성인용품 쇼핑몰 바나나몰은 오는 25일 강남구 삼성동 인근 jbk컨벤션에서 일본AV배우 ‘아오이 츠카사’의 단독 팬미팅을 개최한다.아오이 츠카사는 ‘네이키드웬폰 사소리2’, ‘원컷-어느 친절한 살인자의 기록’에 출연했으며, 국내 잡지 ‘맥심 코리아’와의 인터뷰 촬영을 통해 다양한 매력을 뽐낸 바 있다.　 아오이 츠카사는 “최근 바나나몰 사이트에서 실시된 일본AV배우 인기투표 결과 제가 1위에 선정되었다고 들었다”며, “평소 저를 좋아해주는 한국팬들이 궁금했는데 이번 기회를 통해 팬들과 직접 만날 수 있게 되어 기쁘다”고 말했다.　 팬미팅은 아오이 츠카사와 토크, 게임, 사진촬영 등으로 구성되며, 행사에 관련된 자세한 정보는 바나나몰 홈페이지에서 확인할 수 있다.　(khnews@heraldcorp.com)

South Korea's economic output expanded from a year earlier in 2014, though output by the manufacturing sector continued to dwindle with the portion of trade in total supply also shrinking, a central bank report showed Wednesday.The country's total supply, which equals total consumption, came to 4,237.8 trillion won ($3,598.1 billion) in 2014, up 0.7 percent from the previous year, according to the report from the Bank of Korea.The 2014 reading marked a turnaround from a 0.2 percent on-year drop

Global messaging app operator Line Corp., wholly owned by South Korea's internet giant Naver Corp., has never paid out dividends to its Seoul-based parent firm, documents showed Wednesday.Line has not delivered any dividends to its shareholders since its foundation in 2000, according to the documents submitted to the Japan Exchange Group Inc., Tokyo's main bourse operator and the U.S.-based Securities and Exchange Commission."Divided payout in the future will be decided on various factors such a

South Korea's ruling and opposition parties celebrated the historical inter-Korea declaration announced 16 years ago on Wednesday, while taking different approaches on the deadlock between Seoul and Pyongyang following the North's continued provocations.In 2000, then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and then North Korean leader Kim Jong-il held a historic inter-Korean summit, which gave the birth to the so-called June 15 joint declaration which aimed to bring peace to the Korean Peninsula.The

South Korea on Wednesday urged North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons program and stop reckless provocations as the two Koreas marked the 16th anniversary of their first summit meeting.A summit between then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and then-North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, the late father of the current leader Kim Jong-un, was held in Pyongyang on June 15, 2000.It produced a landmark joint declaration that outlines inter-Korean reconciliation and economic cooperation.Seoul's unifi

A slew of mergers and acquisitions (M&As) the Lotte Group has carried out at home and abroad have elevated the retail giant to a new level, but such moves have also become the target of intense scrutiny by prosecutors amid their widening probe into the group's alleged slush funds, industry watchers said Wednesday.Shin Dong-bin, the second son of group founder Shin Kyuk-ho, was promoted to Lotte chairman in 2011 to take the helm of the conglomerate with businesses ranging from food and retail to

Samsung Heavy Industries Co., a local shipyard, on Wednesday unveiled its detailed self-restructuring program which centers on a cut in workforce and having executives return part of their salaries.Earlier, the shipyard has said it will conduct a self-rehabilitation scheme worth 1.5 trillion won ($1.27 billion), including asset sales and a cut in employees. Its creditors provisionally approved the program.According to the plan, Samsung Heavy will reduce its workforce by 1,500 through an early re

The South Korean Army plans to deploy unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the near future to deliver defense supplies to troops around the country, the military said Wednesday.The Army conducted a system demonstration of a delivery drone during a meeting held earlier in the day to evaluate the feasibility of the UAVs to ferry supplies, it said in a statement. The tested drone handily airlifted a 15 kilogram package to a designated spot during the demonstration, according to the statement."In comp

South Korean archer Choi Mi-sun has tied a world record in women's recurve in the run-up to the Rio de Janeiro Summer, brightening the prospects for her first Olympic medal. (Yonhap)Choi scored 686 out of a possible 720 in the individual qualification round at the Archery World Cup in Antalya, Turkey, on Tuesday (local time). Choi's score equaled the record set by fellow South Korean Ki Bo-bae at last year's Summer Universiade in Gwangju, 350 kilometers south of Seoul.Ki, also in action in Turke

