South Korea will provide $700,000 worth of humanitarian aid to Colombia, Honduras and Nicaragua to help them cope with damage from Hurricane Iota, the foreign ministry said Friday. The Latin American countries were devastated Monday by the category 5 hurricane, the biggest storm this year in the Atlantic Ocean. "Our government hopes that the aid will help the peoples of those countries facing hardship in recovery, due to the stronger hurricane than the previous Hurricane Eta," the mi

Renault Samsung Motors, the South Korean unit of Renault SA, on Friday announced plans to halt operations at its Busan factory for four days next month. The automaker has suffered a sharp decline in sales this year due to a lack of new models and the COVID-19 pandemic. The company plans to suspend operations at its plant in the southeastern port city on Dec. 11, 23, 24 and 31. It will also continue to suspend overnight operations at the plant after having reduced operating hours starting Nov.

The central and local governments on Friday began construction of a new airport at Ulleung Island off the eastern coast. Some 100 people, including officials from the transport ministry and local governments, attended a groundbreaking ceremony. The airport, to be completed by 2025, is projected to shorten the travel time between Seoul and Ulleung to one hour from the current seven hours. The airport is also expected to increase the number of visitors to the island to more than 1 million per y

SK Telecom Co., South Korea's top mobile carrier, said Friday it will merge its security subsidiaries by the end of the first quarter of next year, in its latest move to boost business synergy. SK Telecom said its subsidiary Life and Security Holdings, which wholly owns physical security firm ADT Caps Co., decided to merge with the carrier's digital security subsidiary SK infosec by the end of this year. SK infosec then plans to merge with ADT Caps by the first quarter of next year. The carri

South Korean stocks hit another fresh record high Friday on recovery hopes despite soaring new coronavirus cases. The Korean won surged to an over 29-month high against the US dollar. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) rose 7.54 points, or 0.29 percent, to close at 2,633.45. Trading volume was moderate at about 1.2 billion shares worth some 12.4 trillion won ($11.2 billion), with gainers outnumbering losers 488 to 332. Foreigners bought a net 77 billion won, and retail in

South Korea's state pension fund posted a return rate of over 4 percent through September on robust performances in domestic and overseas stock markets, its operator said Friday. The state pension fund registered a 4.17 percent investment return at the end of September, according to the National Pension Service (NPS). It chalked up a 8.47 percent investment return from the local stock market and a 3.28 percent yield from investments in overseas stocks. The fund's return rates from investme

The opening of South Korea's foreign exchange market will be delayed by one hour on the day of the college entrance exam next week, the committee in charge of the foreign exchange market said Friday. The foreign exchange market is set to open at 10 a.m. and close at 3:30 p.m. next Thursday as part of efforts to ease traffic, according to the Seoul Foreign Exchange Market Committee. Hundreds of thousands of people, mostly high school seniors, are scheduled to take the crucial test that is wide

The government will push for a new law to drastically raise punishments for stalking perpetrators, the Ministry of Justice said Friday. The ministry made a prior announcement of the plan for the legislation via the government gazette, which calls for punishing convicted stalkers with up to five years in prison. Under the new law, acts of continuously or repeatedly approaching, following or blocking a victim against his or her will; waiting for or watching a victim in and around his or her resi

Midsized shipyard STX Offshore & Shipbuilding Co. said Friday its creditors led by the state-run Korea Development Bank (KDB) have picked a consortium as the prime bidder for the shipbuilder. On Nov. 9, the creditors signed a preliminary deal with the consortium comprising local private equity fund KH Investment (KHI) and United Asset Management Company (UAMCO), South Korea's biggest bad debt clearer, to sell the shipbuilder. After the deal, the creditors put up the stake in the shipbuil

SEONGJU -- The defense ministry's latest attempt to bring non-weapon materials and construction equipment onto a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) base in central South Korea on Friday ran into fierce protests from local residents and civic activists opposed to the deployment of the American missile defense system. About 70 residents and activists gathered on a bridge leading to the base for the THAAD system in the central town of Seongju, about 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, to b

Nearly 900 migrant workers were deported or arrested over a three-month period after being caught working illegally in South Korea, the Ministry of Justice said Friday. Immigration authorities have rounded up 1,294 illegal foreign workers from Aug. 1 to Nov. 2 before deporting 885 of them out of the country and placing four others under arrest, the ministry said. They also busted 254 employers of illegal migrant workers and imposed a fine on 232 of them, the ministry said, adding 17 others wer

