With Internet addiction emerging as a serious social issue, the Gongju National Hospital in South Chungcheong Province has opened a clinic dedicated to the treatment of those caught in the Web. This is the first time a national medical facility has launched anti-Internet addiction program here. The five-week session helps Internet addicts as with other patients using diverse medical aspects. Visit

Police arrested a male robber in 50s dressed as a woman to look less suspicious.The man reportedly wore a blouse, mini-skirt, and stockings while stealing 15kg of copper pipe last month. The man had also dyed his hair blond.According to police, the man was wearing his disguise when he was arrested.The man, surnamed Lee, who was released from prison last year, told the police, “I had no job and liv

Senior watchdog official indicted for briberyThe Prime Minister’s Office launched a task force on Monday to revamp the Financial Supervisory Service, under fire for poor oversight of seven troubled savings banks and corruption among its staff.Rim Chae-min, chief of staff to Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik, and Kim Jun-kyung, professor of the Korea Development Institute School of Public Policy and Man

Police were told Monday that there are situations when use of their weapons is appropriate. The National Police Agency Commissioner-General Cho Hyun-oh said in a meeting of high-ranking officials that police officers are encouraged to use weapons such as pistols, tear gas guns and taser guns in situations including those taking place in police stations, especially if they threaten the authority of

Looking at Internet cafes with many messages disparaging migrant workers based on their appearances and nationalities, Soe Moe Thu feels Korea still has a long way to go to establish a “mature” online culture.To maintain the country’s reputation for state-of-the-art Internet infrastructure, the Seoul government needs to make more efforts to ameliorate “online manners,” the 36-year-old Myanmarese s

Ministry seeks to dissuade patients from relying on top-tier hospitalsMore than 11 percent of Korea’s gross domestic product may be consumed by medical care in 2020, the Ministry of Health and Welfares said Monday, stressing the need to reform medical facilities nationwide. Snowballing medical expenses will burden the nation’s economy as the population ages, putting further pressure on the medical

Vocational high schools, mostly attended by students who intend to land jobs right after graduation, are losing their reputation as a sure path to employment. According to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, 463,888 students attended 692 vocational schools across the country in 2010, down from 578,865 students at 775 schools in 2001. While 54.7 percent of them got jobs after graduat

Hundreds of quake-stricken New Zealand households banned from flushing their toilets are now free to flush again. Some 40,000 homes in Christchurch have not been able to flush their toilets ever since a massive earthquake hit the nation in February. After two months of lavatory inconvenience, 860 households are now able to enjoy the benefits of flushing toilets once more. And 15,000 other househol

Prosecutors plan to call in around 30 employees of the country's financial watchdog this week to determine whether they intentionally relaxed their inspections of savings banks in return for bribes, sources said Sunday.   South Korea's top prosecutor has been widening its probe after the chief and other major shareholders at a suspended savings bank were found to have taken out illegal loans to lo

The number of North Koreans who have illegally migrated to Thailand has jumped 50-fold in the past six years and the Thai government is not happy about the sudden influx, a Thai newspaper reported last week. According to the Bangkok Post, an English newspaper in Thailand, the number of North Korean defectors to Thailand marked 2,482 in 2010, compared to 46 in 2004. From October until April, 899 No

Korean and U.S. ministers of education and science will hold talks to discuss ways to boost personnel and research exchanges, the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said Sunday. The talks will be the first of their kind in 30 years.Education and Science Minister Lee Ju-ho will visit Washington Tuesday for the talks with U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan from May 11-13. The two min

Retired provincial public service employees and politicians dominate management posts of local public firms, even though many have no corporate management experience, reports said.Chief executives or board chairmen in 95 of the 127 provincial public firms are former local civil servants or politicians, Yonhap news agency reported Sunday, citing the Ministry of Public Administration and Security.Ou

More and more high schools are selecting Chinese and Japanese as their second foreign languages, elbowing out French and German, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education said Sunday. Experts say practicality was the main drive, which may hurt the diversity of language education in the society. According to the education office, 196 out of 222 high schools in Seoul established Japanese classes an

With Parents’ Day coming up on May 8, most of Korean college students claimed that the best filial duty is lower tuition fees, according to a recent survey.Korean recruitment website Alba’s survey of some 1,323 university students on filial duty found that 46.7 percent were concerned about the price of their tuition fees. A further 15.3 percent responded that ‘having conversations’ was an importan

Nuclear safety authorities have approved the restart of the Gori-1 reactor in 24 days time, saying that their close inspection found no problems with the nation’s oldest reactor whose operation was halted due to a breakdown in one of its circuit breakers.They also called for emergency diesel generators and up-to-date hydrogen removal equipment to be installed at all of the nation’s 21 atomic power