Seoul has been ranked as one of the world’s top cities for sustainable transport, according to the 2017 Sustainable Cities Mobility Index. Hong Kong took first place, followed by Zurich and Paris. European cities dominated the list, making up seven of the top 10. The data examined 100 cities across 23 indicators to give an indicative ranking of the mobility and sustainability of the systems ...

Healthier lifestyles and higher incomes helped increase life expectancy by 10 years in 35 nations in the past half a century, according to the Health at a Glance 2017 report by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development. Out of the OECD’s 35 member countries, life expectancy exceeded 80 years in 25 nations. The leading countries are Japan with life expectancy of 83.9 years, as ...

The global smartphone market has momentum going into the year-end holiday shopping season, according to the International Data Corporation. An estimated 373.1 million smartphones were shipped worldwide during the third quarter of this year, a 2.7 percent rise from the same period in 2016. The five top smartphone makers all shipped more units than they did in the same quarter last year. Sou...

The average annual salary of South Koreans ranked mid to low among major economies last year, with its growth rate over the past six years also hovering below the median, a report said. According to a report by Rep. Park Kwang-on of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, South Koreans earned an average of $29,125 in 2016, the 23rd-highest among the 34 member nations of the Organization for Econ...

South Korea’s Korean Air has been named the 8th best airline in the world, according to the international aviation website AirlineRatings.com. Air New Zealand claimed the top award for the fifth straight year followed by Qantas and Singapore Airlines. The data was based on 13 major criteria including passenger reviews, in-flight product offerings, safety, profitability, fleet age and environ...

Presidents Moon Jae-in and Donald Trump, at their summit meeting in Seoul on Tuesday, agreed to lift all restrictions currently imposed on the payload of S. Korean missiles, as part of measures to greatly expand South Korea’s military capabilities. That means that Seoul can develop its own weapons to eliminate N. Korea's strategic assets.

Presidents Moon Jae-in and Donald Trump, facing the common challenge of dealing with North Korea, have spoken to each other through telephone calls and face-to-face meetings. Although both are less than a year into their terms, the leaders have held three in-person summit meetings already, with the latest taking place Tuesday during Trump’s state visit to S. Korea.

South Korea’s has been announced as the third powerful passport in the world with visa-free access to 157 countries, according to the Passport Index by global financial advisory firm Arton Capital. Singapore ranked top spot with a visa-free score of 159. This is the first time an Asian country has been announced as having the most powerful passport, according to the data. The index ranks 199...

The number of billionaires worldwide rose above 1,500 last year, a 10 percent jump from 2015, due largely to a surge in Asia. In an annual report, Swiss banking giant UBS and auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers said that last year marked the first time it recorded more billionaires in Asia (637) than in the United States (563), crediting the rise of China‘s entrepreneurs. Europe took trailed in ...

South Korea’s army trainees are given about 4.91 square meters of individual space at the army training center, smaller than the average solitary cell in prison, data revealed. According to the Defense Ministry data released by Rep. Lee Chul-hee of the ruling Democratic Party, a typical army trainee shares a squadroom with up to 40 other trainees during the 5-week intensive training for basic ...

About 1 in every 4 high school students in Korea sleeps less than six hours a night, due mainly to excessive studying, causing concern over their physical and psychological health, a lawmaker said, citing the results of an Education Ministry survey. According to the survey of 82,883 students at 765 high schools nationwide on their sleep between April and September last year, 43.9 percent of re...

Russia is the top source country for ISIS fighters, with 3,414 of them joining the group. Four hundred have now returned home, as have 760 of Saudi Arabia‘s 3,244 fighters. Across the European Union, 1,200 foreign fighters have returned out of 5,000 who flocked to war zones in the Middle East. The United Kingdom has the highest total in Europe with 425 individuals returning home while Germany ...

South Korean electronics giant LG Corp. took 10th place on the list of the World’s 500 Best Employers, according to a Forbes report. Google parent company Alphabet, with a workforce of around 72,000 employees, topped the list after its employees credited it with having excellent working conditions, diversity and company image. Microsoft ranked second, followed by Japan Exchange Group, Apple, ...

Chrome is the most popular browser in the world, used by 62.09 percent of web surfers. The advent of Chrome had signaled trouble for all other browsers. Today, it easily outperforms the likes of Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. Mozilla Firefox and former market leader Microsoft Windows’ Internet Explorer are distant second and third most popular browsers. Other browsers like Yandex, Co...

Environmental pollution - from filthy air to contaminated water - is killing more people every year than all war and violence in the world. More than smoking, hunger or natural disasters. More than AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined. A major study released in the Lancet medical journal says 1 in 6 premature deaths in the world in 2015 - about 9 million total - could be attributed to dise...