China hinted Friday at a possible meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korea's ceremonial leader Kim Yong-nam on the margins of a forum in Jakarta next week. Asked about a possible bilateral meeting between Xi and Kim on the sidelines of the conference in Indonesia, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin replied, "Yes, on the sidelines of the Asia-African Conference and other commemorative events, President Xi will have some bilateral meetings."Xi will arrive in Indonesia on

North Korea April 17, 2015

Prosecutors demanded Friday a four-year jail term for the son of the Sewol ferry owner, accusing him of embezzling company funds.Yoo Dae-gyun, whose father owned the ferry Sewol that capsized off the southwest coast last year, was convicted at a lower court last November of the misappropriation of about 7.4 billion won ($6.8 million) from his father's companies between 2002 and 2013. The lower court sentenced him to three years in prison.At a Seoul Appellate Court hearing, prosecutors also deman

Social Affairs April 17, 2015

South Korea will provide more humanitarian aid to North Korea to help ease rising inter-Korean tensions, Seoul's point man on Pyongyang said Friday.Unification Minister Hong Yong-pyo said he will make efforts to encourage more private organizations to increase exchanges at a time when the government's assistance to Pyongyang has been suspended due to 2010 punitive measures on the North for its attack on a South Korean warship."What I'll focus on is how to set up the channel of communications bet

North Korea April 17, 2015

South Korea will take additional stimulus measures in the second half of 2015 if the need arises to prop up the slowing economy, the nation's economic czar has said.Finance Minister Choi Kyung-hwan, who is in Washington to attend a G20 ministerial meeting, made the remarks in an interview with CNBC on Thursday amid growing concern that Asia's fourth-largest economy may lose further ground this year due to falling exports and still anemic domestic demand."We are keeping close tabs on overall econ

April 17, 2015

President Park Geun-hye's approval rating has dropped this week from a week earlier amid a bribery scandal involving some of her key aides, a poll showed Friday.The poll conducted this week by research agency Gallup Korea put her approval rating at 34 percent, down 5 percentage points from the previous week.Regarding Park's job performance, 54 percent of the respondents gave a negative assessment while 12 percent gave no response.Only 51 percent of the respondents from the southern regions of Da

Politics April 17, 2015

South Korea bashed North Korea on Friday for its renewed pledge to cling to its nuclear weapons program, saying it would deal sternly with the communist nation's provocative act.The response by Seoul's defense ministry came after Hyon Yong-chol, the chief of Pyongyang's People's Armed Forces, claimed during an international security conference in Moscow on Thursday that its possession of nuclear weapons "is the direct result of the hostile policy by the United States and ... aimed at eliminating

Defense April 17, 2015

President Park Geun-hye arrived in Colombia Thursday on the first leg of a four-nation trip to South America to help boost South Korea's ties with the "continent of opportunities."The visit underscored Park's efforts to build confidence with her counterparts from Colombia, Peru, Chile and Brazil to expand cooperation with the emerging markets.The combined gross domestic product of the four countries stood at US$3.1 trillion, about half that of 33 South and Central American countries.Seoul said l

Foreign Affairs April 17, 2015

Haruki Murakami, a world-renowned Japanese novelist, said Japan needs to offer an "open-ended" apology for its wartime atrocities, according to a news report Friday."Apology is not a shameful thing," he said in an interview with Japan's Kyodo News Service, adding that his country's past invasion of other nations itself is a "fact," regardless of disputes over details.He said Japan should admit what it did and apologize for that until other countries affected say "it's enough."Murakami stressed t

World News April 17, 2015

Asiana Airlines Inc., South Korea's second-largest flag carrier, said Friday that it will suspend its flights to Hiroshima, Japan, until the end of this month in order to review safety measures.The move comes after an Asiana passenger jet carrying 73 passengers skidded off the runway at Hiroshima Airport on Tuesday while landing, leaving 25 people slightly injured."We will suspend flights to and from Hiroshima, during which we will review the overall safety measures related to the Hiroshima rout

Industry April 17, 2015