S. Korea to bolster legal support for inter-Korean businesses

South Korea plans to revise a law to bolster ties with North Korea and protect local businesses involved in inter-Korean economic projects, the Ministry of Unification said Tuesday.The revision would require the government’s bans or restrictions on economic projects with North Korea to be subject to a Cabinet review. It would also help normalize the operations of companies if they suffer damages from the government’s unilateral decisions.  Kaesong Industrial Complex (Yonhap)“Procedures for a Cab

July 17, 2018

S. Korea investigates alleged N. Korean coal trans-shipped to its ports

The Foreign Ministry said Tuesday it is looking into cases in which North Korean coal was allegedly shipped to South Korea via Russia last year in violation of United Nations sanctions. 　According to an annual UN sanctions committee report summited by a panel of experts, North Korean coal shipped to the Russian port of Kholmsk was unloaded at docks and reloaded onto two vessels that took it to South Korean ports of Incheon and Pohang in October.　North Korean coal was transported from the North’s

July 17, 2018

N. Korean leader tours construction sites, chides officials for incompetence

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un harshly criticized officials for their incompetence during a recent inspection of the construction sites in the country's northeastern region, its state media reported Tuesday.During the "field guidance" at a hydroelectric power station under construction in Orangchon of North Hamgyong Province, Kim lashed out at workers and officials for failing to complete the construction for nearly 20 years, according to the Korean Central News Agency.Kim ascribed the procrast

July 17, 2018

[Newsmaker] Military intelligence agency behind NK restaurant workers' defection: source

South Korea's military intelligence agency masterminded the controversial defection of a dozen North Korean restaurant workers based in China, an informed source said Tuesday.The Defense Intelligence Command, affiliated with the defense ministry, led the 2014 operation supported by the National Intelligence Service, according to the source privy to North Korea issues.The 12 waitresses working at the Ryugyong Korean Restaurant in Ningpo, a city in the Chinese province of Zhejiang, defected to the

July 17, 2018

Koreas to continue peacemaking mood by sending unified teams to 2018 Asian Games

South Korea and North Korea will try to continue their peacemaking mood through sport by sending joint teams to the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia. The Koreas agreed to field joint teams in three sports -- basketball, canoeing, and rowing -- at this year's Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games, which will be held from Aug. 18 to Sept. 2. They will join forces in the women's five-on-five basketball; men's and women's dragon boat, a canoe discipline; and the lightweight coxless men's four, lightweight men'

July 17, 2018

N. Korea to issue special pardons for prisoners to mark 70th founding anniversary

North Korea will issue special pardons for prisoners to mark the 70th anniversary of the regime, North Korean state media said Monday, which experts see as Kim Jong-un’s effort to bolster domestic solidarity amid a shift in political atmosphere following last month’s US-North Korea summit. “The DPRK will grant amnesty to those who have been convicted of crimes against the state and people on the occasion of the 70th founding anniversary of the DPRK,” the Korean Central News Agency said, referrin

July 16, 2018

US, N. Korea to resume search for remains from Korean War

The US and North Korea have agreed to resume the search for the remains of US soldiers killed during the Korean War, with working-level meetings to begin on Monday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said. The agreement came at a general-level meeting between the two sides on Sunday at the border village of Panmunjom, which Pompeo said was “productive and cooperative and resulted in firm commitments” in a statement.  (Yonhap)“Working level meetings between US and North Korean officials will begin

July 16, 2018

Trump touts meeting with Kim, halt in nuclear testing

WASHINGTON -- US President Donald Trump on Sunday defended his diplomatic efforts with North Korea, saying his meeting with leader Kim Jong-un was "a good thing" and the regime's halting of nuclear and ballistic missile tests was a "wonderful" fact.In an interview with CBS, Trump was speaking about his upcoming summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin and how he has low expectations for the outcome.(Yonhap)"I think it's a good thing to meet. I do believe in meetings," he said in an excerpt o

July 16, 2018

Bolton suggests Trump's dismissal of NK threat should not be taken literally

WASHINGTON -- US National Security Adviser John Bolton suggested Sunday that President Donald Trump's assertion that the North Korean nuclear threat is over should not be taken literally.Speaking in an interview with ABC News, Bolton said that the declaration by the president following his historic summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un should be placed in the correct context. (Yonhap)"Come on, what he was saying in context was that if North Korea lives up to the commitments that it made on

July 16, 2018

Presidential panel discusses Rajin-Khasan cooperation during trip to NK

A group of representatives from South Korea's presidential panel returned home Sunday after a trip to North Korea, where they discussed possible trilateral economic cooperation involving the two Koreas and Russia, its official said.The Presidential Committee on Northern Economic Cooperation sent an 11-member team led by committee chairman Song Young-gil to the North's northeastern border region of Rason. They stayed there for two days from Friday. (Yonhap)The team originally planned to attend a

