South Korea's Hyundai Motor Co. and its sister company Kia Motors Corp. ranked as the best-selling passenger carmakers in Canada in the first half of this year, industry sources said Thursday. The t...re of 18.2 percent, according to the sources. The figure is higher than the 42,734 units sold by U.S. automaker General Motors Co. (GM) and 40,620 cars sold by Japan's Toyota Motor Co. in the six-mon...

...l discussions continue on the timing for formal submission of the bill," Carol Guthrie, assistant U.S. trade representative for public and media affairs, told Yonhap New Agency. Relevant committees a...a looming debt default, added the source. Unless he strikes a deal with Republican lawmakers on the raising of the debt ceiling by Aug. 2, the U.S. government will default on its debts. (Yonhap News)

...the United States government maintained a cautious view Wednesday on the reclusive communist nation's latest gesture. The London-based news agency Reuters announced earlier this week that it was plan...ce 2006. AP's television news arm APTN, however, usually relays video footage provided by the North's state media. Japan's Kyodo News Service also has a bureau in Pyongyang, but its news coverage is ...

President Lee Myung-bak awarded South Korea's highest order of national security merit to the outgoing chief of U.S. forces in Korea and the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff at a ceremony Wednesday, participants said. Gen. Walter Sharp and Adm. Michael Mullen were given the Tong-Il Medal of the Order of National Security Merit for their contributions to the defense of South Korea, part...

...ry hour, officials at the Korea Water Resources Corp. said. The bridge near the Imjin River, which flows from the North to the South crossing the Demilitarized Zone, serves as a gauge of North Korea's water discharge. The water agency opened up 13 floodgates of the Gunnam Dam to control the water level, the officials said. The water in the dam, which went into operation last July to capture flas...

Troubled companies to be shut down Korea’s creditor banks have singled out some 30 large firms that should either go through a workout program or be forced out of the market. The names of the compan...ed the results to the troubled firms involved. The creditor banks’ risk assessment rates a company’s financial health status in four grades from A to D. If a company gets a grade of D, representing i...

...800,000 Seoul citizens will sound an alarm for everyone, including politicians in setting the direction of welfare policies. He also vowed to make Seoul one of top five cities internationally. Seoul’s global city competitiveness climbed 21 steps from 30th in 2006 to 9th in 2010. The city’s financial competitiveness rose from 53rd in 2009 to 16th in 2011. Despite unfavorable tourism conditions resulting from the two North Korean attacks last year that killed 50 South Koreans, the numb...

...environment in the capital. Seoul city, the government and various chambers of commerce officials and heads of multinational corporations gathered in hopes of making Seoul a top global city. “Seoul’s competiveness has advanced greatly over the past five years thanks to its investment environment,” said Roland Villinger, chairman of the FIAC and head of McKinsey & Company’s Seoul Branch. Villinger added that the city’s infrastructure, cultural environment, quality of its research and development, corporate competitiveness and its global reputation had all improved ove...

...r lunch on Wednesday that he will discuss with them before nominating the new justice minister and the prosecutor-general amid backlash from both ruling and opposition lawmakers against the president’s top candidate. During his first official meeting with the new GNP leader Hong Joon-pyo and other members of the party’s decision-making Supreme Council, Lee said he will closely discuss with Hong and GNP floor leader Hwang Woo-yea before naming the designates, a senior Cheong Wa Dae official told reporters. Lee is c...

...and contracts with South Korean authorities and investors. Later in the afternoon, the two sides held another session over the issue. The two Koreas had launched the joint tour project at the North’s Mount Geumgang in 1998 as a symbol of reconciliation. The tours, which had been one of impoverished Pyong­yang’s main sources of income, came to a halt on July 11, 2008 after a South Korean tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier when she purportedly strayed into an off-limits military zone. Some 300 ...

The government needs to establish a body dedicated to cultural diplomacy using the country’s soft power, a group of foreign affairs experts said Wednesday calling for a related law. At the Korean Pu...er would take over a substantial portion of diplomacy. “Soft power is much more than just a nation’s cultural attractiveness and includes a country’s political values, ideals, norms and methods for c...