Ancient Egyptian beer making vessels discovered in Israel

TEL AVIV (AFP) -- Fragments of pottery used by Egyptians to make beer and dating back 5,000 years have been discovered on a building site in Tel Aviv, the Israeli Antiquities Authority said on Sunday.Excavation director Diego Barkan said 17 pits were found that had been used to store produce in the Early Bronze Age, from 3500 to 3000 BC."Among the hundreds of pottery sherds that characterise the local culture, a number of fragments of large ceramic basins were discovered that were made in an Egy

March 29, 2015

S. Koreans safely arrive in Djibouti after leaving Yemen

The 10 South Koreans who were evacuated from Yemen have landed safely in Djibouti, officials here said Sunday.The defense ministry said eight civilians and two embassy staffers checked into a hotel in Djibouti around 6:30 p.m. Friday local time, or 12:30 a.m. Sunday in Korean time, having flown in on a U.N. plane. It said two South Korean military liaison officers based in Djibouti helped the South Koreans once they arrived in the African nation.According to the ministry, the liaison officers ha

March 29, 2015

S. Korea to offer $1.1 bln to support development in Latin America

South Korea will offer a total of $1.1 billion won in policy funds to help support economic development projects in Latin America, the finance ministry said Saturday.  The ministry unveiled the plan at this year's Inter-American Development Bank board of governors meeting in Busan, saying that the money will help South Korean companies make inroads into various projects to be undertaken by Latin American countries.  Of the total, $1 billion will come from the country's low-interest Economic Deve

March 29, 2015

10 S. Koreans evacuated from Yemen by plane

Ten South Koreans including two embassy staffers were evacuated from Yemen by plane Saturday as security concerns have heightened following airstrikes against a militant rebel group in the country, Seoul's foreign ministry said.On Thursday, Saudi Arabia and a coalition of Gulf Arab nations launched air strikes against Shiite rebels, known as Houthi, which ousted Yemen's government and dissolved the parliament in early February. The militant group has expanded its influence following its seizure

March 29, 2015

Official: Siege of gunmen in Somali hotel ends, 17 dead

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- Somali government officials say they have taken control of the hotel where extremist gunmen were holed up for more than 12 hours in an attack that has left at least 17 people dead.Capt. Mohamed Hussein said Saturday the gunfire had stopped and security agents have accessed the whole building. Hussein had earlier said the gunmen were believed to have occupied the third and fourth floor of the the Maka Al-Mukarramah hotel in the capital Mogadishu. Al-Shabab, an al-Qaida-

March 28, 2015

Saudi Arabia blames 'technical failure' for Yemen jet crash

SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- Saudi Arabia on Saturday blamed a "technical fault" for forcing two of its pilots in an F-15 to eject over waters south of Yemen during a mission amid a bombing campaign targeting Shiite rebels in the country.The official Saudi Press Agency reported that the pilots were in "good health'' after ejecting Thursday. It said the U.S. offered aid to rescue the airmen.A U.S. Defense Department official told The Associated Press that an American helicopter flew Thursday from neighbo

March 28, 2015

Tuktamysheva takes women's title at figure skating worlds

SHANGHAI (AP) -- Russia's Elizaveta Tuktamysheva wrapped up the most successful season of her young career by easily winning the women's gold medal at the figure skating world championships on Saturday.Tuktamysheva had a huge lead after landing a triple axel in the short program and extended it further in the free skate to score 210.36 points overall, more than 15 points ahead of silver medalist Satoko Miyahara of Japan. Russia's Elena Radionova had a shaky program to fall from second place afte

March 28, 2015

1 in 10 Singapore citizens queue to pay respects to Lee Kuan Yew

SINGAPORE (AFP) -- More than 330,000 people, equivalent to 10 percent of Singapore's citizen population, have visited the city-state's parliament to pay their respects to late prime minister Lee Kuan Yew ahead of his cremation this weekend, officials said Saturday.The surge of mourners was so great that the government had to temporarily suspend access to parliament late Friday for the sake of crowd safety.At peak periods, mourners could only spend a few seconds in front of Lee's closed casket, m

March 28, 2015

Malaysia launches crackdown to thwart protest: opposition

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) -- Malaysian police have arrested two politicians and a political activist as they seek to thwart a Saturday protest march demanding the release of jailed opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, an opposition parliamentarian said.Tian Chua said he also would comply with an order to surrender to police on Saturday, but that the afternoon rally in Kuala Lumpur would go ahead.The arrests are the latest in an escalating crackdown on government opponents amid anger over Anwar's jailing la

