The Korea Herald

Korea to host first Asian conference of UNCCD

IndustryAug 4, 2011

Korea is to play host to the world’s biggest gathering to combat desertification for the first time in Asia in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province.Slated for Oct. 10-21, prominent desertification experts and government officials from 194 member nations of the United Nations Convention to Combat Dese
Ex-prosecutor passes U.S. bar exam

Social affairsAug 4, 2011

A 67-year-old former South Korean prosecutor has passed a bar exam in Washington D.C., giving hope to those dreaming of becoming a lawyer in the United States. Chu Kwang-il, who formerly headed the Seoul High Prosecutors’ Office and the state civil rights agency, was the oldest among those who passe
CJ Construction’s new chief

IndustryAug 4, 2011

CJ Group’s construction arm CJ Engineering and Construction Corp. named Kim Chun-hak as its new chief executive and vice president on Tuesday. Kim Chun-hakBefore taking the post, Kim had been working for Samsung Heavy Industries Co. since 1983 and most recently served as the executive vi
Sohn tapped to head panel

IndustryAug 4, 2011

Sohn Kyung-shik, chairman of the Korea Chamber of Commerce & Industries, has been named as new head of the Presidential Council on National Competitiveness, a government official said Thursday.President Lee Myung-bak, currently on vacation, plans to appoint him next week, the sources said. Sohn Kyun
Academy defends Winfrey as honorary Oscar winner

World NewsAug 4, 2011

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Film academy president Tom Sherak is coming to Oprah Winfrey’s defense.Sherak says Winfrey is “one of the most philanthropic performers in the world” and thus deserving of the academy’s Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted Tuesday
[David Ignatius] Hollywood’s vanishing act

ViewpointsAug 4, 2011

WASHINGTON ― We are living in what New York Times called “a golden age of foreign films.” But American audiences wouldn’t know it unless they are lucky enough to live near an art-house cinema, or can tolerate subtitles on rented DVDs. The rising quality of foreign films over the past several ye
[Gregory Rodriguez] Zero-sum games in an interconnected world

ViewpointsAug 4, 2011

What’s wrong with this picture: Even as the world is becoming increasingly interconnected and interdependent, we seem to be approaching conflicts more in zero-sum terms and with all-or-nothing politics.Because digital networks and the global economy have humans more tightly bound than any time in th
[Editorial] Wrong traditions

EditorialAug 4, 2011

Even before the National Assembly’s confirmation hearing started for the appointment of the new prosecutor-general, some top-ranked prosecutors retired ― just to follow the tradition that has persisted not only in the prosecution but in most other organizations with hierarchical structures in Korea.
[Editorial] Illegal immigrants

EditorialAug 4, 2011

Korea is heading to a multicultural society. The nation needs the influx of foreigners to maintain industries and homes. Migrant workers are active in growing areas of manufacturing and service businesses, including high-tech ones. One out of every 10 marriages has a foreign-born bride. However, acc
[Naomi Wolf ] America’s reactionary feminists

ViewpointsAug 4, 2011

NEW YORK ― It is obvious that the left and the media establishment in the United States cannot fully understand the popular appeal of the two Republican tigresses in the news ― first Sarah Palin, and now, as she consolidates her status as a Republican presidential front-runner, Michele Bachmann. Wha
[Meghan Daum] The siren song of Google+ to Web surfers

ViewpointsAug 4, 2011

Google+, which launched a month ago to great fanfare, is so far feeling more like Google nonplussed. Reported to have crossed the 20-million-user mark two weeks ago, the new social networking site is designed to correct one of Facebook’s major drawbacks: the problem of too much information being sha
[Meghan O’Sullivan] U.S. should say it will stay long in Afghanistan

ViewpointsAug 4, 2011

Even last week’s swearing in of Ryan Crocker ― one of the most talented U.S. diplomats ― as ambassador to Kabul seems unable to stanch the perception that U.S. efforts in Afghanistan are waning. Most Americans take solace in the notion that, in President Barack Obama’s words, “the tide of wars is re
Pakistan steps up security as Karachi death toll hits 58

World NewsAug 4, 2011

KARACHI (AFP) ― Hundreds of extra paramilitary troops have been deployed in Pakistan’s economic capital Karachi which is struggling to end violence that has killed 58 people in five days, officials said Wednesday.Authorities are battling to halt gunfights raging across the key port city― used by NAT
‘Caged’ Hosni Mubarak denies all charges

World NewsAug 4, 2011

Sight of former dictator lying helpless in bed stuns Middle EastCAIRO (AP) ― From a bed inside the defendants’ cage, an ashen-faced Hosni Mubarak showed a glimmer of his old defiance. Egypt’s former president wagged his finger in the air and denied all charges against him Wednesday as he went on tri
Moon may have had a little sister

World NewsAug 4, 2011

WASHINGTON (AP) ― In a spectacle that might have beguiled poets, lovers and songwriters if only they had been around to see it, Earth once had two moons, astronomers now think. But the smaller one smashed into the other in what is being called the “big splat.”The result: Our planet was left with a s