North Korea is holding between 80,000 and 120,000 political prisoners, some for religious reasons, the US State Department said in a report released on Tuesday. The department’s annual International Religious Freedom Report for 2017 revealed 1,304 cases of alleged religious freedom violations in North Korea last year, while detailing the harsh treatment of political and religious prisoners, as w...

A right-wing commentator was arrested on Wednesday for libel against a cable television news anchor and reporters who uncovered an influence-peddling scandal involving former President Park Geun-hye. The Seoul Central District Court issued a warrant to detain Byun Hee-jae, citing the risk that he may destroy evidence and potentially cause harm to the victims. Byun, 44, is accused of spreading f...

Outgoing National Assembly Speaker Chung Sye-kyun said Tuesday he felt “dreadful and ashamed” at the parliament’s failure to adopt a resolution supporting last month’s inter-Korean summit agreement called the Panmunjeom Declaration. “I am perplexed beyond words. … Politics should not be self-centered,” Chung said in a CBS radio interview on the last day of his two-year term as the National Assem...

A prosecutor was suspended for four months after investing in stocks with money borrowed from a suspect under investigation. The Justice Ministry said on Tuesday it suspended the prosecutor surnamed Jung for breach of duty and demeaning the prosecutors’ office. Jung borrowed money from a suspect under investigation at another prosecutors’ office last year, and used it to invest in stocks under ...

A dog meat dealer resumed business at Seongnam’s Moran Market by bringing back its butchery equipment which the city government removed last week, continuing a legal battle to maintain its business. Under an administrative order, city officials on Friday dismantled the last remaining dog slaughter facility in what used to be Korea’s largest dog meat market amid much media attention. Twenty-one ...

Supreme Court Chief Justice Kim Meong-su said on Monday he was “disappointed” at the recent findings that the judiciary under his predecessor had tried to make deals with the presidential office over trials to get its support to introduce a new appellate court. “I am sorry (the judiciary) has disappointed the people. I am disappointed as well,” Kim told reporters on his way to work. A special i...

SINGAPORE -- US President Donald Trump’s cancellation of his June 12 summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore threw cold water on civil servants and people in the hotel industry here who had been preparing for the historic event. Singapore had already begun press accreditation to register foreign journalists wishing to cover the summit. Hotels which had blocked off or taken back...

Experts who have tracked North Korea’s nuclear tests refuted media reports that the country’s dismantling of its nuclear site is nothing more than the destruction of evidence. “Despite whatever actions may be taken in the next couple of days at the nuclear test site, the forensic evidence will outlast any explosions that may be used to collapse or seal the test tunnels,” experts including Frank ...

Three companies each purchased more monazite, which contains radioactive substances, than the mattress maker for Daijin Bed, a lawmaker said on Wednesday amid rising public anger over mattresses emitting dangerous levels of radioactive material. The Nuclear Safety and Security Commission announced last week that some of Daijin Bed’s mattresses emitted radon at levels of up to 9.3 times the natio...

An appeals court upheld a lower court ruling that sentenced two supermarket workers to prison terms for preparing weapons to kill their boss and hurting each other. The Seoul High Court said Wednesday that it sentenced defendants surnamed Lee and Choi to a two-year imprisonment suspended for three years, and a jail term of two years, respectively, on charges including making preparations to murd...

With longer average life expectancy, courts are increasingly recognizing 65, instead of 60, as the retirement age for physical workers. Until recently, courts have followed a Supreme Court precedent in 1989 that saw 60 as the retirement age for laborers. The Seoul Central District Court said on Tuesday that it ruled in favor of a traffic accident victim who appealed that he should receive more ...

A resident of Gwangju spoke out about how he witnessed a military helicopter firing shots at a building during the deadly crackdown on a 1980 pro-democracy uprising in the southwestern city, and how he joined the civilian militia at the time. Ji Yong, 76, recently visited the May 18 Memorial Culture Center to testify after learning that a right-wing critic had identified him in a photo as a memb...

Top prosecutor Moon Moo-il said Monday the prosecution would improve its decision-making process following internal strife over an investigation into a corruption case involving a lawmaker. A team of prosecutors probing a hiring scandal at casino operator Kangwon Land publicly accused Moon last week of exerting undue influence to keep them from requesting a warrant to detain Rep. Kweon Seong-don...

Seoul’s presidential office said on Friday it will “wait and see” as North Korea threatened to not hold talks with South Korea unless it stops the ongoing joint military drills with the US. Citing the Max Thunder exercise between South Korean and US air forces as the reason, Pyongyang called off high-level talks with Seoul on Wednesday, and threatened to cancel the summit talks with Washington s...

North Koreans are upbeat about the economic changes the summit between their leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump might bring, according to a member of a nonprofit group who was in Pyongyang just last week. Singapore-based Choson Exchange, which has trained some 20,000 North Koreans in business since 2007, held its latest workshop in Pyongyang last week, focusing on entrepreneurship ...