WASHINGTON -- US President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered an investigation into whether steel imports affect national security in a move seen as signaling tougher restrictions on foreign steel that could also affect South Korean steelmakers."Today, I'm directing the Department of Commerce to immediately prioritize the investigation ... into foreign steel arriving into our markets, and to submit a report on the effects of these foreign steel products on the national security of the United State

WASHINGTON -- China has put bombers on "high alert" in preparation for a potential contingency in neighboring North Korea, a US defense official was quoted as saying Thursday.CNN cited the unidentified official as saying that Chinese air force land-attack, cruise-missile-capable bombers were put "on high alert" on Wednesday.The official also said that the US has seen an extraordinary number of Chinese military aircraft being brought up to full readiness through intensified maintenance as part of

The UN Security Council on Thursday unanimously adopted a press statement strongly condemning North Korea's latest missile launch."The members of the Security Council expressed their utmost concern over the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's highly destabilizing behavior and flagrant and provocative defiance of the Security Council by conducting this ballistic-missile launch," the council said in the statement, referring to the April 15 launch.(Yonhap)The launch ended in failure as the miss

WASHINGTON -- US President Donald Trump will visit the Philippines and Vietnam in November for annual regional summits, Vice President Mike Pence said Thursday.Trump will visit the Philippines for a set of meetings hosted by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and Vietnam for a summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, Pence said during a visit to the ASEAN secretariat in Jakarta. US President Donald Trump (Yonhap)One of the ASEAN meetings, the East Asia Summit, is scheduled

South Korea will promote the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics to foreigners visiting state-run King Sejong Institutes set up overseas to teach the Korean language, a public foundation that manages the institutes said Thursday.The King Sejong Institute Foundation affiliated with the culture ministry said it will screen a promotional video for the PyeongChang Olympics in Korean cultural classes at 174 institutes in 58 countries around the world. This image shows the two PyeongChang Olympic mascots

South Korea and the United States completed the regulatory process needed for Seoul’s provision of a base site for a US missile defense battery, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday.A bilateral committee on the status of US Forces Korea approved the plan for land transfer, allowing the US military to begin work for the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system in the some 300,000-square-meter land in the southeastern county of Seongju. The land was formerly owned by a Lotte Group

MOKPO -- A probe to shed light on the exact cause of the tragic sinking of the Sewol ferry will begin late next month, a special fact-finding body said Thursday.The eight-member panel set up last month by special law aims to allow maritime experts and lawyers to determine why the 6,800 ton ship capsized in waters off the southwest coast in 2014. The sinking resulted in the deaths of 304 people, with the remains of nine still unaccounted for. (Yonhap)"We expect that the investigation will start a

Hyundai Motor Co. has lowered the prices of its i30 hatchback models to attract customers amid tougher competition from rivals, the carmaker said Thursday. Hyundai Motor has cut the mainstay hatchback's sticker price by 250,000 won to 1.25 million won ($219-$1,097) in the domestic market, South Korea's biggest carmaker by sales said in a statement.  Hyundai's i30 hatchback. (Hyundai Motor)The carmaker has also reduced the number of trims for the car from nine to five. It cut the trims for the 1.

The US Air Force dispatched a nuclear sniffer aircraft Thursday to the east of the Korean Peninsula amid the possibility of North Korea's imminent nuclear test, a government source said."The WC-135 Constant Phoenix, a special-purpose US plane, made an emergency sortie today over the East Sea," the source said, requesting anonymity.The US Air Force's WC-135 Constant Phoenix sniffer plane (Yonhap)Its mission is to collect samples from the atmosphere in order to detect and identity a nuclear explos

The top diplomats of South Korea and Tanzania will sit down together in Seoul next week to discuss bilateral collaboration on economic issues as well as the North Korean nuclear issue, the foreign ministry here said Thursday.The talks between Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se and his Tanzanian counterpart Augustine P. Mahiga are scheduled for Monday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. It will be their second meeting in about four months following one held on Dec. 7 in Ethiopia during a regional f

South Korean football icon Park Ji-sung said Thursday he hopes the national under-20 football team will create a "miracle" at the upcoming FIFA competition at home.South Korea will host the FIFA U-20 World Cup in six cities -- Cheonan, Daejeon, Incheon, Jeju, Jeonju and Suwon -- between May 20 and June 11. At the 24-team U-20 World Cup, host South Korea will face Argentina, England and Guinea in Group A.Park Ji-sung speaks before a match between South Korea and Brazil at the Suwon JS Cup interna

More than 100 South Korean and US warplanes have joined an annual combined defense exercise under way on the peninsula, South Korea's Air Force said Thursday.The Max Thunder training, which started on April 14 for a two-week run, also involves around 1,200 troops, including some American personnel stationed in Japan.South Korea has dispatched F-15K, KF-16, FA-50, F-4E and F-5 fighter jets, as well as C-130 cargo and E-737 airborne early warning and control aircraft. A F-16 fighter jet of the US

GYEONGSAN -- An unidentified armed man escaped with a sack of money after robbing a bank branch of the National Agricultural Cooperative Federation in the southeastern city of Gyeongsan on Thursday, police said. (Yonhap)Around 11:55 a.m., the burglar wearing a mask and toting a gun entered the branch and fired a shot, demanding that tellers at the branch of the cooperative, also known as Nonghyup, put money into a sack he had brought with him. He fled the scene on a bicycle after the tellers com

South Korea will hold an anti-piracy drill in waters off the southern coast ahead of the dispatch of a 4,500-ton destroyer to Somalia, the maritime ministry said Thursday. South Korea Navy's Daejoyoung destroyer. (Yonhap)Taking place on Friday, the one-day drill will involve the South Korean destroyer Daejoyoung, a 17,000-ton commercial vessel and 350 seamen and sailors, according to the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries.Next month, the warship will join the South Korean naval unit which has been

Rare is the pitcher who successfully makes it back from a shoulder operation. Even rarer is the one who bounces back from both a shoulder operation and an elbow procedure.That Ryu Hyun-jin of the Los Angeles Dodgers is pitching at all at the major league level, after missing the majority of the past two seasons with injuries, is no small accomplishment in and of itself. Whether he can continue on at the level, though, remains a big question mark, given his travails in his first three starts of t