Purchases to be finalized before year is over, according to top officials

Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae on Thursday continued to emphasize the importance of prosecutorial reform as public opinion leans against her in her battle with Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-youl. On Thursday Choo wrote a lengthy message on her Facebook account, accusing public prosecutors of wielding unchecked power and resisting reform to serve their own interests. “The prosecutors’ office failed to differentiate between prosecutorial independence and abusing prosecutorial power

Korea's budget for patriots and veterans rose 2.7 percent on-year to 5.8 trillion won ($5.29 billion) in 2021, the veterans affairs ministry said Thursday. The amount approved by the National Assembly the previous day is slightly higher than the 5.79 trillion won the government requested, as the budget for subsidies to veterans of the 1950-53 Korean War and the families of patriots who fought against the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule rose during a parliamentary review, according to the ministr

A provincial government in central South Korea said Thursday it has decided to retain the statues of former Presidents Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo at a local park, dismissing a civic group's request for their removal. The government of North Chungcheong Province announced the decision to keep intact the controversial statues of Chun and Roh installed at the Cheongnamdae Presidential Villa, a lakeside park formerly used by presidents as their summer retreat, in the province's capital of Cheong

The historic peak could be 51.851 million in Nov. 2019

Prosecutors have indicted the leader of an anti-North Korea leaflet campaign for alleged assault against journalists, officials said Thursday. Park Sang-hak, 52, the head of Fighters for a Free North Korea, was charged on Nov. 25 with beating and throwing bricks at producers and crew from the broadcaster SBS on June 23. They visited his home in southern Seoul to interview him about the leafleting campaign but are said to have sustained injuries from his attack. The North Korean defector is als

Tens of thousands of college hopefuls sat the national college entrance exam Thursday, which could determine not only which universities they will attend, but many aspects of their future. The relentless resurgence of the COVID-19 outbreak brought changes to this year’s College Scholastic Aptitude Test, better known as the Suneung here, but some things have stayed the same. The usual scenes of crowds cheering in front of testing centers were nowhere to be seen Thursday morning, with st

The unification ministry's budget for next year has been set at about 1.5 trillion won ($1.34 billion), including a new fund to build an artificial intelligence and big data program to analyze North Korea, officials said Thursday. Of the total 1.474 trillion-won budget, 1.245 trillion won ($1.12 billion) was set aside for the inter-Korean cooperation fund, a 3.3 percent increase from this year, according to a statement released by the ministry. The ministry also introduced a budget of 10.4 bil

Second Vice Foreign Minister Lee Tae-ho will depart for Vietnam on Thursday for bilateral talks and a multilateral business forum with the Southeast Asian partners in the Mekong region, the foreign ministry said. During the three-day trip, Lee will attend the South Korea-Mekong Business Forum, an annual conference consisting of Korea and the five countries near the Mekong River -- Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand, the ministry said in a release. The meeting will be held via video

President Moon Jae-in has emphasized the importance of "procedural justification and fairness" in deciding whether to discipline South Korea's top prosecutor over his alleged wrongdoings, Cheong Wa Dae said Thursday. With regard to the operation of a related disciplinary committee against Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-youl, Moon said, "Procedural justification and fairness are very important," according to Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Kang Min-seok. The president pointed out the

 North Korean hackers have attempted a cyberattack on local pharmaceutical companies developing COVID-19 vaccines and treatments in recent weeks, international media reported Wednesday. 　 　 The Wall Street Journal said a North Korean-linked group, known as “Kimsuky,” has tried to break into six companies since August: US-based Johnson & Johnson and Novavax, British drugmaker AstraZeneca, and South Korea-based Genexine, Shin Poong Pharmaceutical and Celltrion.  　 Reute

The government will pay some 90,000 visiting care workers 500,000 won ($456) each and will also pay for essential workers, such as street cleaners and delivery workers, to undergo health screening under next year’s budget plan. Of the state budget for 2021, which the National Assembly passed into law Wednesday, 35.65 trillion won is to be executed by the Ministry of Employment and Labor. The parliament added some 167.9 billion won to the government’s initial budget for the ministry