Cho Tae-yong, who was nominated by President Yoon Suk Yeol last month for the National Intelligence Service’s top post, said Thursday he would steer clear of meddling in politics if he is confirmed as its director. During the confirmation hearing held at the National Assembly, Cho was asked to give his stance on the NIS’ history of getting involved in domestic politics, for which several of its high-level officials had been convicted. “I recognize that there had been such incid

Three lawmakers on Wednesday said they were leaving the Democratic Party of Korea, marking yet another departure of longtime lawmakers from the main opposition that controls a clear majority in the National Assembly. Announcing their decision to leave the Democratic Party they had long been part of, Reps. Lee Won-wook, Kim Jong-min and Cho Eung-cheon cited their disagreements with the party’s chair, Rep. Lee Jae-myung, and the way he is running the party. The lawmakers, prominent members o

North Korea breached the recently scrapped 2018 inter-Korean military accord approximately 3,600 times, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday. The number of violations by North Korea, counted from the time the deal was reached six years ago, was announced following three consecutive days of North Korean provocations along the sea boundary. The JCS in Seoul told the press that due to North Korea’s firing of artillery shells near South Korean border islands over the past thre

South Korea on Friday called on Russia to halt its arms deal with North Korea following a White House announcement that North Korean ballistic missiles were used in Russian attacks against Ukraine. A senior official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Seoul said on this day that by hauling arms from North Korea, Russia was “contradicting” the United Nations Security Council resolutions despite being a permanent member. The official said that the Foreign Ministry, together with its

Tensions escalated on the Korean Peninsula on Friday morning as North Korea fired some 200 artillery shells into the sea north of the border. Immediately after the North fired the shells off its western coast, South Korean authorities issued evacuation orders on Yeonpyeong Island and Baekryeong Island. North Korea continued to fire shells for two hours until 11 a.m., the South Korean military said. The South’s military said no South Korean citizens or members of the armed forces were harme

South Korea’s spy agency sees North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s only publicly known child Ju-ae as his “most likely successor,” according to its latest analysis. According to a National Intelligence Service report seen by The Korea Herald, the spy service in Seoul believes Ju-ae is most likely to succeed her father as North Korea’s leader, based on her public appearances and reception. The NIS said in the analysis that besides Ju-ae, who was born in 2013, Kim has an

[코리아헤럴드=김아린 기자] 국가정보원이 김정은 북한 국무위원장의 딸 김주애를 “유력한 후계자”로 판단한 것으로 나타났다. 3일 코리아헤럴드가 윤건영 더불어민주당 의원실을 통해 입수한 자료에 따르면, 국정원은 북한 동향 관련한 가장 최근 분석에서 “김주애 등장 이후 공개활동 내용과 예우 수준을 종합적으로 분석해 봤을 때 현재로서 김주애가 유력한 후계자로 보인다”고 밝혔다. 그러면서 “김정은이 아직 젊고 건강에 큰 문제가 없는 데다 변수가 많기 때문에 모든 가능성을 열어두고 주시하고 있다”고 덧붙였다. 국정원은 이어 2013년생인 김주애 외에도 김정은 위원장에게 성별 미상의 자녀가 있는 것으로 파악하고 있다고 전했다. 그 동안 국정원은 ‘김주애 후계자 설’에 신중한 입장을 보여왔다. 지난 9월까지만 해도 김규현 전 국정원장은 정보위 회의에 출석해 김주애를 후계자로 보는 것은 “성급하다&rd

Cho Tae-yong, who was nominated by President Yoon Suk Yeol as the National Intelligence Service director on Dec. 19, once had his driver’s license suspended for driving under the influence. According to the police report The Korea Herald obtained exclusively through the National Assembly on Tuesday, Cho was caught drunk driving on Feb. 23, 1999, and received a license suspension. On Aug. 10 of the same year, the court sentenced him to a fine of 700,000 won ($536). Until recently, Cho was n

In a key year-end message, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un described the two Koreas as “warring countries,” and vowed to “mobilize all physical means and other capabilities to cause a big stir” in the South. The anticipated rise in North Korean provocations will likely include cyberattacks, experts and officials in Seoul say. At the end of five days of Workers’ Party of Korea meetings, the North Korean leader said his country should “no longer commit the error

