Tests on lab mice have opened up a new path towards a vaccine against HIV, one of the most frustrating quests in the 30-year history of AIDS, scientists reported on Wednesday. Genetically modified mice fought back the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) after they had been injected with genes to make antibodies, the first line of defence in the immune system, the report said in the journal Natur...

SEOUL, Dec. 1 (Yonhap) -- The military court said Thursday it has sentenced two Marine major generals to suspended terms on charges of making false accusations against their former top commander. In a trial held Wednesday, the court handed down six-month suspended terms to the two major generals, surnamed Park and Hong. Park was charged in May with spreading what turned out to be false allegati...

The government has decided to send peacekeeping troops to South Sudan next year, sources said Thursday. The decision was made in response to requests from the United Nations made on Aug. 8. Although the decision has yet to be approved by the National Assembly, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who is in Busan for the High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness, thanked the Korean government for deci...

NEW YORK (AP) ― Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services has lowered its credit ratings for many of the world’s largest financial institutions, including the biggest banks in the U.S. Bank of America Corp. and its main subsidiaries are among the institutions whose ratings fell at least one notch Tuesday, along with Citigroup Inc., Goldman Sachs Group Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley and Well...

TOKYO (AFP) ― Energy-saving electric cars with advanced green technology vie for attention as the Tokyo Motor Show opens Wednesday, with robots and computers becoming ever more part of the vehicles on display. Companies are showcasing concept cars with “transformable” bodies and automotive computers linked to smart phones, while showing off energy-efficient vehicles with electric, fuel cell and ...

BUDAPEST (AP) ― Hungary’s central bank said Tuesday it was raising its main interest rate from 6 percent to 6.5 percent after Moody’s recently downgraded the country’s debt rating to junk status. The decision takes effect on Wednesday. The change is the first time the National Bank of Hungary has adjusted its base rate since Jan. 25, when it raised it by a quarter percentage point. Central bank...

BRUSSELS (AFP) -- Eurozone inflation hit 3.0 percent for the third month running in November, official data showed on Wednesday, but analysts expect the European Central Bank to slash its main rate due to the debt crisis. The ECB, the guardian of euro price stability, wants to keep inflation below 2.0 percent but any action when bank governors meet on December 8 could be driven by concerns about...

The government and the ruling Grand National Party are promoting a plan to convert some 30 percent of nonregular workers in the public sector into indefinite-term employees as part of their efforts to curb the continued growth of irregular workforce. According to Statistics Korea, the number of irregular workers reached 5.99 million as of August, accounting for 34.2 percent of the nation’s 17.5 ...

The government has found an easy way to curb inflation ― to change the way of calculating the consumer price index. Statistics Korea said Tuesday that it had updated the composition and weights of the goods and services used to produce the CPI, a job it does once every five years to ensure that the key measure of inflation reflects price trends more accurately. The change magically brought down...

Most everyone hates lawyers. So it probably isn’t a surprise that many people hate law professors, too. A recent front-page article in the New York Times, much discussed in legal circles, was the latest salvo in what is now a long line of attacks depicting the legal academy as impractical and unworldly. I think the dislike, though, is a result of law professors being too much in the world. You s...

The modern conservative movement began 60 years ago with the publication of a book by a 26-year-old first-time author. Reflecting on that work teaches us something important about the nature and trajectory of modern conservatism, about the energy that propelled the movement and about serious problems with the movement today. The book was “God and Man at Yale.” The author was William F. Buckley J...

So far, an all-out war launched by North Korea has been the major conflict scenario that all kinds of operational plans by the Republic of Korea and the United States have been based upon. The structure and development of South Korean forces were organized in accordance with this assumption. There has been an implicit agreement that Seoul provides massive ground forces to defend its metropolitan ...