National Assembly Speaker Park Byeong-seug has wrapped up an official visit to Russia and the Czech Republic, conducting extensive diplomacy focusing on peaceful settlement on the Korean Peninsula and nuclear power plant exports, officials said Monday. Park’s nine-day trip that ended Sunday came at the official invitation of Russian House Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin and Czech Senator Milos Vystrc...

South Korea’s Labor Ministry is facing criticism over a sexual harassment case at a foreign company’s Korean office. Early in 2020, a male employee in his 30s working for a large British investment firm in Korea reported to the UK headquarters that his female boss was sexually harassing him. Following the complaint, the boss began asking him to do things that violated company guidelines and the...

Ruling Democratic Party’s Rep. Park Yong-jin, 50, the first politician who announced a run for president in next year’s election, has vowed that he would reform the military conscription system. Park says it is time to transition to a voluntary military, with compulsory service restricted to basic training for men and women. “The debate on volunteer military system in our society has been quite...

Some politicians have raised their voices in support of granting clemency to jailed Samsung heir Lee Jae-yong, after remarks from President Moon Jae-in appeared to open up that possibility. Earlier this month, Moon said he would “judge after hearing many opinions from the public,” suggesting Lee might be pardoned. He had taken a different tone at a New Year’s press conference, saying, “Now is no...

“If the hotel, which will be located in the center of the park, continues to exist, we should build separate roads, and block the road and hotel with either walls or barbed wire in order to prevent ordinary people from entering,” he said. “If so, the north side of the park will be blocked for the US embassy, the other side will be blocked for the heliport and protective facility and the central ...

New information continues to emerge regarding the night Sohn Jung-min disappeared near the Han River, further fanning public interest in the case. The medical student was found dead in the river the next day. According to police investigations so far, Sohn was with a friend at Han River Park until around 3:38 a.m. on April 25. Later, at around 4:27 a.m., the friend woke up alone and went home wi...

New Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum on Tuesday hinted that more multinational vaccine makers could be seeking a production base in Korea. “Korea is one of the few countries in the world that, as you know, can produce vaccines when combined with various technologies of the US,” he told reporters in his first press briefing on Tuesday afternoon. “Many multinational pharmaceutical companies, Pfizer, J...

An asylum seeker from an African nation won his case against the Ministry of Justice on Monday, after the court ruled it was illegal for the government to refuse to accept refugee applications. The Korea Immigration Service, under the Ministry of Justice, did not dispute the ruling. The Justice Ministry does not release personal information, including nationality, about those seeking refugee sta...

The wife of the Belgian ambassador to South Korea, who was booked on charges of assaulting two clothing store clerks in April, is to avoid punishment on the grounds of diplomatic immunity. “We confirmed that the Belgian ambassador side would not give up the immunity in connection with the assault case of the ambassador’s wife,” the police said Monday. “We will decide not to send the case (to the...

The Seoul court sentenced an adoptive mother surnamed Jang to life in prison Friday for abusing and killing a 16-month-old girl named Jeong-in. Her husband was sentenced to five years in prison for neglecting the abuse. Jang was indicted last December on charges of habitually abusing her adopted daughter between March and October last year and causing her death. The adoptive father surnamed Ahn ...

New Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum said on his first day of work that the nation would have new social distancing rules from July if the coronavirus situation stabilizes. Kim, who took office Friday, presided over a meeting of the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters held at the Seoul Government Complex. “We will do our best to ensure that more than 13 million people complete t...

With a year to go before the presidential election, three political heavyweights from the ruling bloc are rallying supporters, with each of their visions focusing on social welfare policies. Gyeonggi Gov. Lee Jae-myung, former Democratic Party leader Lee Nak-yon and former Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun, dubbed the ruling party’s Big Three, all launched their own think tanks and began working out...

Seoul’s education superintendent is being probed by the nation’s anti-corruption investigation agency over allegations that he abused his power in hiring teachers. This is the first probe by the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials, or CIO, since its inception in January. It was created to investigate allegations involving high-ranking officials or their family members. Su...

South Korea’s presidential race kicked off Sunday with an announcement from two-term lawmaker Park Yong-jin that he intended to run for president in next year’s election, while heavyweights geared up for the election by rallying supporters. Rep. Park of the ruling Democratic Party held a ceremony to announce his candidacy outside the National Assembly on Sunday. “The figures and forces responsi...

Amid growing anti-China sentiment in the nation, some South Koreans are calling for foreign permanent residents’ right to vote to be abolished because a majority of them are Chinese. On April 28, a petition was posted on the website of presidential Blue House with the title of “Foreigners’ voting rights (location election) are unconstitutional. It has to be abolished.” The writer of the post sa...