A fact-finding committee composed of international lawyers said the high-profile mass defection of North Korean restaurant workers in 2016 was really an abduction. In a preliminary report on the committee’s investigation in Pyongyang, released Wednesday, committee chiefs Jun Sasamoto and Niloufer Bhagwat concluded “the twelve women employees were brought to South Korea by deception against their...

Justice Minister nominee Cho Kuk, mired in corruption allegations, is drawing support from liberal heavyweights who could be rival presidential contenders. Cho, a close aide of president Moon Jae-in and once considered a likely presidential candidate, faces allegations that range from his daughter’s illicit college admission to shady investment records involving a private equity fund, whose only...

South Korean health authorities visited the four Southeast Asian countries of Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia from Aug. 26 to Friday to expand regional exchanges in the health sector. During his visit to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City from Wednesday to Thursday, Vice Health and Welfare Minister Kim Gang-lip met with Vietnam’s Social Affairs Minister Le Tan Dung and Health Minister Nguyen T...

The mass defection by North Korean restaurant workers in 2016 may have been orchestrated by South Korean authorities for political reasons, according to two lawyers from an international fact-finding committee. Confederation of Lawyers of Asia and the Pacific Secretary-General Jun Sasamoto and Vice President Niloufer Bhagwat spoke to The Korea Herald on Friday morning in Myeong-dong, Seoul, befo...

Smokers of the younger generations face challenges disparate from those troubling previous generations, giving rise to the need for renewed countermeasures suited to the contemporary smoking scene, according to health experts. The smoking rate has been on the decline in Korea, with the percentage of male adult smokers – who account for the majority of smoking demographics – hitting a record low ...

Health authorities of Korea and Vietnam are seeking to expand collaboration to boost the adoption of affordable health care and facilitate medical exchanges during an upcoming visit to Vietnam by a delegation led by Vice Minister of Health and Welfare Kim Gang-lip. Kim and the ministry’s 11 policy directors and chief officers are visiting Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh from Tuesday to Thursday to discuss...

Justice Minister nominee Cho Kuk said Friday afternoon he would hand over a private equity fund and a school foundation to a nonprofit organization to be used for charity, in response to an opposition demand for an extended confirmation hearing. Earlier in the day, the main opposition Liberty Korea Party demanded a three-day confirmation hearing for scandal-ridden Cho, instead of the usual one-d...

The government said Wednesday it would introduce stricter inspections of food imports, following a lawmaker’s report that elevated levels of radioactive isotopes were detected in food products from Fukushima over the past five years. Rep. Kim Kwang-soo, who serves on the National Assembly’s Health and Welfare Committee, said Monday that 16.8 metric tons of Japanese processed food imported betwee...

For many women, the best moment at the day’s end is getting to unclasp their bras. Now increasingly more women are wondering why that kind of freedom should be confined to home. On May 28, 2018, a group of young women celebrated the annual Menstrual Hygiene Day with a campaign to reject shaming and lift taboos related to menstruation. At the event held in Yeongdeungpo in western Seoul, some wome...

Police are to review revealing the identity of a suspect in the murder of a 32-year-old man whose torso was found without a head or limbs in the Han River on Aug. 12. Gyeonggi Bukbu Provincial Police Agency said Monday a committee was to be launched to decide whether to make the suspect’s identity public and to what scope. The suspect, a 39-year-old motel employee, turned himself in to Jongno P...

A suspect in the murder of a man whose dismembered body parts were found in Han River claimed the victim “started it” during an arrest warrant hearing held Sunday afternoon, a day after he had turned himself in to police. The suspect, a 39-year-old motel employee, said the victim “punched (him), and talked down to (him) first” before the press gathered at the Uijeongbu District Court in Gyeonggi...

Nearly 1,000 complaints have been filed in a week concerning suspicions of tap water contamination in Pohang, a port city in North Gyeongsang Province. Pohang City said Sunday that 925 complaints were lodged Aug. 10-16, reporting black or reddish tap water. The most number of complaints came from residents in Nam-gu, whose water is filtered at a plant in Yugang-ri, a neighborhood in the city’s ...

Women who work at the National Assembly are holding a monthlong campaign to promote gender equality within the legislative arm of the government. According to National Assembly Feminists, a feminist group composed of female National Assembly staffers, 38.2 percent of all staffers at the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, were women as of Aug. 1. While women made up 52.3 percent of interns and...

Authorities have arrested a 39-year-old motel employee suspected of killing a man whose dismembered torso was found in Han River on Aug. 12. An arrest warrant was granted after a hearing for the suspect was held at the Uijeongbu District Court at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Goyang Police said. The man turned himself in to Jongno Police Station at around 1 a.m. Saturday, five days after the dismembered to...

On Saturday, a commemoration ceremony was held in Gwangju, Gyeonggi Province, to remember the women who were forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military during World War II. The House of Sharing, a shelter for the wartime sex slavery survivors, hosted the event, with two of its residents in the audience. This year marks the 28th anniversary since the first South Korean survivor of sexual...