Chinese troops have been stepping up security inspections along the border with North Korea in what seems to be a move to check up on tourists visiting certain sensitive regions, a U.S.-based media outlet said Wednesday.An ethnic Korean source in Tumen, China, told Radio Free Asia that Chinese soldiers on border garrison have been reinforcing their security checks after North Korea vowed to retaliate against South Korea for the recent mass defection of North Koreans to the South.In April, 13 Nor

South Korea's foreign minister said he barely discussed the controversial issue of deploying an advanced U.S. missile defense system on Korean soil during talks with his Russian counterpart earlier this week.Yun Byung-se told South Korean reporters and foreign ministry officials during a luncheon in St. Petersburg on Tuesday that the topic of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system was raised in his meeting with Sergey Lavrov but only in passing."(The Russian side) mentioned a confrontati

South Korea opened a "global business support center" on Wednesday in the Pangyo Startup Campus, the nation's new hub for digital business startups.The center will serve as a "gateway" for local startups to meet foreign investors and launch operations abroad, said the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning.It is tasked with establishing a database of information related to startups here and provide potential overseas investors with this information.It will forge partnerships with foreign a

South Korea posted its 52nd consecutive trade surplus in May as a sharp drop in imports outpaced a fall in exports, customs data showed Wednesday.The country's trade surplus came to US$6.98 billion last month, down from $8.8 billion in the previous month, according to the data from the Korea Customs Service.The May figure marked an 11-percent on-year rise from $6.29 billion tallied in the same month a year earlier, extending its streak to 52 months.But the amount of trade surplus fell for three

South Korea failed to put its stock market back on MSCI Inc.'s review list of developed market index candidates due to a lack of financial reforms required by the widely followed global index provider, the financial regulator said Wednesday. MSCI, or Morgan Stanley Capital International, cited the absence of an around-the-clock market to exchange Korean won with other currencies and delays in Seoul's packages of financial reforms that will take effect after 2017, as some of the main reasons, the

Martin Rennie, former head coach of the Vancouver Whitecaps in Major League Soccer (MLS), was sacked by a South Korean second-tier club on Wednesday.Seoul E-Land FC announced that Rennie will be released from his contract by mutual agreement. The 41-year-old Scot became the club's first-ever head coach when he joined the K League Challenge side in July 2014. He is also the first foreigner to manage a second division pro club in South Korea. (Yonhap)"Seoul E-Land FC thank Martin Rennie for leadin

South Korea has been elected as a member of a U.N. council in charge of overseeing economic and social issues, keeping its membership in the body for 12 consecutive years, the foreign ministry said Wednesday.According to the ministry, South Korea was chosen to keep its membership in the U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) from 2017-2019 in an election held in New York on Tuesday (local time).China, the United Arab Emirates and Tajikistan were other Asia Pacific countries elected as council

Dividend payments to the owners of South Korea's top 10 conglomerates were tallied at 1.46 trillion won ($1.24 billion) for the past five years, despite their firms' sluggish earnings, data showed Wednesday.Samsung Electronics Co. Chairman Lee Kun-hee, South Korea's richest man, topped the list with a total of 681 billion won in dividends from 2011-2015, according to the data by Chaebul.com, a corporate information provider on large businesses. Samsung Electronics chairman Lee Kun-hee (Yonhap)La

Interest rates paid by local lenders are nearing zero percent after the country's central bank slashed its policy rate to a fresh record low, which translates into negative returns on bank deposits when price inflation is adjusted, market observers said Wednesday.According to the observers, Citibank Korea has slashed the annual interest rate on its savings accounts for companies to 0.01 percent from 0.1 percent.A 0.01 percent interest rate yields 1,000 won ($0.85) per year in interest on every 1

North Korea's trade volume sank 18 percent last year from a year earlier, ending five years of straight growth, due largely to a drop in the prices of its key trading items such as coal and overall shipments, a South Korean trade agency said Wednesday.The North's overall trade volume came to $6.25 billion in 2015, compared with $7.61 billion the previous year, according to the state-run Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency.The reclusive country's outbound shipments fell 15 percent on-year to

A woman dropped a complaint against Park Yu-chun, a member of popular K-pop boy band JYJ, on Wednesday, on charges of sexual assault, police said.The 20-something woman, whose identity was withheld, filed the case with the Gangnam Police Station on Friday, claiming the singer raped her at a bar in southern Seoul early in the morning on June 4.She had claimed the incident took place in a bathroom located within a room where they had been drinking together, according to police. Park and the woman,