“I will Seoul you,” “I will Incheon you.” A flood of mockery and parodies hit social media when Seoul City decided on its new slogan “I.Seoul.U” late last month. On Oct. 28, “I.Seoul.U” was picked as the capital’s new logo by a public vote, beating two other candidates -- “Seouling” and “Seoulmate.” The new slogan will replace “Hi Seoul,” which has been used for 13 years.  Seoul City Mayor Park Won-soon (center) and guests hold up a placard with the city’s new brand, “I.SEOUL.U,” at a ceremony h

Seoul City and Beijing vowed to strengthen cooperation to combat environment challenges, especially air pollution, as part of their efforts to protect public health, officials said Wednesday. Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon and his counterpart Wang Anshun agreed to launch a joint environment team that will share their environment measures, technology and information in a bid to improve air quality. “The two cities are a ‘communal breathing community.’ The cooperative study on air pollution based on th

A state-run environmental technology organization held a fair to promote the local green industry and improve access to overseas markets, officials said Tuesday. The Environment Ministry and its affiliate organization Korea Environmental Industry and Technology Institute introduced the strength of the Korean environment industry and environmental projects carried out overseas. The fair particularly stressed a number of successful cases, such as the river restoration projects in Algeria held by D

The increasing number of those taking subways for free, mostly seniors, has contributed to subway operators’ rising deficits, officials said Monday.According to the Seoul Metropolitan Government, 7 of 9 Seoul subway lines recorded about 425 billion won ($373.5 million) in deficit last year, showing little improvement from previous years.Of them, subway Line No. 3 which runs from Ilsan, Gyeonggi Province, to Ogeum in southwestern Seoul through central and southern portions of the capital recorded

The leaders of South Korea, Japan and China failed to produce a dramatic deal Sunday on history or territorial disputes, focusing more on sending a signal that they want to work together on economy and regional security.In their first summit in more than three years, the Northeast Asian powers made the practical choice of keeping the hard-won momentum rather than breaking the mood."We agreed to hold the trilateral summit on a regular basis," President Park Geun-hye told reporters after meeting w

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter called on North Korea to shrink and eventually eliminate its nuclear weapons program, while acknowledging during a visit Sunday to the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas that prospects for reconciling with the defiant North are dim. ``For now what we have is what you see beyond us _ a very starkly divided and heavily defended border area,'' Carter told reporters as he stood on the South Korean side of a marker inside the DMZ that forms the de-facto borde

South Korea and China agreed to share air quality information in real time, upgrading the level of bilateral cooperation to protect public health from dust blowing in mainly from Chinese deserts.During a summit Saturday, South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang inked a memorandum of understanding to share air quality data within an hour of measurement. Under the agreement, the measurement information will be transmitted through an exclusive file transfer protocol, offi

With DSLR cameras in hand and eyes beaming with curiosity, about 20 students carefully listen to a teacher explain how they, too, can take good pictures. This otherwise common scene is made more special as the students are homeless and the teacher is Cho Sei-hon, among the top tier of photographers in Korea. This is part of Cho and Seoul City’s welfare program called “Himang Frame,” or frame of hope, seeking to help homeless members of society become more self-reliant by providing them with a ch

About a dozen major hotels in Seoul will provide amenities for the unprivileged to better support their living conditions, city officials said. Seoul Metropolitan Government and 11 hotels made an agreement last week to provide 32 hotel items, including amenities, electronics and linens, for those in need when the hotels replace them. This will benefit about 8,000 low-income residents living in public rental houses, shelters and temporary single-room units, the city said. The participating hotels

Seoul City will host an international fashion conference next year in a bid to boost the local fashion industry, officials said Wednesday. The 2nd Conde Nast International Luxury Conference will be held in April. The global annual event, led by international Vogue editor Suzy Menkes, covers the Asian luxury industry and examines the role of Northeast Asia as a hub for fashion. Over 500 global fashion figures and creative directors will participate in the event, officials said. This is part of Se

