With unabated controversy over the defection of 12 North Korean restaurant workers, a UN rights envoy on Friday said the two Koreas should not “politicize” the issue and focus on fulfilling the needs of the women and their families. Tomas Ojea Quintana, the UN special rapporteur on North Korean human rights, said he has confirmed the 12 women were living freely here, though there were “inconsistencies” in accounts on their escape. Pyongyang claims that they were abducted by South Korean operativ

South Korea on Friday urged North Korea to accept its offer of military talks and move to defuse tension as its initial plan for dialogue fell apart in the face of Pyongyang’s aloofness. Seoul’s Ministry of National Defense has suggested the sides’ militaries hold talks Friday at the truce village of Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone for a halt in “all acts of hostility” starting Thursday, the 64th anniversary of the armistice agreement. But Pyongyang continued to remain silent, much to the di

As North Korea keeps its silence, South Korea’s proposal of military and humanitarian talks appears to be hanging in the balance on Thursday, deepening frustration among the Moon Jae-in administration officials. On Monday, Seoul suggested the two Koreas’ militaries hold talks on Friday at the truce village of Panmunjeom to discuss a halt in “all acts of hostility,” and their Red Cross officials meet and arrange a fresh round of reunions of separated families. Four days on, however, cross-border

More than 310,000 contract-based workers in the public sector are set to become permanent staff, the government said Thursday, setting in motion President Moon Jae-in’s key election pledge to stabilize employment. The plan was approved at a Cabinet meeting presided over by Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon. The scheme is designed to ease the criteria for full-time contracts to those who are expected to work for two years or longer, for at least nine months each year. Previously, it was eligible for peo

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has recently instructed diplomats to ramp up pressure on the US to foil its denuclearization demand and bring it to the negotiating table for a peace treaty, a news report said Wednesday. The young ruler sent an “urgent directive” to the country’s overseas diplomatic missions while the Group of 20 conference was taking place in Germany on July 7-8, Japan’s Asahi Shimbun reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with North Korea affairs. It called for an initiation

South Korea on Monday proposed military talks with the North in its first formal overture under President Moon Jae-in, who has called for a halt in hostilities and revival of cross-border communication. Seoul also offered a separate meeting between the two sides’ Red Cross officials to arrange a fresh round of reunions for families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War on the Chuseok holiday on Oct. 4, which is also the 10th anniversary of an inter-Korean peace declaration.  A separated family reu

The US Congress is pushing for a bill intended to block companies with North Korea ties from using the American financial system amid growing calls for secondary sanctions against entities in China and elsewhere that may assist with Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs. The bipartisan bill was introduced Thursday by Republican Senator Cory Gardner, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia. He has been urging the UN Security Council to impose a “complete economic emba

Defense Minister Song Young-moo took office Friday, vowing to rebuild the military and boost the country’s capabilities to better counter North Korea’s evolving threats through sweeping reform across barracks and industry. 　The 68-year-old was formally appointed by President Moon Jae-in a day earlier, following a month-long tug of war with opposition parties which had fiercely demurred at the nomination chiefly over his high-paying post-retirement stints at a law firm and defense contractor. Moo

The Foreign Ministry said Wednesday it has launched a probe into an allegation that a diplomat raped a young female contract worker while working with her at its embassy in Ethiopia. The woman was assaulted Saturday after becoming intoxicated during dinner with the diplomat and driven to his home in Addis Ababa, officials said. (Yonhap)Based on preliminary fact-finding questioning, a ministry official said the diplomat invited her to the dinner to “express gratitude” for her help at work and the

EXO (Yonhap)Ahead of its long-awaited comeback, EXO may have found some fans from perhaps the most unexpected place in the world: North Korea. Twitter Korea has unveiled a trend map that highlights all the areas around the globe where EXO fans are located. Of the some 11 million tweets posted between 8 a.m. on Sunday and 7:45 a.m. on Monday, 15 were found to have come from the isolated country.The cities the tweets were traced to include not only major cities like Pyongyang and Hamhung, South Ha

The number of North Koreans who have resettled in the South fell 20.8 percent in the first half from a year ago as Pyongyang tightens border controls, the Unification Ministry said Wednesday. A total of 593 North Koreans arrived in Seoul between January and June, down from 749 of the same period last year, ministry data shows, noting around 80 percent of them are women. This brings the cumulative sum of the defectors here to 30,805. A man hangs a ribbon wishing for a reunification of the two Kor

North Korea has yet to master re-entry technology for its recently tested intercontinental ballistic missile, though it has been making “faster-than-expected” progress, Seoul’s spy agency said Tuesday. At a closed-door parliamentary briefing, the National Intelligence Service assessed the launch on July 4 as an “initial-level” flight test using a fixed launcher, instead of a road-mobile system set for actual deployment, lawmakers said. Although the North is progressing faster than expected, it i

South Korea and five Central Asian countries on Monday launched an office in Seoul to facilitate diplomatic, business and people-to-people cooperation through high-level dialogue, exchanges of working-level public officials and cultural festivals. The Korea-Central Asia Cooperation Forum Secretariat is the first joint permanent body between the countries and represents progress they have made since the forum was incepted 10 years ago as a high-level consultative mechanism. South Korea and the fi

Kenneth Bae, 49, was locked up in North Korea for the longest period as a US citizen until then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper came to his rescue in November 2014. His appalling two years in the oppressive, isolated state have come to the fore once again in the wake of the tragic death of Otto Warmbier, a 22-year-old American student, shortly after his release from 17 months of detention. For Bae, Warmbier’s fate felt more brutal and unjust because unlike him, the youngster had

President Moon Jae-in’s vision to achieve peace on the Korean Peninsula faces a murky outlook, as North Korea is accelerating its pursuit to become a nuclear state, bolstered by its recent test of an intercontinental ballistic missile. The liberal president unveiled a “comprehensive approach” to tackle the issues of denuclearization and a peace treaty in parallel during an address in Berlin on Thursday. He said he is ready to meet with the North Korean leader “at any time and any place” and “pla