Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn on Tuesday said South Korea needs to beef up its military capability against Pyongyang's provocations, highlighting the necessity to deploy an advanced U.S. missile defense system in the country."North Korea's nuclear and missile provocations are escalating every day," Hwang said during the Cabinet meeting. "Even earlier this morning, Pyongyang fired three ballistic missiles."The missiles, presumed to be the Scud type, were launched from North Hwanghae Province and f

Korea's business community voiced hope Monday to expand economic partnerships with Mongolia and unite the Eurasian countries that have great potential to become a major global economic bloc."It is important for Eurasian countries to unite and connect to 'one continent' in order to develop Eurasia to the next level,"Park Yong-maan, president of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said at a business forum held in the Mongolian capital of Ulaanbaatar.Park noted that the Eurasian region has

A delegation of U.S. lawmakers visiting Seoul on Monday voiced their Congress' bipartisan support for cooperation with Korea in diverse areas including diplomacy and military affairs, the foreign ministry said.The delegation consisting of five lawmakers from the Senate and the House of Representatives held a breakfast meeting with Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Lim Sung-nam on Monday, according to the ministry. They all came from the Democratic Party.The ministry quoted Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI),

Korea has detected no signs of China's retaliatory movement in trade following Seoul's decision to deploy an advanced U.S. missile defense system, the trade ministry here said Monday.Seoul and Washington have decided to place the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense on Korean soil by 2017, saying that the deployment is aimed at countering North Korea's growing nuclear and missile threats.The issue has attracted opposition from China, which argues that the system could target neighboring countries

A senior Korean foreign ministry official visited the French Embassy in Seoul on Monday to pay tribute to the victims who were killed in last week's truck attack in Nice. Lim Sung-nam, the country's vice foreign minister, visited the embassy building located in western Seoul earlier in the day and extended condolences to the families of the victims.In a condolence book, he also wrote that Korea strongly supports the French government for its efforts to root out terrorism and that it will activel

One of Korea's state-run policy lenders announced Monday that it will provide $44.6 million to Mongolia to help upgrade its transport system.The Export-Import Bank of Korea said it will use $25 million of its economic development cooperation fund to replace aging buses with new ones in Mongolia and use another $19.6 million to build classrooms equipped with information and communications technology, and develop digital textbooks.The bank said its projects in Mongolia could help Korean firms expa

President Park Geun-hye on Monday renewed her call for national unity, urging citizens to join forces to ensure "watertight security" in the face of military threats posed by North Korea.In a video message to a ceremony marking Agent Orange Day, Park also expressed her appreciation to South Korea's Vietnam War veterans, many of whom have suffered from various illnesses due to their exposure to Agent Orange -- one of the defoliants that the U.S. military used to clear jungles and destroy communis

The decision to place the THAAD missile defense system in South Korea was taken as part of U.S. obligations to defend the Asian ally from the "exceptionally irresponsible" leader Kim Jong-un of North Korea, the CIA chief was quoted as saying."Clearly Kim Jong-un continues to go down a road that is exceptionally irresponsible as far as regional and global security, with his development of nuclear weapons, as well as ballistic missiles," CIA Director John Brennan said at a Brookings Institution di