Seoul City will hold its annual kimchi festival early next month as part of its efforts to promote traditional culture and help those in need, officials said Wednesday. The Seoul Metropolitan Government said the second Seoul Kimchi Festival will be held in the city center with various programs from Nov. 6-8. Kimchi-making, or “gimjang,” is a Korean tradition in which families and neighbors make and share the spicy fermented dish in bulk in preparation of the full-fledged winter. The gimjang cust

Seoul City launched last week a new public bike-sharing service as part of its initiatives to reduce carbon emissions, although the project still faces the tasks of ensuring safety and promoting wider public participation. Since Oct. 15, Seoul Metropolitan Government has offered a total of 1,200 public bikes called “Ddaleungee” at 140 docking stations in five major regions including Yeouido, Sinchon, Seongsu and central Seoul near Gwanghwamun. Ddaleungee bikes are parked at a docking station nea

One out of 2 Seoul citizens does not have enough time to enjoy hobbies and leisure activities due mainly to financial pressures and excessive workloads, a survey showed Tuesday. According to the city-run Seoul Institute, about 50 percent of those surveyed said they do not have enough time for hobbies and leisure activities, with 12.4 percent of them saying they had “far from enough” spare time. The survey was conducted online on 1,000 Seoulites aged 19 or over in August. If they had enough spare

An artificial island will be built in Incheon to better protect endangered birds, officials said Sunday.The Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority said it would construct an 8,900-square-meter-large artificial island in the wetland preservation district in Songdo, Incheon, by late 2018 as part of its efforts to protect internationally endangered bird species. About 5.8 billion won ($5.13 million) will be injected. The wetland in Songdo has served as a habitat and resting place for birds, especiall

The temporary visa fee exemption for Chinese tourists will be further extended, officials said Sunday. The Justice Ministry said it would offer the visa fee waiver for Chinese tourists until the end of this year. As part of efforts to revive the Middle East respiratory syndrome-hit tourism industry, the ministry had temporarily exempted the visa fee waiver for Chinese visitors from July to September, and extended the measure to October. In order to get a visa, Chinese visitors usually pay $15. “

Seoul City will expand its program offering free K-pop dance classes to tourists as part of its efforts to better boost the hallyu industry, officials said Thursday. Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon and SM Entertainment reached a deal to offer the free K-pop dance classes.Since August, renowned SM choreographers have run the dance programs for foreign visitors twice a week at Coex in the capital city. While the maximum number of participants is 450 a year, over 850 already applied for the program as of

Wearing a winter coat and holding a picture of black sheep, a U.S. citizen has been staging a hunger strike in front of the Seoul mayor’s residence in central Seoul since last week. His demand to the mayor is simple: Stop selling public zoo animals to slaughterers. 　A.J. Garcia, U.S. branch president of civic group Coexistence of Animal Rights on Earth, argues that Seoul City is using the overpopulation of animals as a means to draw profits. The Seoul Metropolitan Government runs the Seoul Zoo t

Countries with more Internet users tend to have longer healthy life expectancies, a study showed Wednesday. According to a study conducted by the Institute for Longevity Sciences at Wonkwang University, developed countries with high Internet accessibility were found to have longer healthy life expectancies than developing countries with fewer Internet users. Healthy life expectancy refers to how long a person can be expected to live healthily without a disease.The research team analyzed the Worl

A Korean lower court Tuesday ruled that an international marriage broker is not responsible for a foreign spouse who ran away. Seoul Central District Court upheld the previous rulings the evidence was insufficient to confirm that the broker had known that the runaway wife did not initially have intentions to marry and the broker deliberately provided false information about the foreign wife. A Korean man in his 50s surnamed Han met a Filipino woman in the Philippines in 2011 through the marriage

The newly elected chairman of a U.N. panel on climate change pledged Monday to urge the countries to price carbon emissions as part of the efforts to curb global warming.  Lee Hoe-sung, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, speaks during a news conference in Seoul on Monday. (Korea Meteorological Administration)“During the election campaign, I realized how much the countries longed for the organization’s leading role in solving the problem of climate change. The practical to