A vice culture minister offered to resign Tuesday over suspicions of document forgery, the culture ministry said.The resignation, if accepted, comes only six months after Park Jong-gil, the vice minister in charge of sports at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, assumed the post in March.The move came after local media raised suspicions that he forged a public document in the process of handing over the ownership of a shooting range in Seoul's western residential area to his wife."I'm r

A former vice commerce minister has been indicted on charges of accepting bribes in return for favoring a local builder in its bid to win a nuclear reactor contract, prosecutors said Tuesday.Park Young-june allegedly received 50 million won (US$46,099) in March 2010 from a broker in exchange for peddling his influence for Hankook Jungsoo Industries Co., a local water treatment firm, in its bid to take part in the government's project to build nuclear reactors in the United Arab Emirate (UAE).Sou

The family of disgraced former President Chun Doo-hwan pledged Tuesday to pay off a huge amount of unpaid fines, making a public apology for "causing public concern."In 1997, the nation's top court convicted the former president of mutiny and treason and ordered him to return to state coffers around 220 billion won ($202.15 million) he illegally received in bribes during his iron-fisted rule. Chun has yet to pay some 167.2 billion won he owes. Chun seized power through a coup in 1979 and ruled u

The number of suicides among the youth in South Korea has increased by 57 percent since 2001, data showed Tuesday, growing at a faster pace than that of adults. The number of suicides per 100,000 people aged 10 to 19 rose 57.2 percent to 5.58 in 2011 from 3.19 in 2001, according to the data by the state-run Korea Health Promotion Foundation (KHPF) on the occasion of World Suicide Prevention Day, which falls on Sept. 10. The suicide rate for adults in the 20-64 age group increased 50.5 percent fr

How often are major crimes committed in South Korea? Police data shows that one violent crime occurs every 54 seconds. The National Police Agency released a report titled “Occurrence of the Five Major Crimes,” which said that the number of serious crimes -- murder, robbery, rape, theft and battery -- between January and July this year was 339,186. During the first half of the year, 545 murders were committed -- or once every nine hours, 20 minutes and 24 seconds.A robbery took place once every s

Song Young-keun, a lawmaker in the ruling Saenuri Party, proposed a revision of health and medical laws to identify soldiers and officers at high risk of suicide based on regular monitoring of their mental health.The proposal came as a growing number of soldiers are found to be struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts. The Ministry of National Defense conducted a survey of 1,310 soldiers serving in the military from September last year through May this year; 9.3 percent said they have ex

A group of parents on Monday protested the recent relocation of the Seongnam branch of the Suwon Probation Office in front of its new office in Bundang-gu, Gyeonggi Province. They claimed that the facility’s “sneaky move” to a highly populated area exposes children to crime.The Parents’ Committee for the Relocation of the Seongnam Probation Office held a sit-in demonstration in front of the building in Seohyeon-dong where the center was relocated last Wednesday. The protest started Thursday, a d

A sexual offense was reported every 25 minutes in South Korea in the first seven months of 2013, data showed Monday, ringing alarm bells over the safety of those vulnerable to sex crimes. According to the data by the National Police Agency and submitted to Rep. Kim Hyun of the main opposition Democratic Party, a total of 12,234 cases of rape and other types of sexual harassment were reported from January to July this year, which means an incident occurred every 25 minutes. The so-called crime wa

The 6th annual Social Innovation eXchange Summer School 2013 will be held in Seoul starting Monday to discuss ways to promote sustainable city development, a city official said. Under the theme “Reshaping our Cities and Making them Thrive,” 300 participants from 20 countries will share ideas about five main issues including urban regeneration, “smart cities” and tasks to bring sustainable city innovation. Paul Carttar, former U.S. Social Innovation Fund director, and Geoff Mulgan, chief of the U

The average annual income of new college graduates at big firms reached 37.12 million won ($34,000) this year, according to data by online recruiting agency JobKorea.The starting pay for entry-level workers at 167 large Korean firms grew by 7.3 percent from 34.59 million won last year, the biggest increase since the 2007-2010 global financial crisis, the statistics showed.By industry, workers in the shipbuilding sector were the highest earners, receiving an average annual pay of 41.32 million wo

The heavy spending on free-school meal services to all primary and secondary students is causing a decrease in educational support for children from lower-income families, government data showed on Sunday.The Ministry of Education compiled the overall budget of 17 provincial and municipal education offices across the country. According to the report, the total expenditure on educational support to primary and secondary students has increased by 504 billion won ($462 million) to 3.184 trillion wo