Discourse with Chinese scholars on China’s Belt and Road Initiative

The Lunar New Year or Seollal is one of the two most important and celebrated traditional holidays in South Korea. But, though both halves of the peninsula share many aspects of culture, nearly 77 years of division between the two Koreas have led to divergent holiday traditions. In North Korea, the significance of socialist holidays, including the birth anniversaries of the late leaders Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il, the national foundation day on Sept. 9, and the party foundation day on Oct.

President Moon Jae-in has said that North Korea’s launch of an “intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM)” on Sunday morning amounts to a “breach of UN Security Council resolutions" and a “challenge” to the international community’s efforts to ensure peace on the Korean peninsula. In an emergency National Security Council meeting, Moon made the remarks as he called on Pyongyang to stop adding pressure and tension and return to the dialogue table,

North Korea fired one apparent ballistic missile toward the East Sea on Sunday, South Korea's military said, in the recalcitrant regime's seventh show of force this year. The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the launch from the northern province of Jagang bordering China at 7:52 a.m. It did not elaborate. Jagang Province is where the North conducted the launches of its self-proclaimed hypersonic missiles in September last year and on Jan. 5 and 11. "Our military is tracking a

Rescuers discovered a body of a 28-year-old worker who was buried in a landslide in a quarry Saturday, fire department officials said. Rescue operations are under way to find the remaining two buried workers. The accident occurred at 10:08 a.m. when they were making holes for demolition work at the quarry in Yangju, Gyeonggi Province, according to officials. Seven excavators were mobilized to find the buried workers, but rescue operations were hampered by huge amounts of soil. Authorities sa

South Korea's daily COVID-19 cases reached yet another record high Saturday, driven by a rapid spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant, with a new nationwide virus response system coming into force. The country reported 17,542 new COVID-19 infections, including 17,349 local cases, raising the total to 811,122, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said.   The daily count broke the record for the fifth consecutive day, spiking from 8,570 on Tuesday. The

Traffic on some highway sections began to slow Friday as people hit the road to visit their hometowns or go on trips during the Lunar New Year holiday despite the coronavirus pandemic. This year's Lunar New Year holiday runs from Monday to Wednesday and is extended by two days due to the preceding weekend. The government urged people to refrain from traveling during the holiday to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The nation reported a record 16,096 new cases Friday. As of 7:47 p.m., some se

South Korea on Friday expressed "strong regret" over Japan's push to recommend a former gold mine associated with wartime forced labor as a candidate for a UNESCO World Heritage site and called for its retraction. Seoul's Second Vice Foreign Minister Choi Jong-moon called in Japanese Ambassador to South Korea Aiboshi Koichi to lodge a protest after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced plans to nominate the controversial mine on Sado Island for the 2023 UNESCO heritage list

  The already fraught ties between South Korea and Japan were dealt yet another setback Friday when Tokyo plowed ahead with the recommendation of a former mine linked to wartime forced labor as a UNESCO World Heritage candidate despite Seoul's objections.  After weeks of deliberation, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced the plan to nominate the gold and silver mine on Sado Island for the 2023 heritage designation, considering its historical value.  The move furthe

North Korea on Friday confirmed it had test-fired an upgraded long-range cruise missile and a tactical guided missile this week, as its leader Kim Jong-un inspected a munitions factory for the first time in years.  The official Korean Central News Agency said it “conducted the test-firing for updating long-range cruise missile system and the test-fire for confirming the power of conventional warhead for surface-to-surface tactical guided missile” respectively on Tuesday and T

Schools in Korea are to administer rapid polymerase chain reaction and antigen testing methods to prevent the spread of COVID-19 among students and faculty.  “We are working on adding rapid PCR testing and rapid antigen testing methods at schools to prepare for the start of the new semester in March,” minister Yoo Eun-hye said at a meeting held at the Korea Institute of Educational Facility Safety on Thursday. For boarding schools, students are to be required to undergo rapi

A local environmental group is calling for justice after three roadside trees were allegedly killed by poisoning in Seoul last July near a new drive-through outlet of Starbucks. The Korea Federation for Environmental Movements’ Seoul Branch on Thursday held a press conference at the site, decrying the state prosecution’s decision not to press charges against the person who admitted to having mistakenly poured pesticides.  “The (accused) has already admitted to spilling

Ruling party presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung and his main opposition rival Yoon Suk-yeol are in a dead heat at 35 percent support each, a poll showed Friday. Lee of the liberal Democratic Party (DP) gained 1 percentage point from a Jan. 18-20 survey, while Yoon of the conservative People Power Party (PPP) gained 2 points, according to the Gallup Korea poll of 1,000 adults conducted from Tuesday to Thursday. Ahn Cheol-soo, the presidential candidate of the minor opposition People's Party,

President Moon Jae-in on Friday thanked Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev for last year's return of the remains of a revered Korean independence fighter as they exchanged letters to mark the 30th anniversary of establishing diplomatic ties. In August last year, the remains of Hong Beom-do, one of the most revered Korean independence fighters, were laid to rest at Daejeon National Cemetery, after being returned from Kazakhstan. Hong is a historic and highly symbolic figure in Korea's fight

Japan is in "final consultations" internally to press ahead with a plan to recommend a local gold and silver mine as a candidate for UNESCO world heritage despite South Korea's strong opposition, according to a news report Friday. The Japanese government is nearing a decision to recommend the Sado mine in Niigata Prefecture, where thousands of Koreans were forced into hard labor during the 1910-45 colonization of the peninsula, as a candidate for the 2023 world heritage site, just day