SANTIAGO ― With Korean pop culture fast spreading among young Chileans, the Korean Embassy in the Latin American country is setting its sights on student exchange programs as the focal point for its public diplomacy.Korea has been exploring ways to sustain the Korean Wave around the globe and to make the most of the knock-on effects on its national prestige and cooperation with partner countries. The exchange programs allow participants to better understand Korea and experience firsthand its cul

SANTIAGO/LIMA ― On a slow Wednesday afternoon, dozens of teenage girls straggled into a public park in Santiago, their T-shirts featuring TVXQ, JYJ, Super Junior and other Korean pop stars. Soon, music was turned up, and the group began to walk through the choreography. The practice goes on for about three hours, three days a week. The venue has also become a hot spot for youngsters to exchange the latest K-pop-related information and products. “We also carry out online campaigns to boost sales

The Israeli Embassy brought the story of the founding of the State of Israel, and the powerful immigration story it entailed, to Korea for the first time in a photo exhibition at Korea Foundation Cultural Center Gallery through Feb. 7.It is a story that Israeli Ambassador to Korea Tuvia Israeli knows all too well. He emigrated to Israel with his parents from Romania as a 7-year-old child in 1962.“We stayed in a transition camp, like many first arrivals,” Israeli said during the opening reception

Korea, Japan and China explored ways to enhance regional cooperation in trade, investment and people-to-people exchanges, especially in tourism, on the sidelines of a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Laos on Jan. 20. Secretary-General of the ASEAN-Korea Center Chung Hae-moon met with his counterparts Ma Mingqiang of the ASEAN-China Center and Yoshikuni Ohnishi of the ASEAN-Japan Center. The meeting marked the first such trilateral confab between the ASEAN centers of Japan

An international project started in 2010 to enhance mutual understanding between Korea and Southeast Asian countries has led to the creation of educational materials to promote the values of understanding, peace and human rights.Organizers from the Asia-Pacific Center of Education for International Understanding did this through the power of storytelling. “Telling tales from Southeast Asia and Korea” was launched this month.Teachers in East Asia can promote mutual understanding in English and ot

One of the first things Japanese Ambassador to Korea Bessho Koro noticed when he arrived in Korea about three months ago was the crowds routinely assembling outside his residence in the Seongbuk-dong neighborhood of Seoul ― gaggles of Japanese women aiming and clicking cameras.But, to his chagrin, they were not there to get a shot of him. They were snapping pictures of the house across the street of actor Bae Yong-jun of “Winter Sonata” fame, a TV drama that first aired in 2002.Bae is an example

Korea and China celebrated the 20th anniversary of diplomatic relations last year. As the Korean saying goes, a decade is enough to change even mountains and rivers. Accordingly, there have been enormous changes in Korea-China relations over the last two decades. Before the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1992, the Chinese said that running water carves a gulley. Today, there is not a mere gulley between our two countries but large paths via air and sea. In 2011, 6.68 million Koreans an

The Italian Culture Institute will bring award-winning pianist Christian Leotta to perform a recital dedicated to the sonatas of Beethoven at Ilshin Hall in Hannam-dong, Seoul, on Feb. 4. Leotta is renowned for his vast repertoire, and has received numerous accolades for being the youngest pianist since the youthful Daniel Barenboim to both perform and record the entire corpus of Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas.Leotta will perform Beethoven as part of an East Asia tour that includes stops in Osaka,

Cho Hae-hyeong, honorary consul to Iceland and dean of the corps of honorary consuls in Korea, explains what it takes to represent a foreign country here

Slovakia celebrated 20 years as an independent nation and 20 years of diplomatic relations with Korea in a reception at Seoul Millennium Hilton Hotel on Monday.Slovakia achieved independence on Jan. 1, 1993.“We Slovaks struggled for centuries for national existence and statehood,” Slovak Ambassador to Korea Dusan Bella said in a moving speech before assembled guests, government officials and foreign diplomats. “Jan. 1, 1993, symbolizes the birth of a sovereign Slovakia and is a starting point of