Ruling party presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung has generated an enthusiastic public response after his campaign proposed adding hair loss to ailments covered by national health insurance. Democratic Party Rep. Choi Jong-yoon unveiled the idea on Facebook on Tuesday, saying Lee is looking into it as a campaign pledge to deal with the reality that "one in five" South Koreans suffer from hair loss but resort to buying treatment drugs from overseas or alternative drugs meant for the pr

Hyundai Heavy Industries and US company Palantir Technologies will work on building a new big data platform, the companies said Wednesday.  The two firms clinched a partnership in Las Vegas a day before the official kickoff of the CES 2022. The deal is reportedly valued at above $25 million, according to the industry. Their multiyear deal will improve the way Hyundai Heavy’s affiliates operate their businesses in shipbuilding, offshore engineering and energy and industrial machiner

President Moon Jae-in on Wednesday rebuked the military for failing to detect a man who crossed the eastern inter-Korean border into North Korea over the weekend, calling for the military to have a special sense of alert in border security. The man, who was found to be a North Korean defector, crossed the heavily fortified border on Saturday despite surveillance cameras having caught him as many as five times in a major security failure, according to the military. Moon said the "failure

South Korean tire manufacturer Hankook Tire unveiled an airless tire i-Flex at CES 2022, which has been used for Hyundai Motor Group’s latest robotics module Plug & Drive. According to the company, a 10-inch tire is applied with biomimetic design and requires no air inside unlike a traditional tire.  Inspired by a cell structure of living body, the tire maker said i-Flex adopted multi-layer interlocking spoke design to bolster the load bearing structure and shock absorption.&nbs

South Korea and Singapore should use the pandemic as an opportunity to plan and prepare for the future, the Singaporean ambassador and Herald Corp. chairman said in a meeting on Wednesday. Singapore Ambassador to Korea Eric Teo paid a courtesy visit to Herald Corp. headquarters in central Seoul where he, The Korea Herald CEO Choi Jin-young and Herald Corp. Chairman Jung Won-ju exchanged views on the emerging trends amid the COVID-19 pandemic, such as education trends, carbon neutrality, d

From Lady Gaga’s LGBT anthem “Born This Way” to a Freddie Mercury biopic, LGBT voices are being ‘filtered out of media,’ experts say

South Korea’s military said Wednesday that it failed to stop a North Korean defector even though he was caught on surveillance cameras five times. The Joint Chiefs of Staff on Wednesday disclosed the results of its on-site investigation into how the 30-something North Korean man returned to the North Saturday night. The military currently believes that the defector is the same person who defected to the South in November 2020. The military first spotted him approaching the border reg

The US said “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” on lifting its sanctions on Iran, indicating that an immediate breakthrough to unlock some $7 billion of Iranian assets frozen in South Korea could be difficult. 　 State Department spokesman Ned Price made the remarks Tuesday in the US, when asked about whether the issue of Iranian funds frozen in South Korea due to US sanctions will be resolved soon. It comes as South Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Choi Jong-kun is in

South Korea's unification ministry on Wednesday urged North Korea to respond to calls for dialogue after the North launched what appears to be a ballistic missile toward the East Sea in its latest show of force. The North fired the missile at around 8:10 a.m. from the northern province of Jagang where it claimed to have fired a hypersonic missile in September last year, according to the South Korean military. The missile launch came hours before President Moon Jae-in attended a groundbreaking

Five-member dance crew Turns became the final winner of Mnet’s dance competition “Street Dance Girls Fighter” on Tuesday, taking home the top honor along with 10 million won ($8,350) in prize money. “Street Dance Girls Fighter,” which premiered in November as a spinoff from the cable network’s hit “Street Woman Fighter,” captured viewers by introducing passionate and talented high schoolers’ dance moves. The six finalists -- Newnion, Floo

Lee Jae-myung, the presidential candidate of the ruling Democratic Party (DP), on Wednesday renewed his call for providing COVID-19 relief grants to all people, saying it is an effective way to help pandemic-hit small businesses. "Basically, all people have suffered (from COVID-19), so opportunity should be given to all of them," Lee told reporters after a campaign event in Gwangju, 330 kilometers southwest of Seoul. "I am not saying it needs to be done immediately but in princi

South Korean stocks retreated Wednesday on worries the rising long-term bond yields in the United States may hasten the Federal Reserve's tapering move. The Korean won fell against the US dollar. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (Kospi) declined 35.27 points, or 1.18 percent, to close at 2,953.97 points. Trading volume was moderate at about 774 million shares worth some 14.6 trillion won ($12.2 billion), with losers outnumbering gainers 554 to 319. Institutions dumped a net 1.3

N. Korea fires suspected ballistic missile toward east coast, JCS says

New Samsung CEO says pandemic changed expectations toward healthier technology