[Bills in Focus] Bills to promote strategic technologies, fair app market

Proposed Bill: Partial Amendment to the Telecommunications Business Act Proposed by Rep. Lee Kai-ho (Democratic Party of Korea) ● To promote fair market order in the app market and prevent app market business entities from taking unfair advantage of their transactional position, this amendment prohibits app market business entities with their own operating business from unjustly limiting the installation and utilization of applications on smartphones or tablet PCs through other app market busine

March 11, 2024

Yoon's approval rating falls slightly to 40.2%

President Yoon Suk Yeol's approval rating slid to 40.2 percent last week from a week earlier, a poll showed Monday, amid little sign of a breakthrough in the walkout by junior doctors over the government's plan to increase the medical school admissions quota. The positive assessment of Yoon's performance fell 0.9 percentage point from 41.1 percent, with the negative assessment rising 0.7 percentage point to 56.1 percent, according to a survey by Realmeter conducted Monday to Frida

March 11, 2024

Political parties ramp up campaign efforts amid shifting opinion polls

With only a month left before the April 10 parliamentary elections, political parties are unveiling various pork-barrel election pledges and intensifying efforts to secure key districts, as recent public opinion polls indicate a slight yet significant shift. The quadrennial vote holds significant importance for the ruling People Power Party as a failure to regain a majority in the 300-member National Assembly could potentially render President Yoon Suk Yeol a lame duck for the next three years o

March 11, 2024

Protests at airport as ex-defense chief departs for Australia as envoy

Lee Jong-sup, the former minister of national defense who was recently appointed as ambassador to Australia, faced protests by opposition parties as he arrived at the airport on Sunday to depart for Brisbane. Rep. Hong Ihk-pyo, the Democratic Party of Korea floor leader, held a protest at the Incheon Airport terminal for international flights and said that Lee being sent abroad as an ambassador was a demonstration of “what is wrong with the administration in power.” “Exactly ab

March 10, 2024

Descendant from US missionary family to run for Assembly

Ihn Yohan, who is from the fourth generation of a US missionary family that helped build churches and schools in Korea during Japanese colonial rule, is running for office in the April 10 general election as a ruling People Power Party candidate. The People Power Party committee for nominating candidates for the general election asked In, whose American name is John Linton, to run, and he has accepted, according to those familiar with the matter. Ihn, director of the Severance Hospital Internati

March 10, 2024

Is main opposition’s goal to bring Yoon to ‘judgment’ feasible?

The main opposition’s goal to bring President Yoon Suk Yeol to “judgment” through the upcoming April 10 legislative election, now faces major hurdles due to Yoon’s and the ruling party’s growing popularity, observers said Friday. Democratic Party of Korea Chair Lee Jae-myung in recent weeks has repeatedly stressed the party’s goal to bring the Yoon Suk Yeol administration to “judgment” by winning the election. In his visit to the political symbolic

March 8, 2024

Police launch investigation into attack on ex-soccer player in election campaign

The police on Friday launched a probe into the alleged assault on former soccer player Lee Chun-soo while he was participating in former Land Minister and ruling party candidate Won Hee-ryong’s street campaign ahead of the April 10 general election. The Incheon Gyeyang Police Station received a report from Won’s office at 10 p.m. on Thursday claiming that Lee, who recently endorsed the former land minister for the upcoming election, was “physically assaulted.” Lee was att

March 8, 2024

Former President Kim Young-sam's widow dies

Son Myung-soon, the widow of former President Kim Young-sam, died Thursday at the age of 96, medical sources said. The ex-first lady died of a chronic ailment late in the afternoon while under treatment at Seoul National University Hospital, according to the sources. Son was a widow to Kim, who served as South Korea's 14th president from 1993-1998. Kim died at the age of 88 in 2015. Son was married to Kim in 1951 and was known to have assisted her husband as the supportive wife of the long-

March 7, 2024

Abortion in S. Korea: neither illegal nor legal

Kim, a 33-year-old woman living in Seoul, was taken by surprise when she found out she was pregnant late last year. With no intention of getting married or having a child of her own, she began searching for hospitals that would terminate the pregnancy for her. While searching online, Kim encountered numerous advertisements and blogs listing prices for abortions by vacuum aspiration. The prices varied according to the stage of pregnancy: 600,000 won ($450) before week 7 and 900,000 won before wee

March 7, 2024

Yoon urged to retract appointment of ex-defense chief as envoy to Australia

South Korea’s main opposition party on Thursday asked President Yoon Suk Yeol to walk back the appointment of his former Minister of National Defense Lee Jong-sup as ambassador to Australia. According to the Democratic Party of Korea, Lee has been banned from leaving the country by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials since the beginning of this year over an investigation into the death of a Marine. The Marine died during a search and rescue operation in July last

