Most Popular
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South Korea confirms North Korea’s latest spy satellite launch failed
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Financially active women bear fewer children, report finds
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[Feature] Ignorance about Africa still rampant in Korea
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Leaders agree to revive 3-way cooperation, reaffirm security efforts
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Concerns raised over S. Korea’s plan to hire foreign-licensed doctors
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Aespa breaks silence on Hybe chairman’s remark to ‘crush’ them
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Special counsel bill on death of Marine fails to pass in Assembly revote
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South Korea flies fighters near border over North Korean spy satellite alarm
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S. Korean biz leaders meet with UAE president
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Doosan Enerbility shares jump on W2tr NuScale deal
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S. Korean maestro expects 'good news' on Seoul orchestra's performance in N.K.
A renowned South Korean conductor said Wednesday his push along with the Seoul metropolitan government for an orchestra performance in Pyongyang will likely bear fruit soon, raising the prospect of the South Korean musical group's first concert in the North Korean capital in a decade. &n
Feb. 15, 2012
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Report: China agrees to invest $3b in N.K. zone
China has agreed to invest about $3 billion in developing North Korea’s northeastern free trade zone as an export base, a report said Wednesday.The deal was probably reached before or just after the North’s long-time leader Kim Jong-Il died on Dec. 17 of a heart attack, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency said.China will build an airport, a power plant, a cross-border railway and piers in the North’s Rason economic zone bordering China and Russia by 2020, it said.In return China has secured the rig
Feb. 15, 2012
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North Korea eulogizes late Kim Jong-il
North Korea’s idolizing of its late leader Kim Jong-il intensified ahead of his 70th birthday, calling him generalissimo for his role in turning the communist state into a nuclear power, the state media said Wednesday.The news came one day prior to the late Kim’s Feb. 16 birthday, for which the entire state is to celebrate the event.Pyongyang’s party, military and people’s commissions released a joint declaration through the Korean Central News Agency that the authorities decided to award the ti
Feb. 15, 2012
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Obama urged to press China on N.K. refugees
Kim Jong-un regime in Pyongyang warns of ‘three-generation wipeout’ for defectionAn international human rights group urged U.S. President Barack Obama to pressure Beijing to stop forcefully repatriating North Korean refugees during his talks with China’s Vice President Xi Jinping.The call came as South Korea’s Rep. Park Sun-young of the conservative Liberty Forward Party said 24 North Korean defectors were being held in China ahead of repatriation to their home country.In a letter sent to the Wh
Feb. 15, 2012
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N.K. deserters killed four Chinese: lawmaker
Four armed North Korean soldiers killed a Chinese family of four and robbed their house last Thursday after having deserted from their unit to cross the border with China, a lawmaker claimed on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources. Rep. Park Sun-young of the minor conservative Liberty Forward Party also said that another armed soldier entered China across the Tumen River on Monday.Experts said that such desertions underline worsening food shortages and waning troop morale in the impoverished state.
Feb. 15, 2012
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Western cafe and bakery opens in N.K.
A U.S.-based website on Wednesday made public several photos showing the interior of the newly opened Western coffee shop in Pyongyang.The Viennese “Helmut Sachers Kaffee” opened inside the Museum of Korean History near Kim Il-sung Square in Pyongyang last October through an investment of the Austrian coffee producer and bakery supplier. According to eight pictures included in the posting carried by the North Korean Economy Watch, the shop offers diverse kinds of coffee, such as Wiener coffee, c
Feb. 15, 2012
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N. Korean workers at Kaesong park soften stance toward South: official
North Korean workers at the industrial park jointly operated by the two Koreas have softened their views on the South, a Seoul official said, indicating growing social exchanges despite lingering political tensions on the divided peninsula.More than 50,000 North Koreans work at the complex located in the North‘s border city of Gaeseong, producing clothes, utensils and other goods at 123 South Korean companies operating there. The factory park opened in 2004 amid efforts toward reconciliation fol
Feb. 15, 2012
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Free N.K. Radio undeterred by N. Korean crackdown
Free North Korea Radio will not be deterred in reaching North Korean citizens, despite the authoritarian state’s recent creation of an anti-foreign media unit to crack down on black market radios, the station said. According to a local news report, Pyongyang created Unit 114 in January to remove music CDs and any foreign published media circling among North Korean citizens.This could hamper the activities of the FNKR, which relies on black market radios to send messages to citizens of the impove
Feb. 15, 2012
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South Korean Red Cross proposes talks with North
The South Korean Red Cross on Tuesday proposed working-level talks with its North Korean counterpart to prepare reunions of separated families.The proposal is the first in 15 months after the South Korean government indefinitely postponed inter-Korean Red Cross talks in November 2010, shortly after the North’s deadly shelling of Yeonpyeongdo.South Korea’s Red Cross chief Yu Jung-keun said the South’s side on Tuesday sent a message to the North Korean Red Cross through their channel at the border
Feb. 14, 2012
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N. Korean officials pledge allegiance to new leader
North Korean officials swore loyalty to their new leader Kim Jong-un in a rally, the country’s television reported Monday, in the latest public display of support for his dynastic power succession.Kim became the supreme commander of the country’s 1.1 million-strong military soon after the December death of his father, Kim Jong-il. The young leader is believed to be consolidating his power.Ri Yong-ho, chief of the General Staff of the Korean People‘s Army, vowed to safeguard supreme leader Kim Jo
Feb. 13, 2012
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Activists face punishment for unauthorized contact with N.K.
