The Korea Herald is running a series of feature stories and interviews on the evolution and rise of drug crimes, insufficient support systems and young addicts’ stories in South Korea. This is the fifth installment. -- Ed.   When reading news reports on Chun Woo-won, the grandson of former South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan, and his claims of drug use by several NYU Stern School of Business graduates, Kim Haram, a 21-year-old in New York felt a sense of relief. Kim said Chun was exp

Social Affairs April 2, 2023

A large forest fire broke out on the slopes of Inwangsan, a mountain in central Seoul, on Sunday. According to authorities, the blaze began at approximately 11:53 a.m. and quickly spread to the northern side of the mountain, burning an area approximately the size of 30 football fields. No deaths or casualties had been reported as of 3:30 p.m. on Sunday. The National Fire Agency deployed 15 helicopters, 93 rescue vehicles and 580 personnel to extinguish the fire and said it had contained 70 to 80

Social Affairs April 2, 2023

Early exposure to screens may negatively affects a child’s social development, research showed Thursday. A research team led by Kim Sung-koo, a professor at Hallym University’s Department of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, showed that 95.8 percent of toddlers under the age of 2 who experience developmental delays spent more time using technological gadgets than those who didn't display such delays. The findings were based on a study between 2013 and 2019 of 197 children, 96 o

Social Affairs March 30, 2023

Sejong University’s College of Hospitality and Tourism Management ranked 46th in the annual World University Rankings by Subject in 2023, as released by QS Quacquarelli Symonds on Thursday. It is also the No. 1 hotel management university in South Korea, maintaining the top spot among domestic peers for three consecutive years. Established in 2004, the London-based ranking system aims to help students identify leading universities in a particular subject around the globe. Universities are

Social Affairs March 30, 2023

The soaring popularity of South Korean pop culture has fueled a boom in Korean language learning using songs and dramas in recent years. With the help of the media and internet, foreign learners are putting their best foot forward to get a better grasp of Korean colloquial expressions, new words and slang used by younger Koreans. Some learners also improve their linguistic knowledge by taking Korean language classes. Teachers often find introductory Korean courses easier to teach, but they often

Social Affairs March 26, 2023

South Korean prosecutors said Friday that they would seek the extradition of Do Kwon, the wanted co-founder of Terraform Labs, via the Ministry of Justice, hours after he was arrested in Montenegro. The Seoul Southern District Prosecutors’ Office said it would initiate a repatriation request to the Montenegrin authorities to transfer him to Korea. Kwon was arrested at Podgorica Airport on Thursday before boarding a flight. His identity was confirmed through a fingerprint comparison. Kwon&r

Social Affairs March 24, 2023

The mystery of what happened to the bribes taken by late President Chun Doo-hwan have re-entered the spotlight after his grandson, Chun Woo-won, an accountant based in New York, made headlines last week by alleging that his family was living off the illicit funds. Chun was an Army general who seized power in a coup and led Korea as a dictator from 1980 to 1988. He was responsible for authorizing a massacre of demonstrators during the Gwangju Democratic Uprising before making himself president. Y

Social Affairs March 23, 2023

A father was booked by police on Monday for possessing and using controlled drugs in the presence of his newborn baby. The Women’s and Juvenile Affairs bureau under Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency said Tuesday that it had booked the man, only identified by his surname Jung, for breaching the Child Welfare Act, stating that abuse of drugs can cause emotional child abuse to an infant. According to a complaint filed to the police last week by his family, Jung, who owns a home appliance impor

Social Affairs March 22, 2023

The Seoul Metropolitan Government on Tuesday introduced blueprints to build a floating pool and marina facilities on the banks of the Han River in Ichon, central Seoul. Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon said during his trip to Denmark on Sunday that the swimming complex was inspired by the Harbor Bath, an open-air floating public swimming pool in the Danish capital, Copenhagen. Seoul city authorities explained that Copenhagen’s floating public pool had played a noticeable role in transforming the ind

Social Affairs March 21, 2023

As a growing number of South Korean women are tying the knot in their early 40s, the number of middle-aged first-time brides has outstripped brides in their 20s for two consecutive years, government data showed Monday. According to data from Statistics Korea, there were 10,949 marriages among women aged between 40 to 44 last year, outpacing the 10,113 marriages by women aged between 20 to 24. The number of early 40-something first-time brides surpassed brides in their early 20s for the first tim

Social Affairs March 20, 2023

A physician at a medical examination center in Seoul has been indicted for taking endoscopic pictures of patients and sharing them in a group chat room. The 52-year-old, whose name and gender weren’t disclosed, is facing charges of breaching the Personal Information Protect Act, according to police and prosecution on Monday. The doctor reportedly took pictures of computer screens that contained the personal information of 97 patients during his stint at an examination center in Seoul&rsquo

Social Affairs March 20, 2023

Public servants of all ages have a low preference for eating lunch with their teammates, a report showed Sunday. According to a report by the Korea Institute of Public Administration on the values and organizational innovation of public servants per generation, both the MZ Generation -- a Korean term referring to millennials and Generation Z, or those roughly born from 1981 to 2012 -- and older generations have negative views about eating lunch with coworkers. The finding came to light in resear

Social Affairs March 19, 2023

South Korea’s military said late Wednesday that it would look into claims made by the grandson of the late former President Chun Doo-hwan that his acquaintances, incumbent officers in the military, had used drugs inside the army. The military said that it would try to confirm such claims raised by the grandson, declining to further comment on the issue. The two military men are reportedly lieutenants of the country’s Department of Defense and the Air Force. The Ministry of Defense sa

Social Affairs March 16, 2023

South Korean police raided the Ministry of National Defense on Wednesday as part of an investigation into a claim made by a former spokesperson for the ministry that a fortuneteller had been involved in the relocation of the presidential residence to Yongsan in central Seoul. Investigators from the cyber bureau of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency were sent to confiscate evidence, including vehicle entry records, to determine if the fortuneteller had visited the ministry's premises in Yo

Social Affairs March 15, 2023

The presidential office said Wednesday that the maximum weekly working hours would be decided after adhering to the will of the public, especially underprivileged workers. This semi-reversal came just a week after the Ministry of Employment and Labor announced on March 6 that it would revise the current 52-hour workweek to allow workers to manage their working hours depending on their workload balance. “The core of President Yoon Suk Yeol’s labor market policy is to protect the right

Politics March 15, 2023