Controversy has arisen over whether visiting Seoul's popular nightlife district Itaewon to celebrate Halloween this year is acceptable, as the one-year anniversary of the crowd crush that took the lives of 159 mostly young people approaches. On Sunday, an online community post posed the question: "Is going to Itaewon this Halloween a thoughtless act?" The post presented two options -- "It's thoughtless" and "No problem at all" -- soon sparking fervent disc

By Yoo Hee-dong “Your task is not to foresee the future, but to enable it.” This is the message imparted by a Berber monarch in North Africa to his generals in "Wisdom of the Sands," a posthumous novel by the French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupery, best known for writing "The Little Prince." The monarch’s sharp admonition serves as a warning to the generals who were trapped in their attempts to predict the future by dwelling on history and causal relationshi

Legislation to freeze scammers' assets before a court decision still pending

An endangered sea turtle was found dead in seas near Jeju Island on Saturday, with a fishhook lodged in its front flipper, the Coast Guard reported. The Seogwipo Coast Guard Station said Monday that it located the dead body of a green sea turtle, a globally endangered species, in waters off Beophwan Port in the city of Seogwipo on Jeju Island. The 60-centimeter-long turtle had a fishhook stuck in its right front flipper and was estimated to have been dead at least for 20 days, considering the

Tensions are rising over the potential for a strike by Seoul Metro workers, as labor and management negotiations remain at an impasse. Voting on a November strike began Thursday, with results to be announced Monday. Earlier, Seoul Metro, which operates Seoul Subway Line Nos. 1 to 8 and partially operates Line No. 9, conducted 10 rounds of negotiations with a collective negotiating team representing workers, since the first meeting on July 11, but all discussions eventually collapsed. On Oct. 4,

President to announce quota hikes this week amid doctor shortages

Last year's deadly crowd crush at Itaewon, Seoul claimed more than lives. Recent data showed 1,316 firemen dispatched at the scene are still suffering from the psychological impact of the incident. According to the National Fire Agency data revealed by Rep. Oh Young-hwan of the main opposition Democratic Party, the rescue workers are receiving treatment for various side effects with relation to the tragedy. The deadly incident occurred Oct. 29, 2022 when the crowd became concentrated in a small

South Korea has joined a key donor group of the International Committee of the Red Cross for the first time after making major contributions last year, the humanitarian organization said Sunday. The country was recently included in the ICRC's 2023 Donor Support Group, which consists of donors contributing more than 10 million Swiss francs ($11 million) a year, after it contributed 10.5 million Swiss francs to the ICRC last year, according to the ICRC's office in Seoul. Other than South

South Korea is witnessing a surge in sexual assault cases on subway trains, with 784 incidents reported from January to August 2023 alone, according to data from the police and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport. The data, made public by Rep. Oh Young-hwan of the Democratic Party of Korea, shows a growing trend of assaults that coincides with a post-pandemic surge in public transit usage. The numbers, which include 529 cases of groping or unwanted contact and 255 cases of illici

A South Korean lawmaker on Friday criticized a government-funded research and development institution under the Ministry of Education for distorting explanations of Korean history and culture on its official website, demanding immediate correction. A report released by Rep. Chung Kyung-hee of the ruling party, who is also a member of the National Assembly’s education committee, showed that the Academy of Korean Studies has been labeling kimchi as “pao cai” -- a pickled vegetabl

The Seoul Metropolitan Government announced Thursday that it will implement a system that alerts authorities of overcrowded areas. The city government’s new safety plan comes nearly a year after the deadly Halloween crowd crush that killed 159 people in the neighborhood of Itaewon in 2022, and is intended to prevent similar accidents from occurring in the future. The city government stated that it will implement a system that automatically counts the number of people shown on surveillance

The city of Seoul said Thursday that it will add over 2,500 new trash bins on the streets by 2025. The difficulty to dispose of trash in public spaces has been among the most common complaints from foreign visitors to the capital, as well as residents. Across Seoul, a city of some 10 million residents, there are currently fewer than 5,000 trash cans. Public trash cans disappeared en masse from the streets of Seoul and elsewhere across the country following the 1995 introduction of a pay-as-you-t

Over 200 convicted sex offenders live with another offender under the same roof in South Korea, government data showed, sparking public safety concerns about their potential risk of reoffending. According to data from the South Korean government’s sex offender registration database, 222 convicted sex offenders are living together at 90 locations nationwide, averaging nearly 2.5 offenders per residence. The information was disclosed in a press release by Rep. Lee Hyoung-seok of the Democrat

South Korea's on-year employment growth accelerated for the second consecutive month in September, but jobs in the manufacturing sector fell by the most in five months amid an economic slowdown, data showed Friday. The number of employed people came to 28.69 million last month, up around 309,000 from a year earlier, or 1.1 percent, according to the data compiled by Statistics Korea. Hiring has logged on-year growth since March 2021, and it is the first time in three months that the country

South Korean singer-songwriter Nam Tae-hyun appeared as a witness at a parliamentary audit of the Health Ministry at the National Assembly on Thursday, calling for increased government efforts to help individuals recover from drug dependence and eradicate such illicit substances. Nam, who was indicted on charges of allegedly purchasing and administering methamphetamine with an acquaintance last year, stressed the importance of rehab programs that provide a path to a drug-free state to help in th