A minor progressive party filed legal changes against President Lee Myung-bak and the first lady on Monday for violating the country's real estate transaction law. The Democratic Labor Party claimed that the decision by Lee and his wife to buy land in southern Seoul for their retirement effectively caused monetary losses for the presidential office. The president bought the plot of land in Naeg...

The South Korean economy grew slightly faster than previously estimated in the third quarter on sustained exports, but the growth momentum slowed from three months earlier amid global economic uncertainty, the central bank said Tuesday. Korea's gross domestic product (GDP), the broadest measure of economic performance, expanded a revised 0.8 percent in the July-September period, up from an earli...

South Korea's Coast Guard said Monday that they have rescued four men from a small fishing boat that sank off the country's southwest coast. The 4.7-ton drift-net boat capsized after sending out a distress message at around 8 p.m., local authorities said. The boat was located 4.7 miles northeast of Manje Island. The small island lies some 110 kilometers from the port of Mokpo in South Jeolla Pro...

BRUSSELS (AP) _ Standard & Poor's threatened Monday to downgrade the credit rating of 15 eurozone countries, piling pressure on the currency union's leaders to take radical steps to resolve their debt crisis at a summit later this week. The decision to put 15 eurozone countries _ including AAA-rating nations such as Germany and Luxembourg _ on watch for a possible cut in their credit worthiness ...

SEOUL, Dec. 5 (Yonhap) -- North Korean leader Kim Jong-il regularly blasts the breakdown in military discipline among troops, a report based on internal data collected over the last decade said Monday. The report compiled jointly by the Korea Institute for National Unification (KINU), the Institute for National Security Strategy and a local university, claimed problems started occurring from 200...

LONDON (AP) — A British court Monday gave WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange permission to continue his legal battle to avoid extradition to Sweden over sex crimes allegations. The decision means Assange does not face immediate deportation. British judges said Assange could apply to the Supreme Court to hear one specific point of his legal case — but there is no guarantee that the higher court wil...

SEOUL, Dec. 5 (Yonhap) -- Cable television operators have started to re-air high-definition terrestrial TV programs late Monday following the government's mediation efforts. "We have decided to accept the recommendations made by the national broadcasting watchdog and started the retransmission as of 6 p.m., and agreed to engage in earnest dialogue to resolve outstanding differences in the coming...

Opposition drives home DDoS attack involving aide of GNP lawmaker The Grand National Party was in turmoil Monday following earlier allegations that an aide to one of its lawmakers was involved in a cyber attack against the national election watchdog during the election for Seoul mayor. Last week, the National Police Agency’s cyber investigation unit arrested a former assistant of GNP Rep. Choi ...

A former female prosecutor embroiled in a corruption scandal was arrested on Monday to be questioned over allegations that she received a luxury sedan and a designer handbag in return for peddling her influence, prosecutors dealing with the case said. The Busan prosecutors took the 36-year-old woman surnamed Lee into custody on Monday morning and were interrogating her, they said. “An arrest wa...