Retired South Korean golf legend Pak Se-ri said Thursday hosting a US junior tournament has given her a valuable experience. The inaugural Se Ri Pak Junior Championship was staged at Butte Creek Country Club in Chico, California, from Monday to Thursday.Although the 39-year-old hosted a couple of South Korean events, the Se Ri Cup Junior Championship and Se Ri Pak Invitational on the Korea LPGA Tour -- this was her first tournament with the American Junior Golf Association.  Pak Se-ri (Yonhap)"A

Ryu Hyun-jin of the Los Angeles Dodgers has earned his fifth win of 2017 against the Pittsburgh Pirates.Ryu improved to 5-6 after allowing just one run across six innings in the Dodgers' 5-2 victory at PNC Park in Pittsburgh on Thursday (local time). He was lifted for pinch hitter Austin Barnes in the top seventh when the Dodgers were leading 3-1. It was Ryu's first victory since Aug. 6 when he pitched against the New York Mets. He had no-decisions in his last two outings. Ryu Hyun-jin (AP-Yonha

South Korea's key consumer sentiment index fell slightly in August from a month earlier due mainly to heightened tensions between North Korea and the United States, a central bank survey showed Friday.The composite consumer sentiment index for August came to 109.9, down from 111.2 a month earlier, according to the survey by the Bank of Korea. A reading above 100 means optimists outnumber pessimists.Tensions have spiked on the Korean Peninsula as North Korea and the United States exchanged bellic

South Korean biopharmaceutical firm Samsung Bioepis Co. said Friday it has won approval from European authorities for the sale of its biosimilar drug Imraldi.The European Commission accepted Samsung Bioepis' application to sell the biosimilar referencing AbbVie Inc.'s Humira, the company said in a regulatory filing. The drug treats various diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, and Crohn’s disease.With the approval, Imraldi can be sold in 28 EU member states as wel

North Korea on Friday accused China and Russia of currying favor with the United States, claiming they colluded with each other to distort the truth and churn out unjust sanctions against Pyongyang.The communist nation is up in arms about the US-led international sanctions for its nuclear and missile programs, most recently highlighted by the test-firing of two intercontinental ballistic missiles in July.Earlier this month, the UN Security Council voted unanimously to adopt another resolution ai

Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., a major shipyard here, said Friday that it has won a 215 billion-won ($191 million) deal to supply key parts for a submarine built by its local rival Hyundai Heavy Industries Co.Under the deal with Hyundai Heavy, Daewoo Shipbuilding will deliver the parts to its rival by 2021, it said.Hyundai Heavy is constructing the third 3,000-ton submarine as part of the Chang Bogo-III project in a deal with the Defense Acquisition Program Administration, the cou

The government's anti-smoking campaign, funded partly by increased revenue from a cigarette price hike, has not been effective, officials said Friday.Monthly cigarette sales in January 2015, when the price of cigarettes was raised 80 percent from 2,500 won ($2.21) to 4,500 won, were 295 million packs. Currently, monthly sales are close to300 million packs, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the National Assembly Budget Office.Part of the revenue from the hike cigarette price was

Samsung Electronics Co. on Friday kicked off preorders for the Galaxy Note 8 in a handful of countries, including the United States and Britain, ahead of the official release slated for Sept. 15.According to industry sources, the 64 gigabyte model of the Galaxy Note 8 is being sold for $929 in the US Including taxes, the price is expected to hover above $1,000. The device was selling for a higher price range in Canada and Australia.Preorders in South Korea are expected to begin Sept. 7. (Yonhap)

The South Korean market for so-called target date funds (TDFs) shot up this year from 2016 as investors are keen to prepare for post-retirement life amid low interest rates, a market tracker said Friday.According to fund researcher Zeroin, 37 TDF products with a net asset value of 1 billion won or more had a combined 378.7 billion won ($336 million) under their management as of Wednesday, more than seven times larger than the amount at the end of last year.TDFs are aimed at providing people with

A court in Seoul was to hand down its verdict on Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong on Friday in what is billed as the "trial of the century" that could have deep repercussions on the image of the global electronics giant and affect the fate of ousted former President Park Geun-hye.Prosecutors have demanded a 12-year jail term for Lee on charges that he offered or pledged 43.3 billion won ($38 million) at the request of Park to organizations under control of herlongtime friend and co

President Moon Jae-in may be the most powerful person in South Korea, but he apparently is not the most well-off person even among a handful of officials working at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae, a report showed Friday.According to the annual report from the Government Public Ethic Committee, the president had some 1.82 billion won ($1.61 million) in family assets that included a 322 million-won bank deposit held by his wife, Kim Jung-sook, and a 23 million-won deposit that belongs to hi

The amount of crowdfunding in South Korea shot up nearly 29 percent this year, data showed Friday, showing the platform growing as an effective financing option for startups.According to the data by the Korea Securities Depository, 106 companies raised a combined 14.2 billion won ($12.6 million) from 5,826 investors between February and August, up 29.1 percent from the same period a year earlier.The number of the firms involved represented a whopping 51.4 percent increase from the 70 a year earl

More than half of Americans disapprove of US President Donald Trump's approach to relations with North Korea, a survey showed Thursday.The survey commissioned by George Washington University found that 53 percent of Americans disagreed with Trump's way of handling the recalcitrant regime, while 43 percent approved.Early this month, Trump threatened to unleash "fire and fury" on North Korea if it continued to threaten the US or it allies.The regime in Pyongyang responded with threats to fire ball

A group of South Korean and American scientists have developed high-tech yarn that generates electricity, Seoul's ICT ministry said Friday, a finding that may one day lead to the development of smartphones and other devices that do not need batteries.The Ministry of Science and ICT said a joint international research team from Hanyang University in Seoul and the University of Texas at Dallas developed the yarn -- which is constructed from carbon nanotubes -- that can harvest energy when stretche

The United States should target more Chinese banks in its sanctions against North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, an expert said Thursday.Banks in North Korea's ally and major trading partner are the "source" of the nuclear problem, according to Anthony Ruggiero, a former Treasury and State Department official who now works as a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies."If the Chinese banks are not cooperating now, I think the next logical step will be going aft