There was no promise whatsoever in t
Social AffairsApril 28, 2016
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Second Zika case confirmed in Korea
South Korea’s health authorities confirmed the nation’s second Zika virus case on Wednesday night, identifying the patient as a 20-year-old man who lives in Nowon-gu, Seoul. According to the Health Ministry, the patient visited the Philippines from April 10-14, where infected mosquitoes bit him. He was asymptomatic until April 20, when he developed mild, cold-like symptoms including fever. He visited a local clinic in Seoul that day, but his doctor did not see him as a potential Zika virus patie
Social AffairsApril 28, 2016
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Korea, U.S. to work together on lunar exploration, satellite
South Korea and the United States have agreed to boost their partnership in the aerospace industry to a "considerable" level, a government ministry said Thursday, as the two sides are in related talks in Seoul.The allies opened the working-level meeting Wednesday, the second of its kind, to discuss how to deepen space cooperation.In the first-day plenary session, they "reached a considerable level of agreement on specific ways for cooperation," according to the Ministry of Science, ICT and Futur
TechnologyApril 28, 2016
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Hanyang University chief's work published in Nature journal
Research led by a local college president was recently published in the international weekly journal of science Nature, school officials said Thursday.It is rare for a local university leader’s work to be published in the international journal. Hanyang University said its study led by president Lee Young-moo on hydrocarbon fuel-cell membranes with surface nanocrack coatings was published in the latest issue of Nature. The study featured an innovative way to provide fuel cells, which are essentia
TechnologyApril 28, 2016