India is set to create a defense attache to Korea in September, Indian Ambassador Vishnu Prakash said Tuesday.“In September our full-fledged defense attach is being set up here as a part of the embassy,” said Prakash.The announcement comes after Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh discussed greater defense cooperation measures with President Lee Myung-bak in Seoul last March.The two had agreed to establish a military attache at the Indian Embassy this year but had not set a specific time.Accord

The foreign ministry has suspended a senior diplomat in Auckland from regular duties for alleged ethical lapses, a ministry official said Saturday.   The consul general in Auckland, whose name was withheld, was called home on June 15 after being accused of engaging in a scuffle with a fellow Korean official posted in New Zealand and sexually harassing female embassy staff.   The ministry will hold

Korea will set up an aid fund worth US$1 million to support development projects in five Southeast Asian countries, a foreign ministry official said Saturday.The fund, the amount of which will be gradually increased, will be run separately from South Korea's bilateral official development assistance to Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, he said.The official said the deal was reached in Phnom Pen

KABUL, Afghanistan -- A suicide bomber blew himself up Saturday in a wedding hall in northern Afghanistan, killing more than 20 people including a well-known commander in an attack that deals a setback to efforts to unify the nation's ethnic factions, Afghan officials said.Ahmad Khan Samangani, an ethnic Uzbek who is also a member of parliament, was welcoming guests to his daughter's wedding when

TEGUCIGALPA (AFP) --  A journalist has been shot dead inHonduras, in the 21st deadly attack on the media in the violence-wracked Central American country in the past three years, a press watchdog said Friday.Adonis Felipe Bueso Gutierrez, 24, was leaving an Internet cafe in the northern city of Villanueva with two cousins on July 8 when he was shot, said Longino Becerra of the Committee for Freedo

South Korea intends to consider using the term "sex slaves" to describe women who were forced to serve in Japanese military brothels in World War II, Seoul's top diplomat said Friday.South Korean victims have long been euphemistically called "comfort woman."South Korea is "willing to consider" changing the wording to sex slaves, South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan said in a parliamentary s

South Korea is considering withdrawing at least some of its troops protecting aid workers in Afghanistan, government officials said Thursday.One official said the mission for the unit, called "Ashena," will be over at the end of this year, and other nations are also set to withdraw their forces from the war-ravaged country."We're looking into ways to pull out Ashena forces over several phases," th

PHNOM PENH (Yonhap News) -- South Korea will soon open a diplomatic mission dedicated to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Jakarta this year, as Asia's fourth-largest economy seeks to deepen economic ties with the 10-member regional bloc, Seoul officials said Wednesday.Vice Foreign Minister Kim Sung-han and foreign ministers of Southeast Asian nations pledged to work closely together t

Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan appeared before parliament Wednesday for questioning over the government’s mishandling of an unprecedented military pact with Japan.Kim’s appearance came at the first foreign affairs committee meeting of the new National Assembly, indicating the urgency of justifying an intelligence-sharing agreement with the country’s former colonial ruler.A public uproar over the Cabinet’s covert approval of the deal last month forced Seoul to abruptly postpone the accord’s signi

Kathleen Stephens, an iconic figure in recent South Korea-U.S. ties, emphasized Wednesday that Washington's alliances with Seoul and Tokyo are not a zero-sum game.Japan's gain does not have to be Korea's loss, or vice versa, she said.She dismissed a view that the U.S. is sandwiched between Japan, apparently seeking to expand the role of its self-defense forces, and South Korea, which remains wary of Japan's possible return to military imperialism."I think what has held true for a long time is st

The Japanese government has ordered its diplomats in the U.S. to step up efforts to block the erection of monuments here for Korean women forced to serve as sex slaves for Japan's imperialist troops during World War II, a source said Tuesday.Japan's foreign ministry has "directed its Consul General in New York to actively protest monuments to comfort women being erected by Korean-American groups h