A South Korean national has died in a gunfight with police in Cebu, the Philippines, while allegedly robbing a house with two other Korean companions, local news outlets reported Thursday. The 47-year-old deceased, surnamed Choi, was robbing a house in a luxury neighborhood in Cebu at around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday (local time), with two other South Korean nationals, both surnamed Kim, according to the media reports. The suspects reportedly threatened the owner of the house, who is also a South Korean

The leader of a trainee doctors' group said Thursday there is "no future for South Korea's medical community" after his meeting with President Yoon Suk Yeol over the government's push to increase medical school admissions. Park Dan, the head of an emergency committee at the Korea Intern Resident Association, wrote such a short message in his social media post after he met with Yoon for 2 hours and 20 minutes at the presidential office to discuss the standoff between the

South Korea is poised to chair a UN Security Council meeting on cybersecurity on Thursday to shed light on the repercussions of cyber threats and malicious cyber activities, including North Korea's sanctions-busting maneuvers in cyberspace, on international peace and security. The chairing of South Korea's first Arria-formula meeting — an informal gathering convened by a Security Council member or members — represents a significant milestone for Korea since assuming its pos

President Yoon Suk Yeol ordered South Korean government ministries to explore ways to help South Korean families hire foreign students and marriage migrants as domestic helpers, doubling down on a troubled program designed to address the country's low fertility rate. Conservatives such as Yoon and Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon have proposed hiring foreign nannies at below minimum wage for some time, but faced difficulties in putting the plan into action. Presiding over a meeting at his office to discus

Negative campaigning, distrust of politicians in polarized landscape could turn voters in their 20s, 30s away from polls

President Yoon Suk Yeol said Thursday that he would respect junior doctors’ position on the medical student quota expansion plan when discussing the matter with the medical community in the future, his office said, after he met with the head of the group. Yoon met with Park Dan, the head of the Korean Intern Resident Association, two days after he had offered to talk with the trainee doctors, saying he was willing to hear their voices. At the meeting held at the presidential office lasting

South Korean Ambassador to the UN Hwang Joon-kook stated that children in North Korea face grave human rights abuses, including receiving the death penalty for distributing South Korean dramas, during a UN Security Council meeting at UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday. During the UNSC Briefing on Children and Armed Conflict, Hwang mentioned that children in North Korea face “egregious human rights violations,” despite North Korea being a signatory country to the Convention on t

The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency on Thursday said it would secure some 7.23 million doses of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines for winter this year for individuals at a higher risk of developing the illness as variants of the virus continue to pose a risk to public health. Additionally, the government has decided to convert a portion of homegrown COVID-19 vaccines into NovaVax’s synthetic antigen vaccine, totaling between 300,000 to 500,000 doses. The synthetic antigen vaccine ha

Starting in late April, students from schools that operate morning exercise classes will be provided with free breakfast, according to the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education on Thursday. Launched in October last year, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education has initiated morning physical education activities to revitalize student exercise. Some 573 schools currently holding morning workout sessions that apply for the breakfast plan will benefit from the project. Elementary schools will be

Over 15% of Korean women in 20s look slim, but have high body fat and low muscle mass

Early voting for next week's parliamentary elections will kick off Friday for a two-day run, the election watchdog said. Eligible voters will be able to cast ballots at 3,565 polling stations nationwide from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. during the two-day period, according to the National Election Commission. The NEC said that thorough preparations will be made to ensure voters can cast their votes with confidence in the fairness of the process, particularly in light of the recent discovery of spy cameras a

President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will discuss an array of issues, including North Korean threats and the two countries' trilateral cooperation with South Korea, during their summit next week, a White House official said Wednesday. The two leaders are set to hold the summit on April 10 as Washington and Tokyo are stepping up defense cooperation amid growing security uncertainties stemming from North Korea's evolving military threats, China's growing assertiveness and

The number of marriages between South Koreans and foreign national spouses rose more than 18 percent in 2023, according to the data from Statistics Korea. The number of international marriages fell sharply to some 15,300 cases in 2020 from the previous year's 23,600 and further to about 13,000 the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But the figure bounced back to over 17,000 in 2022 and further to nearly 20,000 last year. Vietnamese women took up the largest share of all wives of

Russia's foreign ministry on Wednesday criticized South Korea's decision to impose sanctions on Russian ships and others, and vowed to take actions in response to the "unfriendly step." On Tuesday, South Korea imposed sanctions on two Russian individuals and their companies involved in the illegal sending of North Korean IT workers overseas as well as two Russian vessels involved in shipping containers of military supplies between Pyongyang and Moscow. "The introduction

The chief of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization said Wednesday leaders of South Korea and three other nations in the Indo-Pacific region were invited to the upcoming summit scheduled in July in Washington. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said South Korea was invited to the NATO summit for the third year as one of the non-NATO partners in the Indo-Pacific region, which include Japan, Australia and New Zealand. "I welcome the fact that I have now invited for the third time the hea