March 7, 2024

GTX-B breaks ground for 30-min Seoul-Incheon commute

Construction work for the GTX Line B suburban rail network broke ground in Incheon on Thursday, as the 6.84-trillion-won ($5.14 billion) project aims to connect the port city to Seoul and Gyeonggi Province via express train services. President Yoon Suk Yeol said the combined population of 13 million people in Incheon and Seoul will enjoy 30-minute commutes once construction of the 82-kilometer railway is complete as planned by 2030. "The transportation revolution in Incheon has just begun t

March 7, 2024

Yoon refuses to bend to doctors' protest

President Yoon Suk Yeol on Wednesday refused to concede to some 9,000 trainee doctors' walkout, defining their collective action as "illegal" and insisting it must be met with stern actions guided by law and principle. Yoon denied the accusations that the government's measures against defiant doctors, such as its decision to suspend the medical licenses of some 7,000 trainees, were meant to suppress doctors' freedom and rights. Instead, these should be construed as actions "to mee

March 6, 2024

Voter support for opposition party plummets: poll

The rate of respondents willing to vote for main opposition party candidates in the upcoming April 10 legislative election dropped by a whopping 9 percentage points from the previous month, poll results showed Wednesday. In a survey conducted by local pollster Metrix on 1,000 Koreans aged 18 or older on March 2-3, when asked which party they would vote for "if the election was held tomorrow," some 26 percent of respondents chose candidates from the main opposition Democratic Party of K

March 6, 2024

North Korea sends political prisoners to nuclear facilities: defector

North Korea is forcing political prisoners to work at some of its high-risk nuclear facilities, a North Korean defector was quoted as telling South Korean authorities. A former Pyongyang resident in her 40s who defected in 2019 said in an in-depth interview with authorities in Seoul that North Korea was sending its political prisoners to labor camps close to nuclear sites, according to a recent report by the government-run Korea Institute for National Unification. “The levels of radiation

March 6, 2024

Financial regulator vows swift implementation of W5tr support fund for local firms

The financial regulator said Wednesday it will work to quickly provide up to 5 trillion won ($3.75 billion) in financial support to local firms this year, while pushing to create an additional 3 trillion-won investment fund for businesses. The government earlier announced plans to provide more than 76 trillion won in financial support for local businesses, with 20 trillion won earmarked for large businesses and 15 trillion won for mid-sized firms. "As a follow-up to the 'business-tailo

March 6, 2024

Disgraced ex-minister meets opposition leader amid talk of alliance

Main opposition leader Lee Jae-myung on Tuesday met former Justice Minister Cho Kuk, who recently launched a political party of his own, exhibiting the possibility of an alliance. The meeting follows Cho’s move to launch the National Innovation Party on Sunday against the Yoon Suk Yeol administration ahead of the upcoming general election, which some critics say is an attempt to avoid jail time. The Seoul High Court in early February decided to uphold a lower court ruling to sentence the 5

March 5, 2024

Yoon to expand state-backed college student aid

President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday announced plans to expand state-backed scholarship programs to woo South Korea's young generation. Yoon told some 460 participants in a policy debate held in the city of Gwangmyeong, Gyeonggi Province, that the government "has the responsibility to help the talented young generation live up to their capacity." Yoon said the number of students eligible to get state-sponsored scholarships, provided by the state-run Korea Student Aid Foundation, wil

March 5, 2024

Ex-consul general in Sydney named chief negotiator for defense cost sharing with US

A senior South Korean diplomat who previously served as the consul general in Sydney has been named to lead the negotiations with the United States on the sharing of costs for the upkeep of US troops here, the foreign ministry said Tuesday. Lee Tae-woo will head the upcoming rounds of the talks on the 12th Special Measures Agreement, the ministry said, without specifying when the initial negotiations will be launched. The career diplomat has the experience and expertise in various fields of the

March 5, 2024

NIS warns of rise in North Korean hacking threats against South Korean chipmakers

South Korea’s spy agency on Monday warned of a recent uptick in North Korean hacking threats against South Korean semiconductor firms. The National Intelligence Service said North Korean hackers have been ramping up hacking efforts targeting South Korean semiconductor equipment makers since the latter half of 2023. The NIS said the North Korean hackers mainly focused on companies whose servers are connected to the Internet and who had their vulnerabilities exposed. The North Korean hackers

March 4, 2024

Why Jongno is known as Seoul’s center of politics

The race to win the Assembly seat for Jongno, long known as the center of politics in Seoul, officially kicked off Monday as the Democratic Party of Korea candidate, Kwak Sang-eon, set to work after a contentious primary. Kwak is the son-in-law of the late liberal President Roh Moo-hyun. The party decided to hand him the nomination for the symbolic Seoul district over other competitive figures such as Jeon Hyun-hee, who served as the head of the anti-corruption watchdog under President Moon Jae-

March 4, 2024