RIYADH, (AFP) -- Saudi Arabia on Saturday confirmed the suicide bomber who killed 21 worshippers at a Shiite mosque had links with the Islamic State group, in what the interior ministry called an attempt to promote sectarian strife.It was the deadliest attack in years to strike the Sunni-dominated kingdom, and marked the first time the jihadist IS group officially claimed an attack in Saudi Arabia."His name was Salih bin Abdulrahman Salih al-Ghishaami, a Saudi national,"  the interior ministry s

North Korea's defense chief who South Korea believes was purged last month was not present during one of leader Kim Jong-un's routine field inspections, the North's state media suggested Sunday.Earlier this month, South Korea's intelligence agency said Hyon Yong-chol, the chief of North Korea's People's Armed Forces, was executed with an anti-aircraft gun in April.The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim Jong-un inspected the command of the Large Combined Unit 264 in North Hamkyong Provinc

The number of people applying for a personal bailout program declined nearly 10 percent in the first quarter of 2015 from a year earlier, court data showed Sunday.A total of 25,775 people applied for a personal bailout in the January-March period, down 9.6 percent during the same period a year earlier, according to the data.The dip is seen as indicating that a spike in people requesting for arbitration to get more leeway to pay back their debts from 2010 through 2014 may be on the wane.In 2010,

"이성 교제는 젊은 남녀가 미래에 대한 어떤 약속도 없이 유쾌한 시간을 즐기는 것이고, 더치페이를 하지 않는 것은 데이트 성폭력의 원인이 될 수 있다." 누군가에겐 황당하게 들릴 수 있는 얘기지만 이는 정부가 만든 고등학생용 성교육 교재에 나오는 내용이다. 　정부가 온라인으로 제공하는 성교육 교재 및 학습자료의 특정 내용이 부적절하다는 의견이 일고 있다.　교육부에서 온라인으로 제공하는 성교육 학습 자료의 일부. 이성교제는 “젊은 남녀가 미래에 대한 어떤 약속도 없이 상대방과 유쾌한 시간을 즐기는 것”이라고 정의하고 있다. 교육부 학생건강정보센터 학교 성교육자료실 (http://schoolhealth.kr/edugender) 에서 배포하는 고등학생용 학습자료를 보면, 이성교제는 “젊은 남녀가 미래에 대한 어떤 약속도 없이 상대방과 유쾌한 시간을 즐기는 것”이라고 정의돼 있다. 또한 청소년기의 이성 교제는 “결혼을 전제로 하는 교제가 아니며, 이성 친구일 뿐임”이라고 명시하고 있다. 교

South Korean boy band Beast will hold a solo concert in Hong Kong next month, the group's management agency said Tuesday.The concert, "Beautiful Show in Hong Kong" will take place at Hong Kong Asia World-Expo Arena on May 30, Cube Entertainment said.During the event, which will be the group's first-ever solo concert in Hong Kong, the group will perform all of its hit songs. "We'll make them one of Asia's top K-pop artists by gradually broadening their activities in China," a Cube official said.D

The latest bid for controlling shares of Kumho Industrial Co., the de facto holding firm of Kumho Asiana Group, ended in vain, industry sources said Tuesday, as the sole bidder's offered price did not meet expectations.The decision came after Hoban Construction Co., a mid-sized local builder, made a solo final bid for the 57.5 percent stake in Kumho Industrial at 600.7 billion won (US$561 million). Kumho Asiana Group controls Asiana Airlines Inc., the country's No. 2 air carrier.According to sou

Police said Tuesday that they have arrested a U.S. serviceman over an alleged assault on a South Korean employee at a local club after being drunk.The 29-year-old U.S. soldier, whose name has not been revealed, was arrested Sunday on accusations of hitting a South Korean employee's face with a brick at a club located in the central Seoul.Police said the sergeant was kicked out of the club after being too drunk and was protesting against the move when he made the assault.He was immediately arrest

ISLAMABAD, April 28, 2015 (AFP) -- Pakistan on Tuesday carried out its 100th execution since lifting a moratorium on the death penalty last December, in what rights group Amnesty International described as a "shameful milestone".Hangings resumed after the country's bloodiest-ever militant attack, in which the Taliban gunned down 154 people -- mostly children -- at a school in the northwest.Munir Hussain, who was convicted of a double murder in 2000, was hanged in the town of Vehari in Punjab pro

BAGHDAD, (AFP) -- Eight Iraqis were shot dead and dumped in Baghdad, officials said Tuesday, in what could be the second series of killings in recent days targeting men who fled Anbar province.An interior ministry official and a tribal leader said the men, who were found in the capital's Jihad area, were people who had fled violence in Anbar, but a police colonel and a medical source said their identities were still not known.Sheikh Naim al-Kuoud, an Anbar tribal leader, said that an armed group

KUCIC KULA, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) -- Bosnian police on Tuesday arrested a man with suspected links to a gunman who stormed into a police station in the country's Bosnian Serb region shouting "Allahu akbar," killing one policeman and wounding two others before he died in the shootout.New details are also beginning to emerge about the gunman, with residents from his village saying his father was taken away by Serbs in 1992 at the start of a brutal multi-ethnic war and never seen again. Monday's

