The Planting Love Charity organization will hold a bazaar Wednesday to mark its 25th anniversary and raise funds for people with disabilities.The event will be held at the Grand Hyatt Regency Room in Seoul from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m, and funds will be used to lease a facility for vocational training and psychological treatment for disabled people in Korea. Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill and members of the Ambassador Spouses’ Association of Seoul will participate, selling the country’s traditional d

South Korea and China will hold a joint inspection of fishing boats operating in their shared waters in the Yellow Sea this week, a move aimed at reducing the number of Chinese ships fishing illegally in South Korean waters, the Seoul government said Sunday.The week-long joint inspection will begin Wednesday, according to the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries.The joint fishing area was set up under the countries' annual fisheries agreement signed in 2001 and is open to any ship from both countrie

South Korea said Sunday it has opened an interim diplomatic mission on a Navy destroyer in waters off the Gulf of Aden to help support the safety of Korean residents who opted to stay in conflict-hit Yemen.The Joint Chiefs of Staff said that an ad hoc diplomatic office was set up Friday (local time) on the warship named Wang Geon to support the remaining 23 Korean residents in Yemen following Seoul's recent evacuation of its people.It marked the first time that a Korean diplomatic mission was se

South Korea is closely watching Japan's plans to unveil its review of school textbooks and an annual diplomatic report as they are expected to contain Tokyo's repeated claim to South Korea's easternmost islets of Dokdo, officials said Sunday.Japan plans to unveil the results of an examination of textbooks for middle school students Monday and publish an annual report on its foreign policy and activities Tuesday, both of which are expected to contain Tokyo's territorial claim to Dokdo.Japan has l

WASHINGTON--The breakthrough nuclear deal with Iran has nothing to do with North Korea and does not change the communist nation's obligations to abandon its nuclear program, the State Department said Friday.   "These really are very different issues. What Iran chooses to do or not do doesn't have a lot of bearing on whether North Korea lives up to its international obligation," State Department acting spokeswoman Marie Harf said at a regular briefing.   On Thursday, six world powers and Iran ann

WASHINGTON--U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter will reiterate Washington's strong security commitment to South Korea when he travels to the Asian ally next week, the Pentagon announced Friday.   Carter is scheduled to visit South Korea on April 9-11 for his first face-to-face talks with South Korean Defense Minister Han Min-koo and other senior officials. He is expected to focus on how to strengthen joint defense capabilities against North Korea.   South Korea is the second leg of a two-nation

South Korea and the United States plan to hold high-level talks later this month to discuss ways to further boost coordination to deter and counter threats from North Korea, the defense ministry here said Friday.  The allies "are scheduled to hold the seventh round of the senior-level Korea-U.S. Integrated Defense Dialogue from April 14-15 in Washington," ministry vice spokesman Nah Seung-yong told reporters.  The upcoming session will be followed by the Defense Trilateral Talks among South Kore

The combination of South Korea's information-communication technology prowess and the United States' top-notch energy technologies would generate great synergy effects in developing future energy sources, a top South Korean energy official said Thursday.  Second Vice Energy Minister Moon Jae-do made the remark during an energy conference in Washington, saying energy-rich countries in the future will have "an abundant variety of energy solutions," not merely an "abundance of fossil fuels."  "From

The defense secretary of the United States will visit South Korea next week for talks on pending security issues including how to counter North Korea's threats, Seoul's defense ministry said Friday.  During his three-day visit starting April 9, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter "is scheduled to meet with South Korea's Defense Minister Han Min-koo to discuss key security issues including how to strengthen joint deterrence against North Korea's nuclear and missiles threat," the ministry said in a

Nancy Pelosi, the U.S. House minority leader, called on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Thursday to apologize for the sexual slavery of Korean and other Asian women during World War II."We have been clear about what we'd like to hear about comfort women," Pelosi told reporters when asked about her view on Abe's planned congressional speech in Washington later this month. "I hope that a statement will be made to free (Japanese) people from this burden of the issue of comfort women."She made th

South Korea vowed a stern response Wednesday to Japan's claim to Seoul's easternmost islets of Dokdo, as Japan will reportedly publish a diplomatic white paper containing the claim.Japan has long declared sovereignty over the Dokdo islets, which lie closer to South Korea than Japan in waters between the two countries, in one of the thorniest diplomatic issues between the two countries.Japan's foreign ministry once again made the claim in its draft for the 2015 white paper, according to Japan's K

Another three South Koreans were evacuated from Yemen by plane on Tuesday as security concerns have heightened following airstrikes against a militant rebel group there, Seoul's foreign ministry said.The foreign ministry said that the three Korean residents in Yemen's capital Sanaa departed for Ethiopia on a U.N. plane earlier in the day following the evacuation of 10 Koreans made on Saturday.Two diplomats will be re-located to an interim diplomatic mission to be placed on a South Korean Navy de