The Supreme Court said Sunday it would allow children under 19 who suffered from domestic violence or child have abuse to sue their parents over parental rights as part of efforts to secure their rights and welfare conditions. Abused minors can now directly request a court to suspend or strip off the parental rights of their parents, officials said. They were previously only allowed to file lawsuits through legal representatives. Otherwise, they had to wait until their legal age of 19. This is p

Social Affairs Feb. 8, 2015

An annual average of at least 16 people died of anesthesia-related accidents in Korea in recent years, a report showed Thursday, raising concerns over the safety of patients undergoing surgery.According to Samsung Medical Center’s report, 82 out of 105 patients who suffered anesthesia-related accidents died between July 2009 and June 2014. The others suffered permanent physical disorders. The report was written by the center’s research team, led by anesthesiology professor Kim Duk-kyung.“This on

Social Affairs Feb. 5, 2015

All foreign students in Korea will be required to subscribe to the national health insurance program as part of the state’s efforts to better secure their living conditions during their stay, welfare officials said Wednesday. All foreign nationals with proof of staying in Korea for more than three months have been allowed to join the public health care system but the subscription has not been compulsory.In order to boost the health insurance subscription, the Health and Welfare Ministry said it

Social Affairs Feb. 4, 2015

One out of 3 three tourists visiting the capital of South Korea is Chinese, with the proportion gradually increasing over the years, a public think tank reported Tuesday.According the Seoul Institute, Chinese nationals accounted for about 36 percent of all tourists to the capital in 2013, followed by Japanese with 24.2 percent. This is the first time that the number of Chinese visitors surpassed that of Japanese. Travelers from the U.S. and Taiwan took the third and fourth spots with 6.5 percent

Social Affairs Feb. 3, 2015

South Korea called on North Korea Monday to discontinue misusing a recent confession by a famous North Korean defector and key witness to a U.N. probe that parts of his well-known story on the reclusive nation’s prison camps are inaccurate.Shin Dong-hyuk admitted last month that some of his testimony of torture and other tragic experiences at the North’s political prison camps, revealed in the book “Escape from Camp 14,” is incorrect. He said he spent most of his time in the North at a different

North Korea Feb. 2, 2015

Avian influenza was found in a dog on a farm in South Gyeongsang Province amid growing concerns that the disease could spread to other animals, officials said Monday. The dog ― one of three at a duck farm in Goseong-gun, South Gyeongsang Province ― had antigens for the highly pathogenic H5N8 strain of bird flu, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said. The farm was affected by the disease on Jan. 23. This is the first time bird flu has been found in a dog in Korea through the det

Social Affairs Feb. 2, 2015

An elderly Korean woman forced into sexual servitude by Japan’s World War II military has died, an advocacy group said Monday, the second death of a former sex slave in less than a week.The victim died of a chronic illness at an undisclosed hospital on Jan. 31, the Korean Council for Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan said.“We cannot disclose any information, including her name and age, because she and her family never wanted to make public that she was a victim,” the group said.

Social Affairs Feb. 2, 2015

Former leftist lawmakers said Monday that they will request the Constitutional Court to review its decision to dissolve their political party embroiled in a pro-North Korean plot, arguing that the decision was “wrong.”In December, the Constitutional Court ordered the dissolution of the minor opposition Unified Progressive Party, leading to the party’s immediate demise. All five sitting lawmakers of the party also lost their parliamentary seats.The ruling came after the justice ministry filed a p

Politics Feb. 2, 2015

The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said Thursday that it was pushing for a five-year animal welfare project, under which pets would have to receive microchip implants starting next year in a bid to reduce the number of abandoned animals. Information about the pets and their owners will be contained in microchips, which will help the owners find their pets more easily if they get lost, the ministry said. Animal hospitals will also be required to record pets’ identifying informati

Social Affairs Jan. 29, 2015

A former Navy rear admiral under investigation over his alleged involvement in a defense industry graft case jumped off a bridge in a Seoul suburb on Wednesday, police said.The Gyeonggi Goyang Police Station said an unidentified person called at 8:10 a.m. to say the 61-year-old man, identified only by his surname Ham, plunged off the bridge over the Han River that flows through Seoul into the Yellow Sea.Ham, also a former executive member of a defense firm, was scheduled to face questioning this

Social Affairs Jan. 28, 2015

South Korea said Wednesday it will resume a program to support North Korean medical doctors’ training in Germany.The move, the first of its kind in seven years, is in line with the Park Geun-hye administration’s push for expanding humanitarian aid for the impoverished neighbor.The unification ministry plans to provide a North Korea-Germany group with 90 million won ($83,000) from the inter-Korean cooperation fund. It will be delivered through the (South) Korea Foundation for International Health

Foreign Affairs Jan. 28, 2015

The prosecution said Monday that it questioned a main opposition party lawmaker over alleged illegal fund-raising in return for political favors. Rep. Shin Hak-yong of New Politics Alliance of Democracy is suspected of creating a slush fund of around 100 million won ($92,000) with the money he pocketed from salaries of his three aides between 2007 and last year. Investigators believe that the 63-year-old three-term lawmaker took the money in exchange for helping them get party nominations for lo

Social Affairs Jan. 26, 2015

A South Korean court on Sunday ordered a sea captain to compensate bereaved family members of a North Korean defector who had died in an accident here, an unprecedented ruling in favor of residents of North Korea. The Ulsan District Court ruled that the sea captain must pay 110 million won ($102,000) to three family members of the defector, who worked for him as a diver, for not taking efficient safety measures to protect his life. The diver, who fled to Seoul in 2011, died of carbon monoxide po

Social Affairs Jan. 25, 2015

Investigators sought an arrest warrant for another day care teacher accused of child abuse, police said Thursday, amid a growing public uproar over a series of such cases. The 25-year-old day care worker in Incheon was suspected of having hit a dozen 4-year-old children habitually and verbally abused them for not following the curriculum. This is the second arrest warrant sought for a day care employee in the city this year. A 33-year-old teacher was arrested last week for striking a 4-year-old

Social Affairs Jan. 22, 2015

The Seoul city government said Wednesday that it would take preventive measures against foot-and-mouth disease amid escalating concerns over its spread. As of Wednesday, more than 63,000 livestock at 63 farms nationwide had been culled, mostly in Gyeonggi Province and North Chungcheong Province, since the first reported outbreak on Dec. 5. The capital will conduct antibody tests on all livestock in national parks in the city and vaccinate all animals that have not yet been immunized, officials s

Social Affairs Jan. 21, 2015