A British investment fund has submitted a letter of intent to a local court to buy cash-strapped STX Shipbuilding Co. and its French unit up for sale, industry sources said Tuesday.The investment fund has offered to buy STX Shipbuilding and a 66.7 percent stake in its French unit, a deal valued at 1 trillion won ($852 million) in total, while French shipyard DCNS and two other foreign shipyards submitted initial bids for STX Shipbuilding only, which could fetch 100 billion won, the sources said.

The US Defense Department on Monday welcomed the provisional signing of a military intelligence sharing agreement between South Korea and Japan."We noted the recent media reports that the Governments of the Republic of Korea and Japan reached a provisional agreement on a bilateral General Security of Military Information Agreement," Cmdr. Gary Ross, a Pentagon spokesman, told Yonhap News Agency. "A potential ROK-Japan GSOMIA could strengthen cooperation between our two closest allies in Northeas

More than 1.71 million foreigners resided in South Korea in 2015, accounting for 3.4 percent of the country's total population, government data showed Monday. According to data from the Interior Ministry and Statistics Korea, the number of foreign residents reached 1,711,013 as of Nov. 1 last year, a more than threefold increase from 536,627 in 2006, when the country began to compile such numbers. The ratio of foreign residents to the total population also rose to 3.4 percent last year from 1.1

The South Korean government on Monday ratcheted up pressure on unionized workers at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co. (DSME) to support a creditor-led restructuring drive."(You) need to face reality," Yim Jong-yong, chairman of the Financial Services Commission, said at a meeting on the nation's corporate restructuring campaign. Yim, named the new finance minister, stressed that both the management and labor of the troubled shipbuilder should make "thorough self-rescue efforts" under

South Korea's unification ministry said Monday that it will maintain its current North Korea policy focused on pressure and sanctions even after the Donald Trump administration takes office next year.In a report submitted to lawmakers, the ministry in charge of inter-Korean affairs added that it will work hard to build strong and close cooperative ties with the next US government and maintain policy "continuity" in dealing with the North."We will focus our efforts on establishing a frame for clo

South Korea's Navy chief on Monday inspected a military exercise in the East Sea designed to enhance its capabilities to counter North Korea's submarine-launched ballistic missiles.Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Um Hyun-seong called for full readiness and a swift reaction if provoked during the inspection aboard a P-3 maritime patrol aircraft, widely known as a "submarine killer." The exercise began Thursday with the aim to assess and improve South Korea's capabilities to strike North Korean sub

South Korean automobiles will go on sale via TV home shopping networks starting in 2018 under a revised regulation, the government announced Monday.The nation's four major home shopping channels -- CJ, Hyundai, GS and Woori -- will be allowed to deal in not just foreign and used cars but also newly made domestic ones, according to the Financial Services Commission.Currently, they are prohibited from selling new South Korean cars, as they are registered with the authorities as being engaged in th

President-elect Donald Trump made his first two key personnel appointments on Sunday, one an overture to Republican circles by naming GOP chief Reince Priebus as his White House chief of staff, the other a shot across the bow of the Washington establishment by tabbing Breitbart news executive Stephan Bannon as chief strategist and senior counselor.The two men had made up the president-elect’s chief of staff shortlist, and while Priebus received that job, Bannon’s post also is expected to wield s

A powerful earthquake that rocked New Zealand on Monday triggered landslides and a small tsunami, cracked apart roads and homes and left two people dead, but largely spared the country the devastation it saw five years ago when a deadly earthquake struck the same region. Strong aftershocks continued to shake the country on Monday, rattling the nerves of exhausted residents, many of whom had spent a sleepless night huddled outside after fleeing for higher ground to avoid the tsunami waves. The ma

North Korean authorities are collecting foil from residents to use them to make camouflage nets for anti-aircraft batteries, a US broadcaster, monitored in Seoul, reported Monday. "The North Korean authorities are urging residents to offer foil as a material to support the army, while insisting that (American) satellites cannot take pictures of their anti-aircraft batteries if they are covered with camouflage nets made of foil,"the Radio Free Asia said, citing a source in the North's North Hamky

The international community needs to exert all-out pressure on North Korea at present but also should not rule out an option for engagement with Pyongyang over the long haul, an ex-Korean point man on unification said Monday.Former Unification Minister Ryoo Kihl-Jae said dialogue with North Korea needs to be considered in the long term as the effect of sanctions will better materialize if there is some sort of parallel engagement policy."For now, an all-out pressure on North Korea is inevitable

