The Moon Jae-in administration will have to spend over 7.3 trillion won ($6.4 billion) in the 2018-2020 period to subsidize the raising of the country's minimum wage to 10,000 won ($8.8) per hour, a report said Wednesday. The Moon government said in July it will raise the minimum wage by 16.4 percent to 7,530 won per hour next year in the biggest wage hike in nearly two decades. Moon hopes the ...

A senior South Korean foreign ministry official expressed hope on Wednesday that talks with his US counterpart will build the "foundation" for better bilateral ties going forward. South Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Lim Sung-nam made the remarks at the start of his meeting with US Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan in Seoul. "I hope we can talk about a wide variety of the issues of mutual ...

LG Chem Ltd., South Korea's No. 1 chemical company, is expected to deliver market forecast-beating earnings for the third quarter of the year, driven by firm demand for its key products and a recovery in its EV battery business, industry data showed Wednesday. LG Chem, set to report its third-quarter bottom line next week, is estimated to have logged a net profit of 517 billion won ($458 million...

Taekwondo has generated the most corruption complaints among South Korean sports, a local lawmaker said Wednesday. According to Rep. Kwak Sang-do of the Liberty Korea Party, 742 corruption cases were reported to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's center for sports corruption between 2014 and August 2017. The ministry's data showed the center completed investigations into 559 cases and...

More than 46,000 under-age minors own an average of 112.74 million won ($99,549) in inherited assets, including 304 who are less than one year old, a report from the National Tax Service said Wednesday. The data, submitted to the National Assembly for parliamentary audits, covered the 2008-2016 period. The report showed 46,542 minors aged under 18 held 5.24 trillion won in handed-down wealth. F...

Lim Ji-yeon, a working mother of two living in western Seoul, is constantly haunted by mobile phone messages from her clients, which often come even after office hours and disrupt her free time and private life. "Can't we just make after-hour messaging illegal so that it would at least teach people some manners?" the 36-year-old PR agent told Yonhap News Agency. "KakaoTalk has destroyed the conc...

Gil Won-ok was 13 years old when she was taken from her home in Pyongyang, now the capital of North Korea, to work as a sex slave for Japanese troops during World War II. Now 90, the elderly South Korean woman flew to Los Angeles, and then to Washington, to share her story in song. It lessens the pain of recounting her past, she said, and gives voice to her childhood dream -- to become a singer...

North Korea on Wednesday sent a short congratulatory message to China on the opening of the 19th congress of the communist party, in what could indicate strained ties over Pyongyang's nuclear and missile tests. The central committee of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea warmly congratulated the Communist Party of China's on its congress, according to the Korean Central News Agency. "It sincerel...

The government collected 6.6 trillion won ($5.82 billion) in taxes last year by bringing the underground economy into the official economy, finance ministry data showed Wednesday. Records for 2013-2016 submitted to the National Assembly for parliamentary audits showed the government had gained a yearly average of 5.39 trillion won in additional taxes in comparison to 2012 through such a process....

The trade ministry's affiliates came under more than 10,000 hacking attempts over the last five years, with the key trade promotion agency subjected to the heaviest attack, the ministry said Wednesday. A report from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy submitted to Rep. Lee Chae-ik for parliamentary audits showed there were 11,525 hacking attempts from 2013 to September this year. The year...

US tech manufacturer Whirlpool Corp. has demanded a punitive tariff of 50 percent on South Korean firms' washers, government sources said Wednesday. According to South Korea's trade ministry, Whirlpool submitted the demand to the US International Trade Commission (ITC), which earlier determined that Samsung Electronics Co. and LG Electronics Inc.'s washers are harming the domestic industry. The...

The number of visitors to local tourist destinations soared nearly 60 percent during the recent Chuseok holiday season, government data showed Tuesday. According to data compiled by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, 8.87 million people visited 108 major tourist attractions in South Korea during the 10-day Chuseok break, the country's autumn harvest celebration, up 59.6 percent from 5....

Senior US and Japanese diplomats arrived in Seoul Tuesday to discuss diplomatic measures to tackle North Korea's nuclear and missile threats. "I am here to focus on our diplomatic efforts to address the issues that confront us about the DPRK," Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan told reporters at Gimpo International Airport. He flew from Japan after a two-day visit. The DPRK is the abbre...

President Moon Jae-in promised all-out efforts Tuesday to help make the upcoming Winter Olympic Games and Paralympics in South Korea a success. The president's remarks came in a meeting with Andrew Parsons, president of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae. The new IPC chief arrived here Sunday for what he called a "mid-term" inspection of local ...