A scene from this year‘s Ansan M Valley Rock Festival, held from July 24 - 26 at the Daebu Sea Breeze Theme Park in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province. (CJ E&M)Despite hordes of unrelenting mosquitoes descending on a crowd sweating bullets in the steaming humidity and losing shoes traipsing through the damp mud, this year’s Ansan M Rock Festival concluded its festivities on a high note, inviting American rock gods, the Foo Fighters. With more than two decades as rock and roll music icons, the Foo Fighters

A scene from the new musical “Arirang,” an adaptation of Korean novelist Jo Jung-rae’s eponymous 12-volume novel, which is at the LG Arts Center in Seoul until Sept. 5. (Seensee Company)Beyond the tale of budding young love and the painstaking struggles of a village and its people, the musical “Arirang” is an emotional roller-coaster of artistic beauty, unrelenting sorrow and the glimmering of hope. From the painful-to-watch scenes depicting the rape of women by Japanese soldiers, to the brutal

A midday explosion in Turkey's southeastern city of Suruc near the Syrian border killed 28 people Monday and sent nearly 100 others to the hospital, Turkish officials said.  The prime minister's office gave the casualty toll in a phone call to The Associated Press.  There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.   A Turkish official, however, said authorities have evidence that the attack was a suicide bombing and suspect the Islamic State group was behind it.  He spoke on conditi

A seasoned North Korean diplomat is  apparently suffering from an illness and he has looked noticeably  gaunt, a former German politician who has recently made a visit to Pyongyang said Monday.A delegation of European political figures, including Jonathan Powell, Wolfgang Nowak and Glyn Ford, visited the North from July 13 to 17. After visiting Pyongyang, the delegation has come to Seoul to have talks with ranking government officials including Unification Minister Hong Yong-pyo."We were surpris

President Park Geun-hye nominated Lee Seong-ho, chief judge of the Seoul Central District Court, as new head of the nation’s human rights watchdog, her office said Monday.Lee Seong-ho (Yonhap)Lee, 57, replaces Hyun Byeong-chul whose term ends next month. The nominee is required to go through a parliamentary hearing, but does not require the legislature’s approval. A native of Yeongdong, North Chungcheong Province, Lee served as a judge for about 30 years, handling high-profile trials including t

A police officer was found dead in an apparent suicide at a police substation in western Seoul, police said Monday. Police said the 31-year-old officer was bleeding from his head with a gun in his right hand in the fitting room when he was found by a fellow officer at around 2:45 p.m.The 31-year-old officer was already dead when emergency crew members arrived.After coming back from a morning patrol, the officer had told his colleague to have lunch and disappeared, according to the police.While h

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has the chance to become to his country what South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva were to theirs: a man of the left who moves toward fiscal responsibility and freer markets. Like Tsipras, both were elected in the midst of an economic crisis. Both immediately confronted the international financial constraints that opposition politicians can afford to ignore.On assuming power, Kim and Lula were able to adjust, pol

The accord struck in Vienna to rein in Iran’s nuclear activities has warmongers fulminating. Citizens worldwide should support U.S. President Barack Obama’s brave effort to outmaneuver them, taking heart from the fact that the signatories include not just the United States, but all five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany.Many of the warmongers are to be found in Obama’s own government agencies. Most Americans struggle to recognize or understand their country’s permanent

A group of children and teachers narrowly avoided what could have been a horrible accident last week when the roof of a classroom collapsed at a child care center in Bangbae-dong, Seoul.Eleven students, from age 1 to 3, used the classroom in which the roof caved in. It was pure chance that the children had just stepped out of the room, led by their teachers, to wash their hands before lunch. The accident could have led to the tragic deaths of teachers and young lives. On the day of the accident,

The death of a National Intelligence Service employee by apparent suicide on Saturday has raised more questions about the spy agency’s hacking activities.The 20-year-veteran of cybersecurity at the NIS who was found dead from carbon monoxide poisoning in his car in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, left three separate suicide notes, including one addressed to his employer, the NIS, which was made public on Sunday.The man, identified only as Lim, was said to have been responsible for the spy agency’s pu

