After a year and a half since President Park Geun-hye took office, relations between the two Koreas appear to be hanging in midair as the North escalates military tension while sending conciliatory signals at the same time. The communist state has in recent months threatened a fourth nuclear test, fired artillery shells toward southern waters, and churned out acerbic criticism against Seoul and Washington over their joint military drills and summit. Yet Pyongyang last week said it would join thi

The foreign ministers of South Korea and China on Monday agreed to step up cooperation to stop further North Korean nuclear tests and foster conditions for “meaningful” dialogue to make progress in its denuclearization.  Wang Yi’s two-day stay here came as Pyongyang has repeatedly threatened to carry out a fourth underground detonation and ratcheted up tension through maritime drills and verbal attacks against the Park Geun-hye administration.  Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (Yonhap)With the p

The U.N. World Food Program is seeking Seoul’s involvement in its program to fight acute malnutrition among babies and mothers in North Korea, which suffers from dwindling funding amid political tension.The world’s largest humanitarian agency is in consultation with the South Korean government over the 2-year-old program to provide health care to some 2.4 million North Korean women and their children until age 2. President Park Geun-hye vowed support for the “1,000 days” project in her speech in

This is the seventh installment in a series of interviews with chiefs of United Nations offices in Korea. ― Ed.With free trade emerging as a global norm for growth, new U.N. rules on transparency in disputes between investors and host countries will play a key role in bolstering their relations while providing greater public access to arbitration procedures, UNCITRAL’s regional chief said. Debate remains fierce over the role and effect of an investor-state dispute settlement clause since South K

President Park Geun-hye on Friday expressed “very strong regret” over North Korea’s artillery shelling near a South Korean patrol ship, calling for an airtight defense posture and further efforts to ensure the safety of residents in the region. The incident took place late Thursday around 150 meters from the vessel sailing near the Northern Limit Line, a de facto inter-Korean border, prompting the South to shoot back five shells immediately. The Joint Chiefs of Staff reported no damage.Park conv

The U.N. World Food Program faces daunting challenges in its programs in North Korea as a “critical” lack of funding threatens their viability, its chief said Thursday, calling on Pyongyang to make “changes” such as improving transparency with aid delivery to help court more donors. Executive director Ertharin Cousin was here for a two-day stay after spending three days in Pyongyang until Wednesday. In Seoul, she and Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se initialed a partnership framework agreement desig

Cardinal Andrew Yeom Soo-jung on Wednesday called on the two Koreas to work to break their standoff through dialogue and sincerity, building on their joint factory park as a stepping stone to reconciliation. The remarks came upon his return from the Gaeseong industrial complex, aimed at raising the spirits of Catholics and other workers there despite persistent cross-border tension. “The Gaeseong district is about 60 kilometers away from the Seoul Archdiocese, but I realized that we live in a wo

South Korea on Tuesday offered its condolences to the North over the recent collapse of an apartment building in Pyongyang, which is presumed to have resulted in heavy casualties. The accident occurred on May 13 in the Pyongchon district, where the construction of the 23-story building was nearing completion, prompting People’s Security Minister Choe Pu-il and other senior executives to offer a rare public apology. The extent of the damage remains unknown but the death toll is expected to be hig

A much-trumpeted Beijing-Moscow summit, coupled with heightened territorial tensions between China and Vietnam, is poised to steal the limelight when world leaders and policymakers gather in Shanghai on Tuesday for a security forum. At the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia, Chinese President Xi Jinping will address the security situation in Asia and ways to strengthen strategic dialogue and cooperation, Beijing officials said. At least 46 heads of state and chief

With the ties between Seoul and Beijing getting closer, questions have been raised over where the Sino-North Korea relationship is heading.Observers said that distrust between the communist allies has deepened in recent years due to Pyongyang’s provocative moves including nuclear and missile tests, which has undermined what they traditionally hailed as an alliance “forged in blood.”Yet, no quintessential change has occurred in their relationship given that the two sides still share critical inte