July 15, 2018

Koreas agree to form joint doubles teams at table tennis competition in South

The two Koreas agreed to form joint doubles teams at a table tennis competition south of the border, Seoul officials said Sunday, following North Koreans' arrival in South Korea. North Koreas' 25-member squad, which includes 16 players, traveled to South Korea for the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) World Tour Platinum Korean Open, which will be staged in Daejeon, 160 kilometers south of Seoul, from next Tuesday to July 22. North Korea previously said it will send athletes to the Ko

July 15, 2018

S. Korean pro-unification group to visit N. Korea this week

A major South Korean pro-unification organization, chaired by a son of late President Kim Dae-jung, is set to visit North Korea this week to discuss a joint project of bringing home the remains of victims of forced labor during the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula, the group said in a statement released Sunday. (Yonhap)The Ministry of Unification on Thursday approved a four-day trip to Pyongyang by five members of the Korean Council for Reconciliation and Cooperation, inclu

July 15, 2018

Government must swiftly confirm facts on NK restaurant workers: lawyers’ group

With the controversy surrounding the arrival of North Korean restaurant workers in 2016 snowballing, a lawyers’ group on Sunday urged the South Korean government to confirm the facts before it is “too late.”The narrative involving the 2016 incident took a sharp turn in May, when restaurant manager Heo Gang-il claimed in an interview with local network JTBC that he had tricked the workers into traveling to South Korea and that the South’s National Intelligence Service had orchestrated their defec

July 15, 2018

US, N. Korea hold talks about return of American troops' remains

The United States and North Korea held general-level talks for the first time in more than nine years on Sunday to discuss the details of an agreement to repatriate the remains of American troops killed during the 1950-53 Korean War.The meeting had originally been scheduled to take place Thursday, but the North called it off at the last minute, citing a lack of preparations. The North then suggested holding general-level talks with the US-led UN Command on Sunday, and the US agreed.  (Yonhap)Sun

July 15, 2018

US-N. Korea summit medallions to be up for sale

Medallions that commemorate the historic US-North Korea summit will be sold here, a local TV shopping channel operator said Sunday.The Singapore Mint will present the US-North Korea summit 2018 medallion to commemorate the historic occasion which took place in Singapore on June 12. (Yonhap)The gold medallion, weighing 15.55 grams and measuring 27 millimeters in diameter, will be priced at 1.21 million won ($1,067) here, with the silver version priced at 89,000 won, according to Hyundai Homeshopp

July 15, 2018

NK restaurant manager claims Seoul's spy agency lured him into defecting

A former North Korean restaurant manager who defected to South Korea in 2016 together with a dozen female workers claimed Sunday that Seoul's spy agency had lured and blackmailed him into defecting.Ho Kang-il's claim, made in a phone interview with Yonhap News Agency, corroborates suspicions that the high-profile defection was not voluntary and the then-government of President Park Geun-hye orchestrated it behind the scenes. (Yonhap)During the interview, Ho claimed that the South's National Inte

July 15, 2018

Despite detente, sanctions on North Korea fan TB epidemic

PYONGYANG (AP) --  Dr. O Yong Il swings open a glass door with an orange biohazard sign and gestures to the machine he hoped would revolutionize his life's work. As chief of North Korea's tuberculosis laboratory, Dr. O saw it as a godsend. Tuberculosis is North Korea's biggest public health problem. With the American-made GeneXpert, his lab would be able to complete a TB test in two hours instead of two months. It took years, but Dr. O got the machines, only to discover GeneXpert needs cartridge

July 14, 2018

Int'l gymnastics body chief says N. Korea to review participating in competition in S. Korea

The chief of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) who recently visited Pyongyang said Saturday that North Korea will review participating in a gymnastics event in South Korea later this year. Morinari Watanabe told reporters at Beijing Capital Airport on his way home that North Koreans will positively review their participation in the Korea Cup international gymnastics competition in Jeju in November. The 59-year-old Japanese revealed that he delivered an invitation letter from Seoul's

July 14, 2018

US preparing for next round of talks with N. Korea: S. Korean official

The United States is stepping up preparations for another round of negotiations with North Korea on dismantling the regime's nuclear weapons program, a South Korean official said Friday.Lee Do-hoon, South Korea's chief nuclear envoy, provided the update to reporters in Washington after holding a series of meetings with US officials handling the negotiations."The US side is accelerating its internal preparations for follow-up negotiations with the North," he said. "The US is forming a negotiating

July 14, 2018

Confusion flares over talks on return of US troop remains

Even after the US announcement of plans for a meeting with North Korea this weekend on the return of soldiers' remains, confusion persists over how to characterize it."Mid day July 12th (the North Koreans) contacted us and offered to meet on July 15th. We will be ready," the State Department's spokesperson Heather Nauert said.The United States is apparently seeking a "government-to-government" approach to receive the remains of service members killed in the 1950-53 Korean War, in line with the S

July 13, 2018