Super Junior is all style and sophistication in its new album “Devil,” a special release celebrating 10 years since the group’s debut. Featuring bouncy, stylized beats and collaborating with an eclectic bunch of musicians, the new album sees the band branching out musically and appealing to a wider audience.In more than a few ways, Super Junior has arguably been a group atypical to SM Entertainment. At a label known for producing ultramodern pop beats and veiling its artists in a pristine public

The Ascott Limited is gearing up to open the Citadines Haeundae Busan next month, marking not only the first Citadines in Korea, but also the largest Citadines-branded “apart’ hotel” in its vast stable of global properties.The soon-to-be opened 468-room, fully serviced residence Citadines Haeundae Busan will officially open its doors on Aug. 15 and will become the property of its kind in the port city. “We will be the first international serviced residence brand in Busan,” said Max Phillips, are

South Korea’s leading chemical and materials firm LG Chem has called on all executives and employees to brace for “uncertainties” in the global economy, despite the marked improvement in its business.“LG Chem has made improvements in businesses during the first half compared to the same period last year as executives and employees have made concerted efforts to achieve our goals,” CEO Park Jin-soo said at a meeting with them at the firm’s plant in Naju, South Jeolla Province, on Monday.“Let’s pr

Asia is currently the world’s fastest-growing region, and foreigners are beginning to spot opportunities to found their start-ups in Asian countries.“What I’m seeing is a real increase in entrepreneurship and a real increase in mobility, especially among younger entrepreneurs,” said Peter Wall, cofounder of Hubud, a coworking space in Bali, Indonesia.However, it is not easy to set up a foreign start-up across the region. While some hubs, like Singapore, are keener to globalize and attract foreig

Sistar (Starship Entertainment)The K-pop charts have been a tough battleground for Korea’s top pop groups in July, but the competition has been particularly fierce among girl groups.While big-name boy bands have generally timed their album releases to avoid head-on clashes, girl groups rolled the dice, with established names returning to the stage at the same time.Here’s a wrap-up of the summer girl group face-off in the K-pop scene so far, who’s come out on top and what’s to come in the coming

A scene from the original cast production of “Chicago,” on run at the National Theater of Korea until Aug. 8. (Seensee Company)One of the longest-running musicals in Broadway history, “Chicago” has made its way back to Seoul with an American cast who brilliantly recreate the good ol’ days of scandalous jazz tunes.  Sprinkled with a wicked murderous twist, the show weaves one of musical theater’s more shamefully alluring tales of lies and human greed. “You’re about to hear a story of murder, gree

The internationally dubbed “boy who loved Batman” and the force behind producing the “Batman” and “Dark Knight” movie series, Michael E. Uslan, has come to Seoul to share the tremendous tales behind how he turned his childhood obsession to one of the world’s most unforeseen game-changing film franchises.The man responsible for reimagining Batman as a noncomical, dark creature of the night who hunts criminals from the shadows said that he would stop at nothing to rid the perception of Batman as a

Hollywood TV and movie director T.J. Scott -- best known for his popular on-screen works “Spartacus,” “Gotham” and “Orphan Black” -- has made his way to Seoul to lend his expertise on the current and future state of the film and TV industries in the U.S.Invited as part of the Korea Creative Content Agency’s “Content Insight” lecture series for the month of July, Scott, who is credited with taking part in more than 50 TV shows and movies over the past two decades, discussed his take on television

One person was killed Saturday in a powerful explosion that partly damaged the Italian consulate in central Cairo, health ministry spokesman Hossam Abdel Ghaffar said.His statement came after a medic told an AFP journalist at the scene of the blast that it had wounded two policemen and three passers-by, but Abdel Ghaffar was unable to specify if the dead person was a member of the security forces or the public.Egypt's official MENA news agency said that early indications were that the explosion

A powerful blast hit the Italian consulate in the Egyptian capital on Saturday, partly destroying the facade of the building in central Cairo, an AFP correspondent at the scene reported.It was not immediately clear what caused the blast, which occurred at about 6:30 am (0430 GMT), when the consulate would have been closed.Medics at the site of the explosion told AFP that it wounded two policemen stationed outside the consulate, as well as three passers-by.Hundreds of soldiers and policemen have