South Korea should work together with Australia, Canada and Japan to form regional economic or security frameworks so as to create a new order free from the burden of choosing sides between the United States and China, an adviser to President Moon Jae-in said Friday. Moon Chung-in, special foreign policy and security adviser, made the remarks during a virtual seminar, stressing that it is very unlikely the tensions between Washington and Beijing will get any better under the next US administrat

South Korea's manufacturing industry saw its added value shrink at the fastest clip in 21 years in 2019 on falling prices of chips and other key products, government data showed Friday. The added value of the country's manufacturing and mining sectors came to 559.8 trillion won ($507 billion) last year, down 1.4 percent from a year earlier, according to the data from Statistics Korea. It was the largest annualized contraction since the 2.1 percent fall recorded in 1998 in the wake of the count

The number of weekday moviegoers in South Korea dropped this week under the heightened antivirus curbs during the third wave of the new coronavirus pandemic, data showed Friday. The Korean Film Council (KOFIC) said 83,050 and 60,891 visited theaters on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively, down from 91,175 and 86,091 from the previous Wednesday and Thursday. The figure is expected to be in further decline as concerns are swelling over a recent hike in COVID-19 cases. The daily caseload of the

North Korea has recently ordered its overseas missions not to antagonize the United States amid an ongoing power transition in Washington following the presidential election win by Joe Biden, according to Seoul lawmakers Friday. The Kim Jong-un regime also executed a big shot in the Pyongyang money change market in late October for a sudden exchange rate fluctuation and an official in August for bringing in prohibited goods amid toughened border customs control due to the new coronavirus pandem

South Korean institutions' investments in foreign securities rose in the third quarter from three months earlier as global financial markets recovered from pandemic-driven losses, central bank data showed Friday. The combined value of foreign securities held by institutional investors came to $345.4 billion as of end-September, up $8.9 billion from three months earlier, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK). It marked a gain for the second straight quarter after a $9.5 billion fall in the firs

South Korean banks' lending rates stayed flat in October, despite rising market rates, central bank data showed Friday. The average interest rate charged on new bank loans came to 2.66 percent in October, unchanged from the previous month, according to preliminary data from the Bank of Korea (BOK). In September, banks' lending rates rose for the first time in four months. The rates declined for the third straight month since June due to the impact of the central bank's policy rate cut in May.

A Seoul court on Friday fined Yang Hyun-suk, former CEO of YG Entertainment, over charges of high-stakes gambling he committed while abroad on numerous occasions. The Seoul Western District Court found him guilty of gambling at Las Vegas casinos in the United States over the past several years and ordered him to pay a fine of 15 million won ($13,600). The court said his behavior could "have a bad influence on the public, especially young people," but that it considered Yang showed re

North Korea appears to be enforcing home classes for elementary school students as a way to avoid classroom gatherings amid nationwide anti-coronavirus efforts, according to state media reports. Uriminzokkiri, one of the North's propaganda websites, said that elementary school teachers in Pyongyang are visiting homes of their students every three days for education as vacation continues. "With the vacation for kids in place, such a new schedule has been started," the website said. &q

왕이(王毅) 중국 외교담당 국무위원 겸 외교부장이 일본에 센카쿠(尖閣·중국명 댜오위다오<釣魚島>)열도는 중국 영토라는 메시지를 던지고 떠나면서 일본 정치권이 격앙된 반응을 보이고 있다. 앞서 아베 신조(安倍晋三) 전 일본 총리 재임 때부터 추진된 시진핑(習近平) 중국 국가주석을 아예 2년 정도 연기하는 방안도 대두한 상황이다. 27일 요미우리(讀賣)신문의 보도에 의하면 전날 열린 일본 집권 자민당 외교부회에서는 왕 외교부장이 24일 열린 중일 외교장관 공동기자회견 때 센카쿠 열도가 중국 영토라고 주장한 것에 대해 반론해야 한다는 의견이 이어졌다. 왕 외교부장은 당시 회견에서 "일본의 어선이 댜오위다오의 민감한 수역에 들어오는 사태가 발생해 우리들은 어쩔 수 없이 필요한 반응을 하지 않을 수 없다"고 말했다. 이는 최근 센카쿠 열도 인근 수역에서 중국 해경 선박과 일본 당국 선박 사이에 신경전이 이어지는 것에 대한 발언이다. 센카쿠 열