Three South Korean pro-unification activists will face punishment for making illegal contact with North Koreans in China, a Seoul official said Saturday. An official with the Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, said the three civilians, representing a pro-unification activist group called the South Side Committee for Implementing the June 15 Joint Declaration, will pay the price for violating the law aimed at regulating inter-Korean contact.No South Koreans can visit North
Feb. 12, 2012
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Inter-Korea talks to possibly resume in mid-April: Seoul's unification minister
Inter-Korean talks could possibly resume as early as mid-April, South Korea's unification minister said Friday, hinting at the possibility of holding the first government-level talks with North Korea in almost year."I have an idea that it should be at least mid-April for the South-North talks to res
Feb. 11, 2012
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Seoul Mayor Park denies reports on joining DUP yet
Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon denied reports that he will join the main opposition Democratic United Party within the month, calling it premature.The Yonhap news agency reported Friday that Park and South Gyeongsang Gov. Kim Du-kwan are to join the left-wing party next Thursday, quoting the South Gyeongsang governor’s office and the provincial branch of the DUP, but both the party headquarters and the mayor denied it.“I currently have no plans to join the DUP next week,” Park told reporters during h
Feb. 10, 2012
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Lawmakers call for FTA benefits to Gaeseong goods
A delegation of South Korean lawmakers from ruling and opposition parties, have urged the South Korean government to support the Gaeseong Industrial Complex in North Korea, after visiting there for the first time since the death of North Korea’s long-time leader Kim Jong-il in December.They called on the South Korean government to negotiate with the U.S. and the EU, both of which have free trade agreements with South Korea, to give FTA benefits to products made in the complex with the recognitio
Feb. 10, 2012
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Savings banks bill raises questions
Compensation exceeding legal ceiling apparently designed to woo Busan votersQuestions have arisen over the fairness and legitimacy of a special bill to compensate the victims of last year’s Busan savings banks’ bankruptcy beyond the current deposit loss compensation ceiling.The parliamentary state affairs committee on Thursday approved the bill to make up for 55 percent of financial losses over the legally guaranteed 50 million won ($44,500) for the savings bank depositors and its subordinated b
Feb. 10, 2012
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N. Korea rejects Seoul’s offer of pest control talks
North Korea has apparently rejected South Korea’s proposal to hold inter-Korean talks on pest control at ancient tombs located in the North.The South Korean authorities have contacted the North’s land and environment protection office, the Office of Forestry, through a Red Cross channel on Tuesday, to suggest both authorities meet in late February.However, Pyongyang’s China-based news website Uriminzokkiri, on Thursday said the South is not ready to hold a dialogue because it banned a civilian i
Feb. 9, 2012
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Seoul proposes inter-Korean talks on pest control at tombs
The South Korean government has proposed to North Korea that working-level inter-Korean talks be held on pest control at ancient tombs located in the North, a source said Wednesday.The complex of Goguryeo tombs, located in Pyongyang and Nampo in North Korea, has some 30 individual tombs from the late period of the Goguryeo Kingdom (37 B.C.―668 A.D.), which ruled the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and northeastern China.The government source said on condition of anonymity that the South Ko
Feb. 8, 2012
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The case for genocide in North Korea
The following article was contributed by Robert Park, a Korean-American missionary and human rights activist who went to North Korea on Christmas day in 2009 to protest against genocide and crimes against humanity. He is also a member of the nonpartisan Worldwide Coalition to Stop Genocide in North Korea. For more information or ways to get involved, contact r2pnorthkorea@gmail.com. ― Ed.The U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and Article 6 of the Rome Statu
Feb. 8, 2012
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Any big change in N.K. unlikely for now
Expert says ruling elite favors status quo, but reform inevitable for economyKim Young-hui, a North Korean defector working here as a researcher on the communist state’s economy, believes any big change there is inconceivable for now as the power elites want to preserve the status quo to maintain their vested interests. Kim of the state-owned Korea Finance Corporation also said that a wave of democratic movements in the Middle East and North Africa would hardly affect the tightly controlled coun
Feb. 8, 2012
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filler-NK-leader-gifts
N. Korean leader uses same gifts as his fatherIn another apparent move to bolster his rule, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has handed out binoculars and rifles to servicemen in the same way his late father, strongman Kim Jong-il, used to encourage military personnel.The gifts appeared frequently during Kim Jong-il‘s inspection visits to the military until August 2008, after which they were no longer seen in footage released by the North’s state media.On Tuesday, however, the (North) Korean Cent
Feb. 8, 2012