[코리아헤럴드=김아린 기자] 윤석열 대통령과 조 바이든 미국 대통령이 공동주최하는 제2차 ‘민주주의 정상회의’를 계기로 열리는 의원 행사에 지성호 국민의힘 의원이 국회를 대표해 한국 의원으로 유일하게 참석한다. 23일 지성호 의원실에 따르면 지 의원은 민주주의 정상회의 기간 중인 28일 열리는 입법 세미나에 참석해 부패 방지를 주제로 연설을 할 예정이다. 이는 미 연방하원의 초당적 위원회인 ‘하원 민주주의 파트너십(House Democracy Partnership)’이 주최하는 세미나로, 2차 민주주의 정상회의 기간 의원들의 교류를 위해 열린다. 지 의원은 지난 2021년에도 화상으로 열린 민주주의 정상회의 입법 세미나에 참석해 북한 인권에 대한 국제사회의 관심과 지원을 촉구했다. 지 의원은 이날 코리아헤럴드에 “최선을 다할 생각”이라며 방미 기간 동안 오는 4월 예정된 윤 대통령의 국빈

North Korean defector-turned-lawmaker Rep. Ji Seong-ho is set to attend the upcoming House Democracy Partnership Summit for Democracy in Washington DC as the only South Korean lawmaker. According to Ji’s office on Wednesday, he has been invited to speak at the three-day summit program hosted by the House Democracy Partnership, a bipartisan Commission in the US House of Representatives. This is Ji’s second time attending the legislative track of the flagship summit convened by the Bid

The leader of South Korea’s opposition party was indicted on Wednesday for an array of corruption charges following a year-and-a-half-long investigation. According to the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office, the Democratic Party of Korea chairperson Rep. Lee Jae-myung will be sent to trial over his suspected role in a controversial real estate project during his time as the mayor of Seongnam, a city in Gyeonggi Province. Seoul prosecutors said in a release that as mayor, Lee l

The issues of “comfort women” -- South Korean women and girls who were forced into Japanese military brothels -- and the disputed islets of Dokdo were not discussed at President Yoon Suk Yeol’s talks with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, South Korea’s foreign minister said Tuesday. Speaking at the National Assembly foreign affairs committee’s plenary session, Minister of Foreign Affairs Park Jin reiterated that there was no mention of “comfort women” or Dok

The families of South Korean and Japanese victims of North Korea’s atrocities will meet in Japan next month and plan to work together to seek justice and reparations. The family of Lee Dae-jun, the South Korean government official slain by North Korean soldiers in 2020, will get together for the first time on April 8 with a support group for families of the Japanese abducted by North Korea in Tokyo, according to the Lee family’s lawyer Kim Ki-yun. Kim said in a phone call with The Ko

Philip Goldberg, US ambassador to South Korea, on Monday praised South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s efforts to restore ties with Japan. “We greatly value Korea’s commitment to promote trilateral and bilateral ties with Japan as witnessed in the ROK-Japan summit last week,” the ambassador said in the opening remarks ahead of his first meeting with the newly elected chair of the ruling People Power Party, Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon. “We admire the actions and statements th

North Korean propaganda outlet Tongil Voice on Sunday blasted South Korea’s ruling People Power Party over an elite defector-lawmaker being elected to a top leadership position in the party earlier this month. “The People Power Party appointed a runaway piece of trash to an important position as the frontman for anti-(North Korean)regime propaganda,” the North Korean outlet said in a statement. “Runaways to South Korea are trash who gave up on being humans. They betrayed

South Korea and Japan agreeing to mend ties at the Tokyo summit on Thursday does not build on what is embodied in the Kim-Obuchi declaration in 1998, according to former President Kim Dae-jung’s longtime aide Park Jie-won. Speaking to The Korea Herald on Saturday, Park said he “would not liken” the deal reached by South Korea and Japan in the recent summit to the declaration signed by South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi. Current South Ko

South Koreans who were mobilized for forced labor by Japanese colonizers filed an asset collection suit against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, rejecting the Yoon Suk Yeol administration's plan for locally funded compensation. The forced labor victims and their families, who won the damage suit against Mitsubishi at South Korea's top court in 2018, filed the suit to seize the Japanese company’s assets here, their lawyers said Thursday. The plaintiffs in the suit are one surviving vi

Four South Korean “unification activists” met with North Korean agents overseas over several years and helped them carry out intelligence activities and other missions, according to Seoul prosecutors. The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said in a release Wednesday afternoon that they indicted the four South Koreans for violating the laws on national security. The four formed an underground organization called the People’s Unification Front and together worked w

President Yoon Suk Yeol expressed deep concerns over the latest North Korean spying scandal during a dinner with the newly elected leaders of the ruling People Power Party on Monday, according to sources familiar with the matter Wednesday. Several ruling party sources said that the president was looking at the counter-North Korean meddling investigations seriously, referring in particular to the country’s main umbrella labor union -- the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions -- and a number

South Korea’s National Assembly Speaker Kim Jin-pyo met with Cardinal Lazzaro You Heung-sik on Monday at the residence of the South Korean ambassador to the Holy See. Kim’s visit to Italy comes as South Korea and the Holy See mark their 60th anniversary of forming diplomatic ties. In a release, the speaker’s office said that the Assembly speaker and the Cardinal Lazzaro discussed South Korea’s bid to host the next World Youth Day, a global event for young people organized

President Yoon Suk Yeol and the freshly elected chairperson of the ruling People Power Party, Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon, will meet twice a month. Yoon hosted Kim and the rest of the new People Power Party leadership for dinner at the presidential office in Yongsan, central Seoul, on Monday to celebrate their election at the party convention last week. Over the private dinner, the president and the party chairperson agreed to “meet regularly, about twice a month” for coordination on policies

A South Korean victim who was forced to work for a Japanese company during World War II said Monday she would refuse to accept locally funded compensation as proposed by the Yoon Suk Yeol administration. Testifying before the National Assembly foreign affairs committee, Yang Keum-duk, who was conscripted in her early teenage years to work at a plant in Japan’s Nagoya, said she would “never accept” South Korean money as compensation. “I would rather starve to death than re

Former National Intelligence Service director Suh Hoon pushed to repatriate two North Korean men who attempted to defect to the South in a bid to restore ties with Pyongyang, according to Seoul prosecutors. In an indictment released Thursday, prosecutors said that then-NIS director Suh ordered the two fishers from North Korea to be sent back, going against the policy that requires any decision to repatriate North Korean defectors to be backed by their intentions to return home. Prosecutors found