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A massive landslide in a remote province in northeastern Afghanistan killed at least 52 people Tuesday, a provincial official said. The stricken area in Badakhshan province is cut off from the rest of the country, covered in snow and is only accessible from the air, significantly hampering any rescue efforts, said Shah Waliullah Adeeb, the provincial governor.Badakhshan is one of the poorest and least-developed regions of Afghanistan. It regularly suffers huge landslid

South Korea's top mobile carrier SK Telecom saw its market share hover below 50 percent for the second consecutive month in March, data showed Tuesday, as smaller rivals continued to expand grounds through budget smartphones.According to data compiled by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, SK Telecom had 49.5 percent of the market in March with 28.3 million users, including those from mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) that rent SK's networks.The figure marks a 0.1 percentage

이달 초 광주고법은 군대 내 기강을 앞세워 최소 4명의 후임병에게 20차례에 걸쳐 성추행하고 구강성교까지 강요한 해병대원에게 징역 1년 6개월을 선고했다. 세계보건기구와 국제 형사 재판소는 강간을 강제로 이뤄진 구강성교, 항문성교를 포함한 “성별에 구분없이 강요된 모든 성적 삽입행위”로 정의하고 있다. 이에 따르면 해병대원 A(21)씨가 저지른 범죄는 ‘강간’에 해당된다. 그러나 A씨가 기소된 명목은 ‘강간’죄보다 처벌 강도가 낮은 ‘유사강간.’ 강간을 ‘이성 성기 간 결합’이라는 특정한 행위에만 국한하고 있는 한국의 현행법 상 동성간의 강간은 법적으로 인정받을 수 없기 때문이다. 성별의 구분없이 가해자가 피해자에게 행한 다른 종류의 성적 삽입행위 역시 ‘강간죄’를 적용할 수 없는 건 마찬가지다. 강요된 구강성교, 항문성교, 성기를 제외한 신체 일부 또는 도구 등을 신체 내부에 넣는 행위는 모두 강간죄보다 법정형 수위가 낮은 ‘유사강간죄’에 해당한다. 전문가들은 강간죄와 유사강간죄를

TEL AVIV (AFP) -- Fragments of pottery used by Egyptians to make beer and dating back 5,000 years have been discovered on a building site in Tel Aviv, the Israeli Antiquities Authority said on Sunday.Excavation director Diego Barkan said 17 pits were found that had been used to store produce in the Early Bronze Age, from 3500 to 3000 BC."Among the hundreds of pottery sherds that characterise the local culture, a number of fragments of large ceramic basins were discovered that were made in an Egy

South Korea's financial regulator said Sunday it will invest an additional 20 trillion won (US$18.07 billion) in long-term fixed-rate mortgage loans to meet the explosive demand for a new government-backed lending program meant to tackle the household debt problem.The move came as South Koreans rushed to sign on with local banks last week to convert their short-term floating-rate mortgage loans into long-term, fixed-rate loans.The provision of the additional amount will be completed by April 3,

North Korea blasted South Korean President Park Geun-hye Sunday over her recent speech made at a ceremony to mark Pyongyang's torpedoing of a South Korean corvette in 2010 that killed 46 sailors.Speaking on the fifth anniversary of the tragedy Wednesday, Park said she "hopes North Korea abandons its reckless provocations and belief that nuclear weapons can protect the country." She, however, did not directly accuse the North of downing the South Korean ship Cheonan in the speech.She was paying t

SINGAPORE -- South Korean President Park Geun-hye met with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on the sidelines of the funeral ceremony of Lee Kuan Yew, founder of Singapore, a sign of thaw in bilateral relations soured by territorial and other history-related issues.Park proposed that South Korea, China and Japan take necessary steps to carry out agreements reached by the three nations' top diplomats earlier this month, according to her office.The foreign ministers of the three countries have ag

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- Somali government officials say they have taken control of the hotel where extremist gunmen were holed up for more than 12 hours in an attack that has left at least 17 people dead.Capt. Mohamed Hussein said Saturday the gunfire had stopped and security agents have accessed the whole building. Hussein had earlier said the gunmen were believed to have occupied the third and fourth floor of the the Maka Al-Mukarramah hotel in the capital Mogadishu. Al-Shabab, an al-Qaida-

SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- Saudi Arabia on Saturday blamed a "technical fault" for forcing two of its pilots in an F-15 to eject over waters south of Yemen during a mission amid a bombing campaign targeting Shiite rebels in the country.The official Saudi Press Agency reported that the pilots were in "good health'' after ejecting Thursday. It said the U.S. offered aid to rescue the airmen.A U.S. Defense Department official told The Associated Press that an American helicopter flew Thursday from neighbo

SHANGHAI (AP) -- Russia's Elizaveta Tuktamysheva wrapped up the most successful season of her young career by easily winning the women's gold medal at the figure skating world championships on Saturday.Tuktamysheva had a huge lead after landing a triple axel in the short program and extended it further in the free skate to score 210.36 points overall, more than 15 points ahead of silver medalist Satoko Miyahara of Japan. Russia's Elena Radionova had a shaky program to fall from second place afte