President Lee Myung-bak told the newly-elected leadership of the ruling Grand National Party over lunch on Wednesday that he will discuss with them before nominating the new justice minister and the prosecutor-general amid backlash from both ruling and opposition lawmakers against the president’s top candidate.During his first official meeting with the new GNP leader Hong Joon-pyo and other member

DP lawmakers eye GNP home turf; ruling party mulls replacing veteransParties are seeking to turn the table in next year’s general elections with a bold lineup of possible candidates as some veteran lawmakers gave up their candidacy or pledged to run in strategically important areas other than their home-turf constituencies.Rep. Kim Hyo-seuk, a third-term lawmaker of the main opposition Democratic

A consortium led by CJ Group, a South Korean food and entertainment conglomerate, said Monday that it has signed a contract to purchase a controlling 37.62 percent stake in Korea Express for 1.85 trillion won (US$1.75 billion).CJ Cheiljedang Corp. and CJ GLS Inc. will each pay 922.5 billion won to take over South Korea's largest logistics firm from two subsidiaries of cash-strapped Kumho Asiana Gr

The head coach for a local military football team has been arrested for allegedly taking cash from parents of a player involved in match fixing, the defense ministry said Monday.The bench boss for Sangju Sangmu Phoenix in the first-division K-League, named Lee, was arrested on charges of blackmail. The Sangju team is made up of professional players who have been conscripted to serve the mandatory

SEOUL (AFP) -- North Korea has agreed to hold talks with South Korea to settle a dispute over Seoul-owned buildings at a jointly run resort which have been seized by the communist country, officials said Monday.The communist North had set a deadline of Wednesday for final discussions about the properties at the Mount Kumgang resort, which is in North Korea and was supposed to have been a symbol of

The ruling Grand National Party, led by newly elected chairman Rep. Hong Joon-pyo, has announced a reformative, “people-friendly” stance.In the party workshop at the National Assembly on Sunday, the Supreme Council and the policy committee agreed almost unanimously to slash university tuition fees and reinforce regulations over conglomerates.The plan also included overturning additional corporate

The newly-elected chairperson of the ruling Grand National Party Rep. Hong Joon-pyo expressed concerns over the party’s recent outspoken comments on conglomerate policies.“The key point in backing small- and medium-sized businesses is to come up with active measures to help them, not to extort from large businesses,” Hong said in a radio interview on Wednesday.By this, he referred the party’s poli

Party to hold emergency meeting after court says voting rules invalidThe Grand National Party is in a state of confusion after a court unexpectedly invalidated its revised rule on its chairperson election scheduled for next Monday.The Seoul Southern District Court upheld the claim that the party’s revised internal constitution was unlawful and suspended its legal effect on Tuesday.The GNP revised

South Korean activists sent five anti-North Korean propaganda balloons across the inter-Korean border on Saturday from a western border resort in commemoration of the outbreak of the 1950-53 Korean War, their representatives said.About 10 activists, mostly North Korean defectors, released the propaganda balloons in Paju, north of Seoul, Saturday morning. The balloons carried about 100,000 leaflets