[코리아헤럴드=김아린 기자] 조태용 국가정보원장 후보자가 음주운전 이력이 있는 것으로 확인됐다. 2일 코리아헤럴드가 국회를 통해 확보한 자료에 따르면, 조 후보자는 1999년 2월 23일 음주운전이 적발 돼 면허 정지 처분을 받았다. 조 후보자 측은 관련한 입장에 대해 “청문회에서 소상히 밝히겠다”고 답했다. 대통령실 국가안보실장으로 일하던 조 후보자는 지난 달 19일 새 국정원장으로 지명됐다. 〈원문〉 [Exclusive] South Korean spy chief nominee had license suspended for drunk driving Cho Tae-yong, who was nominated by President Yoon Suk Yeol as the National Intelligence Service director on Dec. 19, once had his driver’s license suspended for driving un

South Korea on Monday returned North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s fresh threats of a nuclear attack with a warning that an attempt at such a move would result in the end of his regime. Shin Won-sik, the Minister of National Defense in Seoul, said in a written New Year’s message that Pyongyang will be made to face the realization that military threats against the country would mark “the beginning of its own downfall.” Late Sunday, the Defense Ministry responded to the North

A change of administration in Washington is unlikely to sway South Korea-US joint deterrence of North Korea's nuclear threats, the national defense chief in Seoul said Thursday. Minister of National Defense Shin Won-sik told reporters in a press conference that he doesn’t think the bilateral cooperation on nuclear deterrence will depend on which administration gets elected in the US, “whether it be Biden’s or Trump’s.” Responding to a question on concerns that Donal

The Ministry of National Defense in Seoul has characterized sympathizers of the North Korean regime threats within South Korea. In its latest version unveiled Tuesday, the Defense Ministry’s moral training program called sympathizers of the North Korean regime and its ideology “threats from inside that imperil the very foundations of liberal democracy.” The ministry said in the program that among South Korea, there existed forces that “sympathize with North Korea’s

Han Dong-hoon, the star prosecutor who was President Yoon Suk Yeol’s first justice minister, is about to make his official debut in politics as the leader of the ruling party. One of the best-known figures in Yoon’s Cabinet, Han surprised Seoul’s political capital Yeouido on Thursday when he accepted an offer to lead the People Power Party, the top seat of which had been left vacant for over a week. Previous party leader Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon stepped down amid an open power struggl

Cho Tae-yong was tapped again by President Yoon Suk Yeol earlier this week to head the National Intelligence Service, marking his third presidential nomination under the administration that is less than two years old. Since Yoon took power about a year and a half ago, Cho was made his ambassador to the US and then his national security adviser -- a minister-level role he would be leaving if his appointment as the new leader of the spy agency is finalized. A seasoned diplomat, Cho built a career

A trilateral scheme has kicked off for sharing data on North Korean missiles in real time among the defense chiefs of South Korea, Japan and the US. The Ministry of National Defense in Seoul said Tuesday its prelaunch inspections have found the missile data-sharing scheme to be “completely ready for operations” and currently “operating smoothly.” The Defense Ministry said the scheme would allow the three allies to detect North Korea’s missiles and share related info

President Yoon Suk Yeol on Monday asked his national security team for an “instant and overpowering response to any North Korean provocations” following the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile by Pyongyang earlier in the day, which raised military tensions on the peninsula. The North’s fifth ICBM launch of the year was fired into the sea off the east coast of the Korean Peninsula on Monday morning, as previously predicted by a senior Seoul official last week. In a N

South Korea and the US held another round of talks on nuclear deterrence in Washington DC on Friday, as part of US President Joe Biden’s commitment to step up protection from North Korea. According to a Seoul official, both sides agreed to complete guidelines on joint nuclear defense strategy by mid-2024 -- a timeline that falls before the US presidential election. South Korea’s principal deputy national security adviser, Kim Tae-hyo, told reporters that Seoul and Washington have dec

North Korea hosted a Russian governor of a far-east border region on Tuesday for talks on boosting economic ties, according to Pyongyang’s official state news agency. The official Korea Central News Agency said in a report Wednesday that North Korea’s foreign economic affairs official Yun Jong-ho met with Oleg Kozhemyako, the governor of Russia’s Primorsky, to discuss “elevating economic cooperation between regions of the two countries to a higher level.” The state-

The shift in power in Poland is stoking worries in South Korea over its possible toll on an arms export deal to the European country reached last year. Donald Tusk, a former European Union leader, was chosen as Poland’s prime minister for a second time in a parliamentary vote Monday, ending eight years of the nationalist conservative administration’s rule. With the change of the administration, the Polish Parliament’s Speaker Szymon Holwnia has said that agreements signed by th