Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., a major shipyard in South Korea, said Monday its restructuring scheme is going smoothly, with its three offshore facilities to be delivered on time."We expect our business result to remain in positive terrain going forward as our restructuring plan is being implemented as promised, and ships and offshore facilities will be delivered as scheduled," the shipbuilder said in a statement.In the first half of the year, Daewoo Shipbuilding suffered a net lo

South Korea's transportation minister on Monday vowed stern measures against what he called an illegal strike by unionized cargo truck drivers while pledging to take available means to minimize the fallout on the local economy.The warning came hours after some 7,000 truckers began staging a walkout while demanding the withdrawal of a recent government plan on modernizing the country's shipping industry.Transport Minister Kang Ho-in asserted that the demand for the withdrawal of the government pl

Sales of cigarettes in South Korea edged up from a year earlier in the third quarter of this year despite the government-led anti-smoking campaign, government data showed Monday.South Korean smokers purchased 990 million packs of cigarettes during the July-September period, up 0.6 percent from 980 million sold a year earlier, according to the data compiled by the Ministry of Strategy and Finance.The quarterly figure, however, marked an 18-percent plunge from 1.2 billion packs sold over the same

The amount of payments made electronically hit a record quarterly high in the second quarter, central bank data showed Monday, in the latest sign that a growing number of South Koreans are using electronic means for financial transactions.The daily average amount of electronic financial transactions came to 322 billion won ($289 million) in the April-June period, up 7 percent from the previous quarter, according to the data from the Bank of Korea (BOK).The Q2 reading marks a slight decline from

South Korea's unification ministry said Monday it plans to hold its first policy meeting on North Korea's human rights with other ministries this week to discuss ways to get Pyongyang to change the way it treats people.Vice Unification Minister Kim Hyung-suk will host the consultations with senior officials from Seoul's foreign and justice ministries Tuesday to discuss Seoul's policy on North Korea's human rights.The move comes as a new law aimed at improving North Korea's dismal rights situatio

Foreign investors continued their net buying of South Korean stocks for the fourth straight month in September, raising their share ownership to a near record high, data showed Monday.Offshore investors bought a net 1.63 trillion won ($1.46 billion) worth of listed South Korean shares last month, marking the fourth consecutive month of net purchases, according to the data by the Financial Supervisory Service.Their cumulative net purchases reached 11.1 trillion won in the first nine months of the