The COVID-19 pandemic has had a negative impact on how receptive Koreans are to a multicultural society, a study by government-run think tank Korean Women’s Development Institute suggests. The research, titled the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family’s 2021 Multicultural Acceptability Study, has been conducted every three years since 2012. This year, 5,000 adults aged between 19 and 74 and 5,000 middle and high school students were polled. According to the survey, the adult re

Social Affairs March 30, 2022

Cheong Wa Dae on Tuesday denied recent rumors regarding the first lady’s expenses over clothes and fashion items, saying that no state funds had been used. “The groundless assertions related to first lady Kim Jung-sook using special activity expenses for costumes to wear at official events are completely false,” Shin Hye-hyeon, deputy spokesperson for Cheong Wa Dae, said at a briefing Tuesday. “National budget, including special activity expenses, have not been drawn

Politics March 29, 2022

Busan Metropolitan Government has signed memorandums of understanding with businesses on investments worth 360 billion won ($293 million), the city said Monday. According to the local government, the city hosted a conference in central Seoul to promote business opportunities in the southern port city to corporations located in Greater Seoul. Through the event, it signed memorandums with four corporations, including digital shopping platform SSG.com, which is owned by retail conglomerate Shin

Social Affairs March 28, 2022

President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed bilateral cooperation for peace on the Korean Peninsula in a telephone conversation on Friday. During the 25-minute phone conversation, Yoon stressed the two countries should cooperate for peace on the Korean Peninsula and the complete denuclearization of North Korea. “Yoon said the South Korean people are greatly worried about the tension between the two Koreas following the consecutive intercontinental ballistic

Politics March 25, 2022

The ongoing COVID-19 surge in Korea is wreaking havoc on schools, leaving students, parents and teachers confused with quarantine protocols. The Education Ministry said Wednesday that 379,983 kindergarteners, elementary, middle and high school students in Korea were confirmed of COVID-19 from March 15 to Monday. A total of 1.05 million students have tested positive since the new semester began earlier this month. Even amid the virus crisis, more schools are continuing to hold in-person class

Social Affairs March 23, 2022

Health authorities are expecting the omicron variant spread to reach its peak within 10 days, reaching some 370,000 COVID-19 cases a day. South Korea saw 282,987 new confirmed cases as of Thursday midnight, while the number of deaths hit 229. “According to predictions from multiple research teams, the spread will reach its peak within 10 days. The average daily new cases can reach the maximum of 370,000,” Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum said at a meeting held at the government complex

Social Affairs March 11, 2022

Korea International School has won the AP Computer Science Female Diversity Award, in recognition of the school’s effort to bring diversity to a program for advanced computer science. The College Board, a nonprofit organization established to expand access to higher education, honored the school’s Design and Innovation Department (D&I) for its near equal gender representation in AP computer science principles courses. Other classes in the department also strive to draw more fem

Social Affairs March 10, 2022

The 2022 presidential election showed that age and regional divides in Korea continue to remain solid. President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol of the main opposition conservative People Power Party beat his liberal rival Lee Jae-myung from the Democratic Party of Korea by 0.73 percentage points, marking the smallest point gap in the presidential election history of Korea. The previous record of the smallest point gap was set in 1997, when former President Kim Dae-jung won the election by 1.53 percent

Politics March 10, 2022

Voter turnout for this year’s presidential election reached 77.1 percent, similar to the figures from the previous election. Nearly 8 in 10 eligible South Korean voters cast their votes to elect a new president, including ballots from two days of early voting. Approximately 34 million out of 44.2 million eligible voters ultimately cast their ballots. A final figure is expected to come out sometime Thursday. The preliminary tally released less than two hours after polls closed at 7:30 p.m

Politics March 9, 2022

Lee Jun-seok, chairman of the People Power Party, continued fanning the “gender war,” claiming women are less likely to vote than men. “Some surveys show women have less intention to vote compared to men. They may show systemized movements online, but it is difficult to say that (the movements) lead to actual voting,” Lee said on a radio show Monday. When asked about his party’s candidate Yoon Suk-yeol’s vow to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality and F

Politics March 9, 2022

With the presidential election just around the corner, candidates traveled to regions across the nation, in hopes of wooing voters from rival strongholds, and also to appeal to those who have not yet made their mind up. Lee Jae-myung, the major ruling Democratic Party of Korea candidate, visited Jeju Island on Monday for the first time since his official election campaign kicked off.  “State affairs is not a practice field for an amateur,” Lee said while canvassing near Don

Politics March 7, 2022

Schools in Korea are scrambling in confusion as the country’s COVID-19 cases continue to rapidly increase. According to the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, 15,337 students in Seoul were newly confirmed to have COVID-19 between Feb. 28 and Thursday, while 1,417 school faculty members in Seoul were also confirmed. The tally has been on a steep rise. Though there were 2,883 new confirmed cases in students in Seoul on Tuesday, the number rose to 6,240 on Wednesday and 6,214 on Thu

Social Affairs March 6, 2022

Ahn Cheol-soo, the presidential candidate for the minor opposition People’s Party, stepped down once again from a election race on Thursday, marking his fourth withdrawal in a political career that extends just over 10 years. Ahn became a big name in local politics starting in 2011, when there were rumors that he -- a respected doctor-turned-software mogul at the time -- would run in the Seoul mayoral by-election. Ahn, however, declined to join the race, instead choosing to endorse the

Politics March 3, 2022

The new school year kicked off Wednesday while the country’s daily COVID-19 tally soared to nearly 220,000. According to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency’s report on Wednesday, the number of daily cases here reached 219,241, up 80,248 from the previous day. The total caseload reached 3,492,686 accordingly, the country’s health authorities said.　 Despite the tally, most schools opted for in-person classes Wednesday. Though the Education Ministry gave school

Social Affairs March 2, 2022

Unvaccinated students living with confirmed COVID-19 patients will be allowed to attend in-person classes staring March 14, as part of the Ministry of Education’s new guidelines announced Monday. Schools will not penalize students’ COVID-19-related absences from the new semester onward. Also, from March 14, students can attend classes in person even if their family member has been infected with COVID-19. The Ministry of Education announced more details to its response against the

Social Affairs Feb. 28, 2022