Kwon Hyuk-soo, 64, was appointed as the new CEO of Korea Coal Corp.According to the state-run coal mine operator, Kwon, who joined Korea Coal Corp. in 1975, served as a vice president between 2006 and 2008, and then worked for state-run Kangwon Land Corp. as an outside director. Industry watchers said the biggest task ahead of Kwon was to develop a restructuring plan to lower the company’s debt level. Korea Coal Corp. gained the poorest score in the 2013 financial standing evaluation of 22 state

When Simon Winchester wrote his travelogue “Korea ― A Walk through the Land of Miracles” in 1988, he was retracing the steps of Hendrick Hamel, a Dutchman who became one of the first Westerners in Korea when he was shipwrecked on Jejudo Island in the 1600s.Now that path has been trodden again, this time by New Zealand photographer Blair Kitchener, who has made a photo booklet of his journey, called “Korea from the Road.”The route starts on Jejudo Island and winds up the western side of the penin

Seoul Players will be holding its third annual 10-Minute Play Festival starting Friday, with 16 plays by expats and overseas writers.Eight 10-minute-long plays will be performed on Friday and Saturday at Spazio Luce in Itaewon, with the audience voting for the best four on both days.Those eight will go through to the final the following Saturday, when the audience will choose the winning play.The plays were chosen in early summer after about eight months of receiving submissions. Seoul Players t

About 50 equestrians kicked off a cross-country horseback ride from Jejudo Island to Seoul on Monday in a bid to promote equestrianism.Organized by a national association to promote the horse industry and a local club of horse riders, the journey started at Jeju Race Park on the southern island of Jejudo and will end at Seoul Race Park in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi Province, the equestrian ground nearest to the nation’s capital, on Oct. 3.The 11-day tour will mobilize about 60 horses for 490 kilometers

The race for the leadership of the country’s largest Buddhist order has intensified with the incumbent chief slamming the current election system. Ven. Jaseung, the current leader of the Jogye Order, on Monday said he did not support the current election system. “I think the leaders should be recommended for the position by a unanimous recommendation,” he said as he announced his platform in Seoul. “But if that is not feasible in real life, I think we should adopt a direct election system, where

The Kokdu Museum in Seoul will be promoting Korea’s traditional wooden figurine culture overseas with a touring exhibition across Europe, the museum announced Tuesday. Collections of various kkokdu from the museum will be on display in Germany, Hungary, Belgium and France starting Thursday until April of next year. The Kokdu Museum is dedicated to the time-honored funeral rituals of kkokdu, which are small figurines carved from pine wood that were traditionally used during funeral practices duri

MILAN (AP) ― Without entering the debate over climate change, Milan fashion designers are engaging in some serious season-bending.Though this week’s fashion previews are for summer 2014, designers ― without claiming to have any weather crystal ball ― have dotted the runways with furs, boots and leather. The biggest cross-seasonal indulgences are fur stoles, tops and Prada even had a summer fur coat. Boots were summer cuts, with open toes, and leather jackets in some cases was perforated or inter

Oakwood Premier Coex Center, the leading serviced residence in Seoul, has embarked on a renovation project to offer a more guest-friendly experience 11 years after its opening. The 20 billion won ($18 million) renovation, which started in March, is transforming the classical interior of its 280 residences into a more chic and modern design that allows international travelers to stay comfortably in style. It is expected to be completed by October 2015.  Oakwood Premier Coex Center has undergone t

Kim Hoon, among the first generation of abstract expressionists in Korea, died after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. He was 89. Kim led the development of Korean modern art by opening the Modern Painting Exhibition in 1954 and forming the Korean Contemporary Printmakers Association in the late 1960s. His contemporaries include Park Soo-keun, Kim Whanki and Chang Ucchin. He was among the first Korean artists to be invited for an exhibition in New York in 1958, along with Kim Whanki and Pa

Lee Choung-bum, founder of the Junghae Welfare Association in Seoul, received a friendship medal from the Vietnamese government on Saturday for promoting bilateral relations between South Korea and Vietnam, the association said. The medal is conferred to a foreigner or a group of foreigners who have contributed greatly to friendship between the two countries.  The 57-year-old attorney and other like-minded Koreans opened Junghae Vocational School, the predecessor of Thu Duc College of Technology

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s wife Akie Abe recently posted a Facebook message hoping for the restoration of strained relations between South Korea and Japan.According to the Asahi Shimbun and reports in other media on Monday, the 51-year-old wife of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe disclosed in the post that she attended the Korea Japan Festival 2013, one of Japan’s largest events for cultural exchanges between the two countries, at Hibiya Park in Tokyo on Saturday.It also showed a photo her jo