Hanwha Solutions said Tuesday it will spend 338 billion won ($283.3 million) to add 270,000 tons of production capacity of caustic soda, a key raw material for electric vehicle batteries. According to the chemical and energy unit of South Korean conglomerate Hanwha Group, the investment will allow the company to ramp up the annual production capacity of caustic soda at its petrochemical plant in Yeosu, South Jeolla Province, to 1.11 million tons from the current 840,000 tons. “Hanwha

The main opposition People Power Party’s chairman on Tuesday said he will resign from the election committee, following the latest spat with a party lawmaker that again highlighted the young leader’s struggle to take command. People Power Party Chairman Lee Jun-seok announced the intent to resign from the committee following an argument with the election committee campaign’s communication chief Rep. Cho Su-jin on Monday. Lee will maintain his post as party chairman. “

Premature declaration would have adverse security ramifications for alliance strength, UNC status 　

SEJONG -- Almost 4 in every 5 foreign salaried workers in South Korea were found to be earning less than 3 million won ($2,500) a month, state data showed Tuesday. According to Statistics Korea and the Korea Immigration Service, around 811,000 foreigners were employed here this year, up 0.9 percentage point compared to the previous year. Of them, the portion of foreign employees whose monthly wage stayed under 3 million won reached 78.1 percent, or 633,000 people, this year. While 52.2 perce

Incheon International Airport Corp. has inked a 600 billion won ($503 million) deal to operate and develop Hang Nadim International Airport in Indonesia for 25 years starting next year, officials said Tuesday. It is the first overseas airport operation and development project Incheon International Airport Corp. has undertaken, they added. The deal was signed by Incheon International Airport Corp. and Batam Indonesia Free Zone Authority to operate and develop the Indonesian airport in Batam, Ri

Kyobo Life Insurance, the No. 3 life insurer in South Korea, has applied for a preliminary approval to list its shares on the country's main bourse, the stock market operator said Tuesday. Kyobo Life Insurance submitted the application with the Korea Exchange (KRX) for an initial public offering (IPO) and picked NH Investment and Securities Co. as the lead manager for the envisioned stock listing, according to the operator. Other details were not disclosed. In November, Kyobo Life Insurance s

South Korea said Tuesday it will hold high-level strategic talks with China via video links this week, the first bilateral session of its kind in more than four years. Choi Jong-kun, first vice foreign minister, is scheduled to hold the 9th Strategic Dialogue with his Chinese counterpart, Le Yucheng, Thursday afternoon, according to Choi Young-sam, spokesman for Seoul's foreign ministry. They had the 8th Strategic Dialogue meeting in June 2017. The two sides plan to have discussions on a wide

To mark the end of the year, the Korean Film Council is screening a selection of films from Indieground’s “2021 Independent Movie Library.” 　 The movie library is part of an Indieground project to promote Korean independent films to the public and find new distribution channels for filmmakers. For this year’s “Independent Movie Library,” a total of 727 films were submitted and 87 films -- 22 features and 65 short films -- were selected. A special screenin

“Special Cargo” featuring Oscar-winning “Parasite” star Park So-dam will be screened at 2022 International Film Festival Rotterdam’s Harbour program, according to the film distributor NEW. The film festival will be held offline from Jan. 26 to Feb. 6 next year. Founded in 1972, the annual film festival has been held at the end of January at various locations in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. In 2020, the festival premiered the black-and-white version of “Paras

The number of subscribers at CJ ENM’s streaming platform Tving has increased dramatically since October last year on the back of its original content, the company said. The number of paid subscribers to Tving increased by 256 percent as of Dec. 18, a rise which the company attributed to the popularity of its 60 original and exclusive content that it started offering in January. To further expand its reach, the streaming platform operator on Tuesday unveiled a list of new Tving original

National Museum of Korea exhibition highlights artistic, practical elements of lacquer

The number of protests held this year has jumped, even as the country’s daily coronavirus tally and the number of critically ill patients have continued to increase throughout this year. According to the National Police Agency’s report released Tuesday, the number of demonstrations held nationwide during the January-November period reached 79,407, around 238 protests per day. Last year, the figure marked 77,453 over the same period, police said. Demonstrations particularly spik

South Korean builder GS E&C has completed its construction of New Selander Bridge in Tanzania, the largest development project funded by the South Korean government in Africa. New Selander Bridge is also the first bridge project GS E&C has worked on in Tanzania. It will officially open for use on Dec. 27. Located in Dar es Salaam, the largest city and financial hub of Tanzania, the New Selander Bridge is 670 meters long. It is a new type of bridge that has combined the characteristics

Hyundai Motor Group raised its global electric vehicle (EV) sales target for 2026 to 1.7 million units from 1 million units, its chief executive has said, underscoring the automaker's push to meet the growing EV demand. Hyundai Motor CEO Chang Jae-hoon made the remark in an interview with the US-based Automotive News published on Tuesday, saying that the company will double the EV lineup to at least 13 models by 2026.  "That's very ambitious. Next year, we expect to sell about 220,

The chief of the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) said Tuesday he will quit all his positions in the party's presidential campaign committee following a dispute with a senior member of the committee. Lee Jun-seok announced his departure at a press briefing at the National Assembly after Rep. Cho Su-jin, the PPP campaign's communications chief, disobeyed his order and said she would listen only to the party's presidential nominee, Yoon Suk-yeol. Later in the day, Cho also offered to res