An apartment building under construction in Pyongyang collapsed last week, prompting senior executives to offer a rare public apology, state media and Seoul officials said Sunday. The disaster took place on May 13 in the Pyongchon district, where the construction of the 23-story building was nearing completion, according to the official Korean Central News Agency. No death toll was reported though it described the accident as “serious.”As many as 92 households had already moved in, an official a

A recently resigned executive of KBS touched off a political firestorm over the weekend after revealing that Cheong Wa Dae has intervened in the state-run broadcaster’s coverage of the ferry disaster and other sensitive issues. Kim Si-gon, former chief of the network’s news bureau, said at an assembly of KBS reporters on Friday night that he had been under “constant pressure” over the content of news programs. Senior officials from the presidential office frequently gave him instructions by phon

Korea and Japan on Thursday discussed ways to resolve the long-festering issue of Tokyo’s mobilization of Korean women as sex slaves during World War II. Lee Sang-deok, director general for Northeast Asian affairs at Seoul’s Foreign Ministry, touched down in Tokyo early in the day for a two-day stay. He held talks with Junichi Ihara, director general for Asian and Oceanian affairs at Tokyo’s Foreign Ministry, and was expected to meet with Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Akitaka Saiki. The meeting

ak Thae-song, a deputy director in North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party, has become the party’s new secretary in charge of the western province of South Pyongan, state media confirmed Wednesday. He succeeded Hong In-bom, who was likewise promoted to the post from party deputy director in June 2010. Hong’s new title remains unclear, though he was named a deputy for the country’s rubber-stamp parliament early this year. Pak’s new position came to light as the official Korean Central News Agency rep

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has visited an Air Force unit in the western province of South Pyongan, calling on pilots to master modern flight training equipment and improve the existing gear, state media reported Thursday. The field inspection at the Korean People’s Army’s Air and Anti-Air Force Unit 447 marks at least his third participation in Air Force events in less than a month. The young leader attended a combat flight contest at an air force base last week and guided a flight training

Criticism is rising on the peninsula and abroad as North Korea continues to churn out a deluge of scathing invectives against the leaders of South Korea and the U.S. and other parts of what it calls hostile forces. Pyongyang’s state media is notorious for vitriolic remarks and warlike rhetoric against the allies. But its tone appears to have grown more hateful, especially since their summit in Seoul late last month, during which U.S. President Barack Obama warned the communist state against a fo

Seoul and Tokyo plan to hold working-level talks Thursday on the long-standing issue of Japan’s sexual enslavement of Korean women during World War II, the Foreign Ministry here said Tuesday.The meeting will mark a second round of consultations aimed at improving the two countries’ relations frayed by revisionist moves by Japanese officials and politicians. Lee Sang-deok, director general for Northeast Asian affairs at Seoul’s Foreign Ministry, is scheduled to arrive in Tokyo on Thursday for a t

Speculation is growing over the political status of Choe Ryong-hae, who had been deemed North Korea’s second-most influential man, as his coveted military post was taken over by a newly emerged figure, though he still appears to boast formidable power in public. The rise of Hwang Pyong-so, the new director of the General Political Bureau of the Korean People’s Army, sparked a flurry of rumors and analyses that portrayed Choe as the target of a new purge. The announcement marked the latest in a s

This is the sixth installment in a series of interviews with chiefs of United Nations offices in Korea. ― Ed.For Rhee Hyeun-suk, knowledge-sharing has been a lifelong task. She spent more than 20 years teaching information technology management at universities and helping Africa to improve its digital infrastructure at a U.N. agency in Addis Ababa. Now as chief of the UN-APCICT in Incheon, her mission hovers between continents on a daily basis: to help developing countries to build their human,

North Korea’s infant mortality rate topped 33 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2012, a study showed Thursday, reflecting the country’s chronic food shortages and lack of widespread, adequate health care services. The finding resulted from analyzing nutrition surveys conducted jointly by the Pyongyang government and international organizations from 1998-2012. Lee Joung-hee, a professor at Kyonggi University’s graduate school of education in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, released the work in Review of