Negotiations will reportedly start on a Korean-Chinese free trade agreement in the near future, possibly as early as in June. A senior Blue House official is quoted as saying that Korea and China will hold a summit this month and declare the launch of negotiations next month.As the official said, China has a strong desire to conclude negotiations on a free trade deal with Korea. But Korea has not

A dictionary definition of “new town” is a “planned urban community designed for self-sufficiency and providing educational, commercial and recreational facilities for its residents.” As such, it differs from “settlements that evolve in more ad hoc fashion.”Britain began to build new communities under the New Towns Act of 1946. Many other countries, borrowing from Britain, have since launched simi

It has long been accepted for the Japanese prime minister and other Cabinet members to cancel official visits to foreign nations because of Diet deliberation schedules. Japan’s standing on the diplomatic stage is thus degraded, and national interests are negatively affected. Such a long-standing but wrongheaded custom must end now.Ruling and opposition parties have agreed to allow Foreign Minister

“Well, I’ll be damned. It looks OK!”That was Chicago’s own Andy Martin ― self-proclaimed “King of the Birthers” ― on the phone with a reporter for Mother Jones magazine after the White House released a copy of President Barack Obama’s long-form birth certificate on Wednesday.Martin, who announced in December that he’s running for president on the Obama-wasn’t-born-here ticket, brags that he starte

An audience of 750 million tuned in July 29, 1981, to watch Lady Diana Spencer marry the Prince of Wales.In America, little girls were glued to the television from before dawn, enthralled by Diana’s dress with its billows of silk taffeta, 10,000 pearls and 25-foot train. To a young girl’s eye, the only blemish of this perfect day was that the bride’s signature feathered hair succumbed to the summe

Salvador Dali or M.C. Escher? This question leaps to the mind navigating the ruins of Japanese cities like Tagajo. Skylines now look as if Dali’s surrealist brush had a hand in rendering things so out of place. Escher’s mind seems at work, too. Interlocking shapes that shouldn’t exist in the three-dimensional world litter cityscapes that before March 11’s earthquake and tsunami were pretty run of

TOKYO (AP) ― Criticism of the Japanese government’s handling of the crisis at a radiation-spewing nuclear power plant increased Saturday, with a new poll indicating three-quarters of the people disapprove and a key adviser quitting in protest.A Kyodo News service poll released Saturday showed that Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s support ratings were plunging.The poll reported that 76 percent of the res

The worst yellow dust storm this year covered the Korean Peninsula on Sunday as winds blew a thick layer of the dust from deserts in northeastern China.The weather agency issued a yellow dust watch for five northwestern islands, Daejeon, Daegu, Busan, Ulsan, Gwangju, and Chuncheong, Gyeongsang and Jeolla provinces. It posted yellow dust advisories for the afternoon in Seoul, Gyeonggi and Gangwon p

A third of South Korea’s fathers feel they don’t talk enough with their children, with the lack of dialogue experienced most among single-parent and poorer families, a survey showed Saturday.More than 34 percent of fathers said they don’t spend enough time talking to their children, while 19.8 percent of mothers felt the same way, according to the survey by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Fami