North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has approved the deployment of a new intermediate-range ballistic missile for combat use as the country succeeded in test-firing it, Pyongyang's state media said Monday. North Korea's leader observed the launch of the ground-to-ground Pukguksong-2 missile, expressing satisfaction with its accuracy in hitting targets, according to the Korean Central News Agency. T...

South Korea’s newly elected President Moon Jae-in announced his picks for the prime minister and three positions in the presidential secretariat through a press briefing, within a few hours of being sworn into office. The announcement came shortly after Moon began his presidency, reflecting his firm resolve to normalize state affairs that have been put on hold following the ouster of his predece...

WASHINGTON -- US President Donald Trump severely berated National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster for undermining his efforts to get South Korea to pay for the THAAD missile defense system deployed to the country, a news report said Tuesday. The reprimand came after McMaster called his South Korean counterpart, Kim Kwan-jin, and assured him that Trump's demand for Seoul to pay for the $1 billion ...

US congressional leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, issued a series of statements welcoming the election of South Korea's new President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday, expressing hope for working closely together with the new government to further strengthen the alliance. "I congratulate President-elect Moon Jae-in on this hard-fought victory. The strategic partnership between the US and South ...

North Korea said Wednesday that it has detained an American man for conducting "criminal acts of hostility" aimed at overturning the country. The man identified as Kim Sang-dok was arrested at Pyongyang's international airport on April 22, according to the North's state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). "He was intercepted for committing criminal acts of hostility aimed to overturn the DPR...

South Korea will be confronted with a severe shortage of medical sector workers in the coming years as demand for health care services exceeds supply, a local report said Wednesday. In the report on the long-term outlook for medical service personnel, the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs estimated the country will face a shortage of 110,000 nurses by 2020 with numbers hitting 158,00...

South Korea said Wednesday that it will distribute to government agencies and post online a report compiled by private-sector experts to detail Japan's wartime sexual slavery of Korean women. The 216-page report, along with a separate data book, is based on an analysis done by 10 professors and experts seeking to shed light on the suffering of Korean women forced into front-line brothels for Jap...

A lawmaker of the conservative Bareun Party said Wednesday that he has withdrawn his earlier decision to leave the party along with a dozen of his colleagues in support of the presidential candidate of a rival party. Rep. Hwang Young-cheul told reporters that he has decided to stay in the party, an about-face from his announcement Tuesday to defect, along with 12 other party members, expressing ...

More than 1,200 South Korean members of families separated across the border since the 1950-53 Korean War died in the first quarter of this year, government data showed Wednesday. The two Koreas held last family reunions in October 2015 at a resort on Mount Kumgang on North Korea's east coast. The event was suspended amid tensions in inter-Korean ties. The number of separated family members who...

US has expressed no desire to alter the terms of an agreement with South Korea to deploy the THAAD missile defense system, a senior South Korean official said Tuesday, following a dust-up over who should pay for the $1 billion system. US President Donald Trump sparked a firestorm in South Korea with his repeated demand that Seoul pay for a THAAD unit installed in the country to bolster defenses ...

US President Donald Trump discussed North Korea when he spoke by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the White House said Tuesday. "They spoke about how best to resolve the very dangerous situation in North Korea," the office said in a readout. The main focus of the call was Syria, it said. "President Trump and President Putin agreed that the suffering in Syria has gone on for far too...

US should be careful about holding negotiations with North Korea, former US Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton said Tuesday, after President Donald Trump said he would be "honored" to meet with the North's leader under the right circumstances. "The North Koreans are always interested, not just Kim Jong-un but his father before him, were always interested in trying to get Americans t...

US Sen. John McCain said Tuesday he can't understand why President Donald Trump said he would be "honored" to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, expressing concern that such a remark helps the "prestige" of the dictator. Trump made the remark in an interview with Bloomberg News on Monday, arguing that he would "absolutely" be willing to meet with Kim if such a meeting takes place "under ...

North Korea is trying to use its nuclear weapons as an "instrument of blackmail" to force the US to leave South Korea so as to realize "coercive reunification" of the divided peninsula, a senior White House official said Tuesday. Matt Pottinger, senior Asian affairs director at the National Security Council, also said during a security forum that the US has now been left with no other choice but...

US President Donald Trump said he will take action on North Korea "if I have to act" without drawing a red line in advance. "I don't like drawing red lines but I act if I have to act," Trump said in an interview with Fox News aired Monday night. Trump argued he's different from his predecessor, Barack Obama. "I'm not like President Obama where you draw a red line as you said a red line in the ...