Richard Betts skeptical of President Moon Jae-in’s offer of talks in return for freeze in North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests

South Korean President Moon Jae-in is set to meet his US counterpart Donald Trump this week with the meeting expected to set the tone for the future of the alliance amid escalating North Korean threats and growing geopolitical uncertainties. The new South Korean president will hold the two-day talks in Washington on Thursday and Friday (US time). He will head for the United States on Wednesday for his first-ever summit with a foreign leader.  This composite image shows South Korean President Moo

A group of North Korean taekwondo officials and athletes arrived in South Korea on Friday for soon-to-be historic performances at the world championships.Amid much fanfare at Gimpo International Airport in Seoul, the International Taekwondo Federation delegation of 36, led by its president Ri Yong-son, arrived south of the tense border via Beijing. Of those 36, 32 are North Koreans. Their flight was delayed by more than an hour due to inclement weather. Officials and athletes of the North Korea-

The lone North Korean member of the International Olympic Committee on Friday kept mum on potential co-hosting of next year's Winter Olympics with South Korea.Chang Ung arrived in South Korea to attend the World Taekwondo Federation World Taekwondo Championships starting Saturday in Muju, 240 kilometers south of Seoul. Chang traveled with officials and athletes from the North-led International Taekwondo Federation. The ITF practitioners will have a performance during the WTF event's opening cere

President Moon Jae-in on Thursday urged China to do more to rid North Korea of nuclear weapons, noting the communist state may acquire nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile in “the not too distant future.”“I believe China is making efforts to stop North Korea from making additional provocations, yet there are no tangible results as of yet,” the new South Korean president was quoted as saying in an interview with Reuters.“China is North Korea’s only ally and China is the country that

South Korea's parliament on Thursday passed a resolution calling for the reunions of families separated across the inter-Korean border in time for Liberation Day in August.The reunions of families, mostly divided since the 1950-53 Korean War, have not been held since October 2015 amid heightened tensions caused by Pyongyang's unceasing provocations, including two nuclear tests last year. Lawmakers attend a parliamentary plenary session at the National Assembly in Seoul on June 22, 2017. (Yonhap)

South Korea's vice unification minister on Wednesday met Japan's top envoy to Seoul to discuss the security situation on the Korean Peninsula and ways to strengthen cooperation, government officials said.Chun Hae-sung and Amb. Yasumasa Nagamine exchanged views over North Korea's nuclear issue and bilateral matters, according to the Ministry of Unification. Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-sung (left) and Japanese Ambassador to Seoul Yasumasa Nagamine (right) on June 21, 2017. (Ministry of Unif

A pro-North Korean newspaper in Japan on Wednesday condemned President Moon Jae-in for suggesting that Seoul is willing to hold unconditional talks if the North stops its provocative acts.The Chosun Sinbo described Moon as a "spokesman" for US President Donald Trump, claiming that the South is joining the bandwagon of Washington's hostile policy toward Pyongyang. (Yonhap)Moon made an offer for talks in his speech to mark the 17th anniversary of an inter-Korean summit held on June 15, 2000."(Nort

South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha and her Japanese counterpart agreed on the need to cooperate in North Korean issues in a telephone conversation, Seoul’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Wednesday. Kang and Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida spoke over the phone, during which the Japanese top diplomat congratulated Kang on her inauguration earlier this week, according to the official. According to Seoul’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the two ministers discussed pending issues in

LOS ANGELES -- The South Korean Consulate General in Los Angeles on Tuesday asked the local police authorities to arrest suspects who robbed two South Korean women as soon as possible, the consulate general said.Consul General Lee Key-cheol visited the Best Western Hotel in Placentia, California, where the two women -- a mother and daughter -- were robbed and the mother was beaten and left unconscious on Friday, before meeting with Placentia Police Chief Darin Lenyi to convey the South Korean go

The US Senate has scheduled a hearing that is expected to focus on the death of Otto Warmbier, an American college student who was detained in North Korea for more than a year, its website showed Wednesday.Warmbier, 22, died Monday, days after returning home in a coma following 17 months of captivity in the North for stealing a political propaganda poster from a hotel in Pyongyang. Otto Warmbier is on trial at a court in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang in this photo released by the North`s

South Korea voiced strong protests Wednesday against Japan's latest claims to its easternmost islets of Dokdo in an education manual.The foreign ministry also said that it called in Katsuro Kitagawa, a minister for political affairs at the Japanese embassy, to lodge complaints about what it sees as "repeated" and "unjustified" territorial claims."We strongly protest Japan's repeated and unjustified claims to our own territory, Dokdo, and demand its immediate withdrawal," the ministry said in a s