A compromise has been reached between the ruling Saenuri Party and main opposition Democratic United Party on the issue of a parliamentary investigation into Ssangyong Motor Co., allowing the extraordinary session of the National Assembly to convene on Monday.Despite the tentative peace between the two main political parties, the issue continues to divide the country’s political arena. Under Thursday’s agreement, the DUP and the Saenuri Party formed a six-member negotiation group that will opera

The successful launch on Wednesday of the Korea Space Launch Vehicle-1, or the Naro, has brought South Korea, as Education, Science and Technology Minister Lee Joo-ho put it, a “step forward” in advancing its space technology.This was Korea’s latest and third launch of a rocket carrying a science satellite into space.Experts, however, said the mission to see large economic returns in space development was only half-complete, given that the Naro was a “joint-venture” rocket with key engine techno

Samsung Electronics came under fire for its clumsy response to a toxic gas leak in its semiconductor line, which killed one subcontract worker and injured four others on Monday.The world’s largest technology company was accused of failing to take proper safety measures and even attempting to conceal the incident to minimize damage to its reputation.The plant is located less than 4 kilometers from Dongtan New Town in Hwaseong City and Suwon City, where 1.3 million residents live in both areas.  T

For any reigning monarch, stumbling off the throne is painful. It’s expected to be the same for Apple Inc., the king of electronics and smartphones, which recently forfeited the crown as the world’s most valuable company. ExxonMobil has now taken over that spot as Apple has lost some $247 billion in shareholder wealth compared to its high, which pundits note exceeds the value of IBM, worth $232 billion. Last week, following its earnings announcement -- which disappointed investors despite being

Putting aside the concerns over his administrative capacity, President-elect Park Geun-hye’s choice of presidential transition team leader, Kim Yong-joon, as her first prime minister looks to be heading into all-too-familiar territory.Lest her appointee get caught up in the political scrutiny by the opposition bloc, Park emphasized Thursday that her choice was based on Kim’s judicial integrity as a former Constitutional Court chief.But, as admirable as his career has been ― becoming the country’

President Lee Myung-bak was dealt a another blow on Thursday as his elder brother and a former aide were convicted of taking illegal funds from failing saving banks. A lower court sentenced his brother Lee Sang-deuk, 72, a former Saenuri Party lawmaker, to two years in prison and fined him 750 million won ($702,000). He was arrested in 2012 for allegedly receiving hundreds of millions of won from two financial institutions and a business group from 2007 to 2011.The banks were at risk of being sh

The police announced on Tuesday that 10 officials at CJ CheilJedang, a chaebol manufacturer of food and medicine, have allegedly given illegal kickbacks worth approximately 4.5 billion won ($4.2 million) to more than 200 doctors over two years from May 2000. The kickbacks were allegedly offered in exchange for prescribing its product and were the form of lending the company credit cards to doctors. Some of the doctors used the company credit cards to purchase furniture and other commodities for

New Eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem may well be the ultimate compromise candidate.Elected to head the group of eurozone finance ministers Monday, the Dutch finance minister has sided with Germany and other northern eurozone states who insist on austerity for countries needing bailouts. He is also a social democrat like the government in France, the EU’s other major power player.But perhaps the key factor driving his acceptability is his novelty ― Dijsselbloem has headed the Dutch finance min

South Korea’s top speed skater Lee Sang-hwa is getting faster, breaking national and world records in the space of 24 hours.Lee won the Speed Skating World Cup race in Calgary, Canada, on Sunday in 36.80 seconds in the 500 meters, taking 0.14 seconds off the previous record set by Yu Jing of China last January. A day earlier, she broke the national record with 36.99 seconds, becoming the first Korean female to break the 37-second barrier. Her record-breaking performance adds to her sweep of all

“The Board of Audit and Inspection should be audited and inspected first,” said a TV talk show commentator on Friday, one day after the state agency unveiled the result of its inquiry of the four-river restoration project.The BAI called President Lee Myung-bak’s pet project of damming and dredging “seriously flawed.” Poor design left dams with feeble base structures that could cost hundreds of billions of won each year in maintenance, and blocked water flow that could deteriorate water quality a

A court’s ruling on the Taean oil spill on Wednesday is likely to rekindle controversy as its assessment of financial damages fell short of expectations. The Seosan Branch of the Daejeon District Court ordered a 734 billion won ($694 million) compensation payout to victims of the country’s worst oil spill in Taean, South Chungcheong Province, after five years of legal disputes.About 128,000 people including residents, fishing and tourism business operators and local government offices sought 4.2

The man tapped by President Lee Myung-bak to head the nation’s highest court is proving himself to be a walking encyclopedia of ethical deprivation. Lee Dong-heub, who was nominated by the president in early January to be the chief justice of the Constitutional Court, faces a series of allegations ranging from unlawful real estate transactions to backroom dealings with powerful corporations. Records indicate that Lee registered his residence at an address in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, in 1995,

The 787 Dreamliner is Boeing’s newest and most sophisticated passenger jet. It is the world’s first passenger jet built mainly from lightweight carbon-plastic materials, while the use of a lithium-ion battery to start the auxiliary power unit is also unprecedented. The innovative technologies cut fuel costs largely by about a fifth. Airline companies worldwide have ordered more than 800 of the jets, which have a price of $207 million. But the 787 has been hit by technical and electric malfunctio

The sudden resignation by one of President-elect Park Geun-hye’s top security and deplomacy aides from her transition team is sparking speculation about the reasons, ranging from a policy rift or personal irregularities to dismissal for an information leak.The takeover team confirmed Sunday that Choi Dae-seok, a key architect of Park’s policy to engage North Korea, quit the subcommittee on defense, unification and foreign affairs the previous day.Neither gave the reason of his departure. Specula

A dreadful, if not downright scary, scenario is the end of free content on the Internet. What if you had to pay a fee for each and every piece of digital content you browsed on the Web? What if there were no Wikipedia, and no free news feeds from tens of thousands of media outlets? Aaron Swartz, a pioneering programmer, envisioned a cyberspace where online content is freely available. But before his vision was realized in full, he tragically ended his life at the age of 26, U.S. authorities conf