Acting President and Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn on Thursday called on newly commissioned police officers to contribute to addressing social conflicts at a time the nation is sharply divided over the recent ouster of Park Geun-hye as president.During a commissioning ceremony at Korean National Police University, Hwang stressed that now is the time to "respect each other and hold hands together for the sake of reconciliation and cooperation." Acting President and Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn spe

Politics March 16, 2017

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is to visit the Demilitarized Zone on Friday as the first major schedule of his trip to South Korea, the foreign ministry said Thursday, in an apparent bid to demonstrate a strong alliance between the two countries against North Korea.Tillerson is to come to South Korea early Friday after staying in Japan as part of his three-country trip to Asia that will also take him to China on Saturday.US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson (C) arrives in Tokyo on March 15,

Foreign Affairs March 16, 2017

Local property magnates are staying away from investing heavily in the country's real estate as South Korea braces for an early presidential election and possible interest rate hikes, market watchers said Thursday."Big time investors are currently taking a cautious position ahead of changes, although they still have a keen interest in the realty industry," an analyst at a Seoul bank said.The US Federal Reserve raised the key interest rate by 25 basis points to a range of 0.75 to 1 percent Wednes

March 16, 2017

North Korea on Thursday condemned South Korea and the United States for "escalating nuclear attack threats," citing the participation of US strategic bombers and the nuclear-powered USS Carl Vinson in joint military drills in South Korea. North Korea's official news agency, KCNA, said a fleet of B-1B Lancer bombers from the Andersen air base on Guam made a stealth flight over the Sangdong firing range of South Korea on Monday for about an hour on a nuclear bomb-dropping drill aimed at making pre

North Korea March 16, 2017

The Supreme Prosecutors' Office said Thursday that it will toughen punishments for employers accused of intentionally delaying or refusing wage payments to employees, seeking in particular to protect the welfare of the nation's growing number of part-timers.As part of such efforts to protect the underprivileged, the SPO said it will implement a three-strikes system against immoral employers with records of repeated failures to pay wages.Under the new system, all employers who are caught failing

Industry March 16, 2017

Park Yu-chun, member of K-pop boy band JYJ, has been cleared of all four sexual assault allegations that have dogged him since last year, his agency said Thursday.C-JeS Entertainment, Park's agency, said that "the Seoul Central District Prosecutors Office notified (Park) of such investigation results," and added, "the string of cases involving Park Yu-chun since last June have been closed."(Yonhap)Park, a member of the famous K-pop boy band JYJ, was embroiled in a scandal as four different women

Performance March 16, 2017

The number of official markets in North Korea has been on a rapid increase under the connivance of the authorities, a US broadcaster said Thursday. "The number was recently confirmed to be 439 via an analysis of satellite images of the communist country by Curtis Melvin, a researcher at the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University in the United States, Radio Free Asia said.  A North Korean market in Pyongyang (Yonhap)The figure was an increase of 40 from a year ago, with some 1-1.8 million

North Korea March 16, 2017

South Korean stocks traded higher late Thursday morning, but pared their earlier gains on profit-taking, as the US Federal Reserve, as expected, raised interest rates and hinted that future adjustments will be carried out in a gradual manner.The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index  rose 11.78 points, or 0.55 percent, to 2,144.78 as of 11:20 a.m.The US stocks rose sharply overnight after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates as expected without accelerating its timeline for further ti

March 16, 2017

Liberal presidential hopeful Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo said Thursday if elected he will grant more power to the state fair trade watchdog and improve corporate governance to break corruptive relations between the government and large businesses."The top task for national reforms is to root out the corruptive links between the government and businesses," Ahn of the People's Party said in a statement.  Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo of the People's Party (Yonhap)He said he will establish a fair market order by expan

Politics March 16, 2017

The Donald Trump administration may go ahead with imposing secondary sanctions on Chinese companies and build up US military power to increase pressure on the Asian rival in a bid to rein in an increasingly wayward North Korea, a South Korean think tank predicted Thursday.Forecasting the Trump administration's North Korea policy direction, Asan Institute for Policy Studies' researcher Go Myong-hyun said in a report that the US policy on North Korea will be formulated under the administration's b

International March 16, 2017

Thae Yong-ho, a former Pyongyang diplomat who defected to Seoul last year, on Thursday urged South Korea to be "predictable" when it comes to inter-Korean issues."(The conservative and liberal parties) must reach consensus to let North Korea know that it will pay dearly for any provocations against South Korea," Thae said during a meeting with lawmakers."Only then will North Korea not roll out thoughtless policies against the South."Thae Yong-ho, a former Pyongyang diplomat who defected to Seoul

Foreign Affairs March 16, 2017

A national security expert on Thursday called on South Korea to consider putting on hold the ongoing deployment of a US missile defense system on its soil until China stops its stepped-up retaliation on Korean goods and businesses.South Korea and the US recently started the process of installing a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system to cope with the North's missile threats. Members from conservative civic organizations calls for China to stop retaliatory steps against South Korea's planne

Foreign Affairs March 16, 2017

South Korea has begun an environmental impact assessment of a local golf course ahead of the deployment of an advanced US missile defense system there, the military said Thursday, speeding up the deployment amid growing threats from North Korea.  The defense ministry picked a firm in December to conduct the assessment of the site in Seongju in the southeast, which will host the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system. Late last month, the company began looking into the location to see if THAA

Social Affairs March 16, 2017

Most South Koreans are very cynical about politicians as they believe those in politics tend to serve not for national interests but personal gains, a survey showed Thursday.As many as 87.3 percent of the 1,052 people polled said politicians put more focus on personal interests than on national well-being, according to a poll conducted by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs between June and November last year.Only 7.3 percent were neutral and 5.3 percent said politicians are focuse

Social Affairs March 16, 2017

Moon Jae-in, a frontrunner presidential hopeful from the Democratic Party, on Thursday announced his plans to fight the nation's mounting household debt by lowering the ceiling of interest rates and other measures.The announcement came as outstanding household credit in South Korea jumped to 1,344.3 trillion won ($1.18 trillion) in the final quarter of 2016, up 11.7 percent from a year earlier. Moon Jae-in, former head of the Democratic Party, speaks during a session on household debt held in Se

Politics March 16, 2017