The U.S. is poised to start flying a spy plane near the Demilitarized Zone to acquire further intelligence on North Korea, a report said.In an article dated Monday, the Stars and Stripes, a U.S. military newspaper, quoted U.S. Air Force officials as saying the U.S. was negotiating with South Korea t

The military will place female officers in more combat duties that have so far been closed to them, a senior official said Thursday.Boo Jae-won, head of the personnel planning bureau at the defense ministry, said 12 combat branches will be open to female soldiers from 2012 to 2014.“We will open up a

The presidential office has drawn up a list of unethical practices considered common in bureaucracy, such as personal use of official credit cards, and sent it to ministries and agencies as part of efforts to tighten discipline in officialdom, an official said Wednesday.“There are practices that min

WASHINGTON (Yonhap News) ― A group of American scholars and dignitaries said Tuesday that they will launch a fresh campaign this week to boost the slow-moving efforts to construct the first formal Korean War museum in the United States.Dozens of former U.S. ambassadors to Seoul, scholars and others

WASHINGTON (Yonhap News) ― Wendy Sherman, nominated to become the State Department’s third highest-ranking official, on Wednesday emphasized that the U.S. should use the full range of foreign policy tools including a variety of “sticks and carrots” in dealing with North Korea’s nuclear program and o

The dropout rate of North Korean defectors in South Korean schools has gradually declined over the last few years, an education institute said Thursday, a sign that efforts to help support North Korean students paid off.The dropout rate for North Korean students in primary, middle and high schools s

An opposition leader Thursday called on the government to focus its economic policies on improving working conditions and creating more jobs as part of efforts to move toward a welfare state. “To become a fair welfare state, (the government) should change the policy focus to make a people-centered e

“Boys and girls, it’s time to go to bed.” When I was a boy, everyday this message came from the television or radio just before 9 p.m. I thought of it as a signal for the end of the day and would go to bed. I knew nothing about the world after that time. The 9 to 6 sleep schedule was considered the

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos will visit South Korea next week for summit talks with President Lee Myung-bak on economic cooperation and other issues, the presidential office announced Wednesday.Santos will arrive on Sept. 14 for a three-day state visit that will also include a visit to the

An artificial seismic event that occurred at the time of the sinking of the Cheonan last year indicates that an explosion was the cause of the disaster, a study showed Wednesday.Hong Tae-kyung, a South Korean professor at Yonsei University, wrote in a recent paper that a tremor of 1.5 magnitude occu

The government should set a quota for the recruitment of high school graduates when hiring new employees, President Lee Myung-bak said Friday. Presiding over a meeting on his “fair society” campaign, he strongly challenged the deep-rooted workplace practice of favoring employees by school diploma ra

Ahn Cheol-soo, a venture entrepreneur-turned-professor revered by many young Koreans, said Friday that he was considering running for Seoul mayor as an independent candidate in next month’s by-elections. Ahn Cheol-soo“I have not yet made up my mind,” Ahn told reporters in Seoul, denying a news

China has replaced its deputy negotiator to the stalled six-party talks on ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs, a diplomatic source in Seoul said Thursday. Yang Houlan, who has held the post since February 2009, was recently appointed as China’s ambassador to Nepal in a “regular” reshuffle

Rival parties agreed Thursday to begin the ratification process for the long-pending free trade agreement with the United States in the same pace with the U.S. Congress, officials said.The last-minute compromise averted a feared clash between the rival parties. Opposition lawmakers had hinted at the

A Seoul court has ordered the South Korean government to compensate the Seoul city government for environmental damage caused by an oil leak from a U.S. military camp here, the city said Thursday.The Seoul Central District Court handed down the ruling in favor of the Seoul Metropolitan Government, w

South Korea will ask the United States, China and Japan to prevent their citizens from visiting a troubled mountain resort in North Korea, a Seoul official said Tuesday.The move comes as the isolated communist country is seeking to attract foreign tourists to Mount Kumgang as part of its attempts to

A top South Korean court said Tuesday that it is unconstitutional for the government to make no tangible effort to settle disputes with Japan over its refusal to compensate Korean women mobilized as sex slaves during its 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.The Constitutional Court ruled in

Yu Woo-ikUnification MinisterYu Woo-ik, 61, former ambassador to China, mapped out several of President Lee Myung-bak’s major policies. He was the first chief of staff under the Lee administration in 2008. Yu is said to have designed the grand canal plan, which later became the controversial four-ri

South Korea on Tuesday urged Japan’s new government to “look squarely at its past,” setting a brusque tone following reinforced Japanese moves to lay claim to the South’s easternmost islets of Dokdo. Japan’s parliament approved former finance minister Yoshihiko Noda as the new prime minister earlier

TaLK volunteer teachers from English-speaking countries help rural kids learn languageYEONGI, South Chungcheong Province ― Benjamin Stevens, 24, first came to Korea with his mother for a seminar nine years ago. Fascinated by Korea, he wanted to come back, and realized his dream thanks to the TaLK (T