South Korea's highest court recently upheld a lower court ruling that cleared an 82-year-old man of spy charges, for which he served a seven-year prison term after being convicted over five decades ago. The Supreme Court rejected an appeal by the prosecution, who claimed that the man, surnamed Kim, was guilty on some of the charges pressed against him back in 1969. The court said the evidence presented against him did not indicate that Kim could potentially threaten the nation's securi

An actor in his 40s is being investigated on the charge of drunk driving, with additional allegations of him assaulting the people who reported him to the authorities. The officials at Seoul Seongdong Police Station said they have handed prosecutors a drunk driving case that occurred at on July 2 in Seongdong-gu, eastern Seoul. The actor is believed to have been drinking at a restaurant in Gangnam-gu, southern Seoul, before driving his car some three kilometers to his home in Seongdong-gu. The m

More than half of recorded incidents suspected of being sudden unintended acceleration have involved drivers under the age of 60, government data showed Wednesday, contrary to the spreading belief that many such cases are caused by operator error on the part of older drivers. There have been 456 reports of SUA in South Korea from 2014 through last month, according to a Korea Transportation Safety Authority report submitted to Rep. Ahn Tae-jun of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea. The

A South Korean court sentenced a 27-year-old man who led a scam that involved spiking teens' drinks with drugs and blackmailing parents to 23 years in jail Tuesday. The defendant surnamed Lee is believed to have been the leader of a crime ring that made drinks out of methamphetamine and milk and distributed them to middle and high school students in Daechi-dong, southern Seoul on April 3, 2023. The perpetrators falsely claimed that the drinks would help students concentrate. Lee ordered his

A local DJ was sentenced to 10 years in prison Tuesday for a February drunk driving accident that resulted in the death of a 54-year-old motorcyclist. The Seoul Central District Court found Ahn Ye-song guilty of death by dangerous driving, hit and run, drunk driving and not taking appropriate measures after causing an accident. It also ordered that her car be seized as a relatively rare form of punishment imposed on particularly severe drunk-driving cases. The investigation found that Ahn, whi

Of cases in which hospitals refused to take emergency patients, 41.9 percent occurred because the hospital lacked the necessary medical staff to take care of the patient, fire agency data has shown. From 2023 to June of 2024, there were 4,227 cases across the country in which a hospital refused to admit an emergency patient taken there by ambulance, according to the National Fire Agency data provided to the Rep. Kim Sun-min of the minor opposition Rebuilding Korea Party. Of those cases, 1,771

A man in his 50s is being investigated by local police on suspicion of deliberately driving his car into another vehicle, injuring a pregnant woman, who was a passenger in the other car at the time. According to the Hwaseong Seobu Police Station in Gyeonggi Province, the driver ran his car into the side of another car Saturday. The other driver's pregnant wife and two young children, aged 3 and 4, were in the vehicle at the time. The female victim, who was 24 weeks pregnant at the time, fel

The South Korean prosecutors said Monday it has indicted a man in his 30s for killing his own mother in her sleep. The Daegu District Prosecutors' Office pressed the matricide charges against the suspect, who has intellectual disabilities. He is accused of killing the victim at 4 p.m. on June 10, while she was sleeping at a restaurant she owned in Sangju, North Gyeongsang Province. The suspect told the investigators he committed the crime because of a grudge for his mother repeatedly repr

An opposition lawmaker on Monday accused the incumbent Yoon Suk Yeol administration of "giving up trying to defend Dokdo as Korean territory," given that the Oceans' Ministry's reports to the president have never mentioned the island since Yoon took office in 2022. Rep. Lim Mi-ae of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea said that the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries report she recently acquired shows that the Dokdo Islets are not mentioned once in the reports submitte

A record-high 47.56 million passengers used South Korean carriers in the first half of this year, logging a 29.1 percent increase from the same period in 2023. The passenger traffic was the highest in the country's history, up from the previous high of 47.04 million in the H1 of 2019, according to the Air Portal data of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. The annual all-time high for passengers of local airlines is 93.47 million, also recorded in 2019. The number of passenge