South Korea and the United States met in Seoul on Monday to discuss ways to improve human rights conditions in North Korea and other pending issues, the foreign ministry said.The North Korea human rights consultative meeting was attended by Kim Yong-hyon, director-general of the Korean Peninsula peace regime bureau, and Ambassador Robert King, Washington's special envoy for North Korean human rights issues, according to the ministry.The meeting marked the second of its kind following their first

지난 11일 금요일 오후 4시 30분 (현지시각) 하버드 대학교, 대학원 한인 재학생 및 연구원 193명은 하버드 메모리얼 교회 앞에서 박근혜 대통령의 하야를 요구하는 시국 선언식을 가졌다.이는 학부생을 주축으로 진행된 11월 4일 시국선언에 이어, 하버드 대학교 한인 전체가 광범위한 토론 및 참여를 나누며 이루어졌다. (사진 출처=하버드 시국선언단)시국선언문은 누구든지 자유롭게 참가해 자기 의사를 밝히며 투표로 사안을 결정하는 민주주의 회의 방식 ‘타운홀 미팅 (town hall meeting)’을 통해 작성, 발표됐다.선언문은 ‘박근혜 정권이 도덕성과 기능 면에서 국민의 신뢰를 완전히 상실했다’며 시작했다. 또한, 이 사태는 ‘한 개인에 국한된 사건이 아니라, 현 정권 전반에 걸친 광범위한 문제’라며 ‘우리 사회 모든 분야에 걸쳐 공정성에 대한 국민의 신뢰가 파괴되었다’고 진언했다.이들은 박근혜 대통령이 ‘국정에서 즉시 물러날 것’을 요구하며 또한 수사 당국이 ‘성역 없이 철저히

North Korea's fresh investment in China dropped to a record low last year, while Chinese investment arriving in the communist North also shrank for a third consecutive year amid increased international sanctions against Pyongyang, a report showed Monday.According to the report from the Korea International Trade Association, fresh North Korean investment in China came to $70,000 in 2015.The report was based on related data from China's statistics office, KITA said. The 2015 tally marked the lowes

Opposition parties on Monday threatened to oust Defense Minister Han Min-koo if his ministry presses ahead with the tentative signing of a military intelligence-sharing pact with Tokyo.South Korea and Japan plan to provisionally ink the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) to enhance cooperation in coping with North Korea's evolving military threats during their talks in Tokyo, Seoul officials said.Four years ago, the two sides failed to sign the arrangement in the face of

Apartment supply hit a record high this year in the month of October, but the sum of "collective lending," a system in which financial institutions lend money to home buyers in groups, fell as the government took the reins to control spiking household debt, the latest tally showed Monday.Figures collected and released by financial authorities said the country's four leading commercial banks approved 2.53 trillion won ($2.17 billion) in collective loans in October, the second-lowest sum this year

President Park Geun-hye on Monday accepted a proposal by the main opposition party leader for bilateral talks, her office Cheong Wa Dae said, raising hopes for the easing of a political crisis sparked by a corruption scandal involving her close confidante.Park will hold bilateral talks with Choo Mi-ae, the leader of the Democratic Party, on Tuesday.Early in the morning, Choo made an overture to Han Gwang-ok, the presidential chief of staff, to hold talks over the ongoing political deadlock.The p

South Korea's highest income tax rate for high-income earners is already higher than the average of OECD states, a report said Monday, opposing a move by opposition lawmakers to further raise the rate for the highest income earners.The report from the Korea Economic Research Institute (KERI) noted the country's highest possible income tax rate currently stands at 38 percent, compared with the average 35.9 percent of all member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Developmen

Some 3,000 employees have quit their jobs from South Korea's top three shipbuilders in the third quarter of the year as the industry underwent extensive restructuring programs to cope with global oversupply and low demand amid a global economic slowdown, industry sources said Monday.The country's three biggest shipyards -- Hyundai Heavy Industries Co., Samsung Heavy Industries Co. and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co. -- have been implementing drastic self-rescue programs, including a

The number of people preparing to seek jobs, a group that some economists see as the same as unemployed, increased to a record level for the month of October, according to Statistics Korea on Monday.The would-be job seekers are different from the unemployed in that they are not yet actively looking for work but studying and getting ready to apply for jobs. Their number in October reached 650,000, the highest since record keeping began in 2003 by the state statistical office. The latest figure is