The government and the ruling party agreed Thursday to set aside 1.5 trillion won (US$1.3 billion) in next year's budget to help curb soaring college tuitions, party officials said. The agreement came at a meeting among the Grand National Party(GNP) and the finance and education ministries. The money will be used to set up "national scholarships," provide subsidies for students from lower-income...

Saving sight between classes Teen runs 180-member charity group across 14 schools in free time By Kirsty Taylor Sometimes it is hard to get taken seriously as a teenager, said high school student Kim Soo-yeon, but she needs people to listen to her to help save others’ sight. The 16-year-old Korea International School student and her team of 180 volunteers have spent weekends visiting optician...

The government will investigate seven big coffee franchises operating in the country's capital area and five other large cities to see if they violated local labor laws, the labor ministry said Thursday. The seven chains are Caffe Bene, Coffee Bean, Starbucks, Tom N Toms, Pascucci, Angel-in-us and Hollys. The move came after a local daily reported earlier this week that franchise coffee shops d...

After two days of interrogation, prosecutors sought warrant to arrest Kwak No-hyun, Seoul’s education superintendent, Wednesday on allegations that he bought a rival candidate out of last year’s election. Investigators at the Seoul Central Prosecutors’ Office were said to have reached a conclusion that the 200 million won ($187,000) that Kwak paid Park Myoung-gee, the withdrawn candidate who is ...

The public’s attention has turned to lawyer-turned-civil activist Park Won-soon, as professor. Ahn Cheol-soo declined to run in the upcoming Seoul mayoral by-election, throwing his support behind Park. “Park has long dedicated himself to promoting civil rights in Korea and is sufficiently qualified to serve as Seoul’s mayor,” said Ahn on Tuesday afternoon after a closed-door meeting with Park. P...

The Foreign Ministry said Wednesday it will buy a domestic bulletproof limousine to serve visiting state leaders and high-ranking officials ahead of the 2012 Seoul nuclear security summit. The ministry will be purchasing a Hyundai Equus limousine in November as the first locally produced bulletproof vehicle to be used for diplomatic services. The purchase “has a symbolic meaning for domestic ca...

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos will visit South Korea next week for summit talks with President Lee Myung-bak on economic cooperation and other issues, the presidential office announced Wednesday. Santos will arrive on Sept. 14 for a three-day state visit that will also include a visit to the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas, a meeting with South Korean business leaders and a...

The majority of smallpox vaccines that Seoul has stockpiled in case of a biological attack by North Korea have either expired or failed to pass toxicity tests. According to a report by the Korea Food & Drug Administration released on Wednesday, Seoul stockpiled 7 million vaccines between 2002 and 2010. However the report, submitted to the National Assembly’s Health and Welfare Committee, goes o...

An artificial seismic event that occurred at the time of the sinking of the Cheonan last year indicates that an explosion was the cause of the disaster, a study showed Wednesday. Hong Tae-kyung, a South Korean professor at Yonsei University, wrote in a recent paper that a tremor of 1.5 magnitude occurred at the time of the ship sinking on March 26 last year in the Yellow Sea. In the paper, publi...

A group of researchers are seeking clues in Japan as to the whereabouts of the remains of South Korean patriot Ahn Jung-geun, in the first trip of its kind, sources said Wednesday “A group of four researchers left for Japan yesterday as part of efforts by the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs to find the buried remains of Ahn Jung-geun,” said the government source, as quoted by other new...

The recent establishment of foreigner-only serviced apartments in the public housing district in Seocho, southern Seoul, has caused controversy, as it comes at the expense of low-income Korean residents. Foreigner-only serviced residences with golf practice facilities will be built inside a public housing rental district in southern Seoul for low-income households. The serviced apartments capab...

Youth Community Union says 81% of cafes nationwide pay no allowances A former part-time coffee shop worker filed a complaint with the Ministry of Employment and Labor on Wednesday that the nation’s largest coffee shop franchise, Caffe Bene, had refused to pay him and his coworkers with weekly holiday allowances. If accepted, the complaint is expected to pave way for tens of thousands of youths ...