The latest bid for controlling shares of Kumho Industrial Co., the de facto holding firm of Kumho Asiana Group, ended in vain, industry sources said Tuesday, as the sole bidder's offered price did not meet expectations.The decision came after Hoban Construction Co., a mid-sized local builder, made a solo final bid for the 57.5 percent stake in Kumho Industrial at 600.7 billion won (US$561 million). Kumho Asiana Group controls Asiana Airlines Inc., the country's No. 2 air carrier.According to sou

Industry April 28, 2015

Police said Tuesday that they have arrested a U.S. serviceman over an alleged assault on a South Korean employee at a local club after being drunk.The 29-year-old U.S. soldier, whose name has not been revealed, was arrested Sunday on accusations of hitting a South Korean employee's face with a brick at a club located in the central Seoul.Police said the sergeant was kicked out of the club after being too drunk and was protesting against the move when he made the assault.He was immediately arrest

Social Affairs April 28, 2015

ISLAMABAD, April 28, 2015 (AFP) -- Pakistan on Tuesday carried out its 100th execution since lifting a moratorium on the death penalty last December, in what rights group Amnesty International described as a "shameful milestone".Hangings resumed after the country's bloodiest-ever militant attack, in which the Taliban gunned down 154 people -- mostly children -- at a school in the northwest.Munir Hussain, who was convicted of a double murder in 2000, was hanged in the town of Vehari in Punjab pro

International April 28, 2015

BAGHDAD, (AFP) -- Eight Iraqis were shot dead and dumped in Baghdad, officials said Tuesday, in what could be the second series of killings in recent days targeting men who fled Anbar province.An interior ministry official and a tribal leader said the men, who were found in the capital's Jihad area, were people who had fled violence in Anbar, but a police colonel and a medical source said their identities were still not known.Sheikh Naim al-Kuoud, an Anbar tribal leader, said that an armed group

International April 28, 2015

KUCIC KULA, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) -- Bosnian police on Tuesday arrested a man with suspected links to a gunman who stormed into a police station in the country's Bosnian Serb region shouting "Allahu akbar," killing one policeman and wounding two others before he died in the shootout.New details are also beginning to emerge about the gunman, with residents from his village saying his father was taken away by Serbs in 1992 at the start of a brutal multi-ethnic war and never seen again. Monday's

International April 28, 2015

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A massive landslide in a remote province in northeastern Afghanistan killed at least 52 people Tuesday, a provincial official said. The stricken area in Badakhshan province is cut off from the rest of the country, covered in snow and is only accessible from the air, significantly hampering any rescue efforts, said Shah Waliullah Adeeb, the provincial governor.Badakhshan is one of the poorest and least-developed regions of Afghanistan. It regularly suffers huge landslid

International April 28, 2015

South Korea's top mobile carrier SK Telecom saw its market share hover below 50 percent for the second consecutive month in March, data showed Tuesday, as smaller rivals continued to expand grounds through budget smartphones.According to data compiled by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, SK Telecom had 49.5 percent of the market in March with 28.3 million users, including those from mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) that rent SK's networks.The figure marks a 0.1 percentage

April 28, 2015

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

International March 29, 2015

South Korea's financial regulator said Sunday it will invest an additional 20 trillion won (US$18.07 billion) in long-term fixed-rate mortgage loans to meet the explosive demand for a new government-backed lending program meant to tackle the household debt problem.The move came as South Koreans rushed to sign on with local banks last week to convert their short-term floating-rate mortgage loans into long-term, fixed-rate loans.The provision of the additional amount will be completed by April 3,

Business March 29, 2015

North Korea blasted South Korean President Park Geun-hye Sunday over her recent speech made at a ceremony to mark Pyongyang's torpedoing of a South Korean corvette in 2010 that killed 46 sailors.Speaking on the fifth anniversary of the tragedy Wednesday, Park said she "hopes North Korea abandons its reckless provocations and belief that nuclear weapons can protect the country." She, however, did not directly accuse the North of downing the South Korean ship Cheonan in the speech.She was paying t

Politics March 29, 2015

SINGAPORE -- South Korean President Park Geun-hye met with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on the sidelines of the funeral ceremony of Lee Kuan Yew, founder of Singapore, a sign of thaw in bilateral relations soured by territorial and other history-related issues.Park proposed that South Korea, China and Japan take necessary steps to carry out agreements reached by the three nations' top diplomats earlier this month, according to her office.The foreign ministers of the three countries have ag

Politics March 29, 2015

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-

International March 28, 2015

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

International March 28, 2015

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

International March 28, 2015