Police in Incheon are investigating a possible case of animal abuse after four stray cats were found dead Thursday at an apartment complex in the city. According to Incheon Namdong Police Station, the cats were found dead at around 4 p.m. at an apartment complex in Guweol-dong, in Incheon's Namdong-gu. One of the cats had its legs cut off. Police are checking the surveillance footage of the area around the apartment complex. They also asked the Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency to conduct

A fire broke out at 9:40 a.m. at the Korail's Seoul headquarter in Yongsan-gu, central Seoul on Saturday, and multiple firefighters have been dispatched to the scene. The fire has been extinguished as of Saturday morning, and no casualties have been reported. Parts of the road from the intersection above the Sookmyung Women's University Station to the intersection at the western part of the Seoul Station were temporarily blocked due to the accident.

A man who left an insulting message about the victims of Monday night's car crash in central Seoul, which left nine dead or four injured, has turned himself in to the police. Seoul Namdaemun Police Station said Friday it was investigating a man in his 20s, who turned himself in for leaving a memo mocking the victims at the make-shift altar for the victims near the Seoul City Hall in Jung-gu, central Seoul. He told police at around 3:15 p.m. on Thursday that he wished to turn himself in, s

An overwhelming majority of young job seekers in South Korea say they will pursue some type of action when they are discontent with the company, a survey showed Friday. A local job-search platform Catch revealed the results of the survey it conducted on 1,699 of the people belonging to Generation Z -- adults born after the mid-1990s. When asked what they would do if they are dissatisfied with the company they work for, only 10 percent of the respondents said that they would just hold it in. Ab

A Busan court sentenced the 67-year-old man who attacked main opposition Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung with a knife in January to 15 years in prison Friday. The court found the defendant surnamed Kim guilty of attempted murder and violation of the Public Official Election Act, for his Jan. 2 attack against Lee during his visit to the city. Kim had posed as a supporter to approach Lee, but then stabbed him in the neck. He told investigators that the attack was to prevent Lee from becomi

A fire broke out Friday at an ink factory in the industrial district in Hwaseong, some 62 kilometers south of Seoul. No casualties have yet been reported. The fire broke out at around 7:15 a.m. at the 1,700-square-meter factory and forced the evacuation of three workers from the site, according to the Gyeonggi Fire and Disaster Headquarters. The authorities issued a level-one emergency response and dispatched 31 fire engines and 78 emergency personnel to the site. The flames were extinguished

The parents of the players attending a soccer academy run by Son Woong-jung, the father of soccer superstar Son Heung-min, released a joint statement Thursday dismissing the recent allegations that he and two coaches at the institute abused the children there. Despite the statement, civic groups said later in the day that the parents making such claims of no abuse can be in itself a form of secondary abuse against the victim. In the joint statement, the parents said, "after years at the a

South Korea's national weather agency said Thursday it plans to forecast the weather further into the future, starting with expanding its mid-term forecast from the current 10-day outlook to 14 within this year. The Korea Meteorological Administration said it will review its numerical weather prediction to see if it can provide specific weather data for up to 14 days. The KMA currently has a three-level weather forecast system: the short-term forecast of up to three days predicts the specif

With medical professors at major hospitals joining the nationwide walkout of medical staff, a doctor at a Seoul-based hospital has chosen to continue practicing while showing his support by going on hunger strike. Professor Ko Beom-seok, a breast disease surgeon at Asan University, said he has been taking nothing but water, salt and coffee since June 23. Ko said could not take part in the ongoing walkout because he felt he could not leave his patients. ut also could not turn away from his coll

With the shock of Monday night's deadly car crash in central Seoul still fresh, a photo circulating online with two handwritten notes left at the site in yellow circles has sparked anger. As of Thursday, a photo of two handwritten notes some deemed derisive of the deceased has been posted on social media and various online forums. Nine people were killed and four were injured by a speeding sedan near City Hall in central Seoul, with the cause of the crash still under investigation. "