March 28, 2015

Taiwan arrests after protest over China flight route

TAIPEI (AFP) -- Taiwanese police on Saturday arrested 13 people who splashed red paint on the wall of the presidential residence in the latest protest against China's planned launch of a controversial new flight route.The protesters from the small anti-China opposition party Taiwan Solidarity Union briefly scuffled with military police guarding the residence of President Ma Ying-jeou in Taipei in the early morning.The demonstration came ahead of the scheduled launch of the route known as M503 ov

March 28, 2015

Italian court throws out Knox conviction once and for all

ROME (AP) -- Amanda Knox, who maintained that she and her former Italian boyfriend were innocent in her British roommate's murder through multiple trials and nearly four years in jail, was vindicated Friday when Italy's highest court threw out their convictions once and for all."Finished!'' Knox's lawyer Carlo Dalla Vedova exulted after the decision was read out late Friday. "It couldn't be better than this."The surprise decision definitively ends the 7{-year legal battle waged by Knox, 27, and

March 28, 2015

Chinese president promotes regional vision at Boao Forum

BEIJING (AP) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping is arguing for strong China-led efforts to promote Asian economic and political cooperation while speaking a major regional economic conference.Xi delivered the keynote address at the Boao Forum held Saturday on Hainan island in the country's south, at which he lauded the promise of the Chinese economy despite slowing growth. The Chinese president also celebrated what he said was a multipolar world in which all countries play equal roles in regional d

March 28, 2015

U.S. to pursue more trilateral defense cooperation deals with Korea, Japan: senior official

The United States will pursue further three-way defense cooperation deals with South Korea and Japan like the information sharing agreement concluded among the countries late last year, the top Pentagon official in charge of Asian affairs said Friday.Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs David Shear made the remark during a speech at an event on U.S.-Japan security, calling the intelligence sharing deal was a "good first step" and expressing hopes for Seoul and To

March 28, 2015

Pelosi to visit S. Korea next week

U.S. Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi plans to visit South Korea next week, diplomatic sources said Thursday, amid hopes she could play a role in helping resolve tensions between Seoul and Tokyo over the issue of Japan's sexual enslavement of women during World War II.Pelosi will lead a delegation of U.S. House lawmakers on the visit to South Korea on April 1-3. Seoul is part of a regional trip that will also take her delegation to Myanmar, Vietnam and Japan, the sources said. She was to depart on

March 27, 2015

U.S. withholds comment on S. Korea's decision to join AIIB

The United States on Thursday withheld comment on South Korea's decision to join the Chinese-led regional development bank AIIB, only expressing hope that members will work toward having the institution embrace transparency and high standards."I am not going to react or comment on their decision. I would say in general we've seen a number of countries make decisions to join the bank. That is their decision," State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke said at a regular press briefing."We certainly ho

March 27, 2015

U.S. has 'solid' understanding of Seoul-Tokyo shared history: Korean envoy

The U.S. government, Congress and academics have a very "solid" consensus that Japan should stop its attempts to gloss over its wartime wrongdoings, namely the issue of sex slavery, the South Korean ambassador to Washington said Thursday.The remarks by Amb. Ahn Ho-young came amid speculation that Washington appears to be "fatigued" as tension over the shared history between Seoul and Tokyo has been protracted without signs of improvement."It is my understanding that the U.S. government, lawmaker

March 26, 2015

Photos of S. Korean islets of Dokdo on display in Beijing

Pictures of South Korea's easternmost islets of Dokdo were put on display in Beijing on Thursday, the event's organizers said, marking the first overseas photo exhibition of Dokdo. Dokdo, which lies closer to South Korea in the body of water between the Korean Peninsula and Japan, has long been a thorn in relations between the two countries. South Korea keeps a police detachment on the islets, effectively controlling them.The exhibition, which runs through April 17 at the Korea Culture Center in

March 26, 2015

Asylum seekers in S. Korea hit record high in 2014: U.N. report

The number of asylum applications hit a record high in South Korea last year, with people from Egypt, Pakistan and China dominating the list of asylum seekers, a U.N. report showed Thursday.South Korea recorded 2,900 asylum applications in 2014, up 81 percent from the 1,600 tallied in the previous year, according to a 2014 report on asylum trends released by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.The report analyzed the trends of asylum claims in 44 industrialized countries last year.

March 26, 2015

S. Korea honors independence hero in China

South Korean government officials and lawmakers paid their respects Thursday in China on the 105th anniversary of the death of a revered Korean independence hero who assassinated a prominent Japanese colonial leader a century ago.It was the first time that a South Korean government-organized memorial service for Ahn Jung-geun, who shot to death the Korean Peninsula's first Japanese governor-general, Hirobumi Ito, in China's northern city of Harbin in 1909, was held in China. Such events, however

March 26, 2015