South Korea's foreign ministry plans to hold a public hearing Thursday on ways to resolve the thorny issue of how to compensate victims of Japan's wartime forced labor during World War II in line with the Supreme Court's ruling. The hearing, co-organized by the ministry and Rep. Chung Jin-suk, head of the South Korea-Japan Parliamentarians' Union, is scheduled to be held at the National Assembly...

South Korea's finance ministry said Thursday owners of two homes will pay less taxes if they dispose of one of them during an extended period amid a slump in the home market. Under the plan, such homeowners will not be subject to heavier taxation if they offload one of the two homes within a three-year period, according to the Ministry of Economy and Finance. The ministry earlier extended the p...

South Korean stocks opened higher Thursday, taking a cue from overnight Wall Street gains on anticipation of slower inflation in the United States. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index had increased 6.24 points, or 0.26 percent, to 2,365.77 as of 9:15 a.m. Overnight, the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite added 1.76 percent, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 0.8 percent, amid ex...

Seoul shares ended higher Wednesday, extending their winning streak to a sixth day, with investors awaiting the release of the new US consumer price index for clues on the future of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy. The Korean won fell against the US dollar. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index added 8.22 points, or 0.35 percent, to close at 2,359.53 points. Trading volume was m...

Opposition leader Lee Jae-myung on Wednesday renewed his pledge not to give way against what he called the prosecution's "violent attempt to distort and fabricate," a day after he was questioned over bribery allegations. In a questioning that lasted roughly 12 hours, Lee, chairman of the main opposition Democratic Party, was grilled by prosecutors on Tuesday over allegations that the city govern...

Supporters of the ruling People Power Party picked former four-term lawmaker Na Kyung-won as their favorite for party leader, giving her almost twice as much support as the closest challenger, a poll showed Wednesday. In a poll of 1,020 voters conducted by Hangil Research from Saturday to Monday, 30.7 percent of PPP supporters said Na should be the next chair of the party. Rep. Kim Gi-hyeon was...

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo said he had expressed objections to a birth policy suggested by a presidential committee on low birthrates, as the committee's chief offered to resign after the suggestion ran afoul of the presidential office. Han made the remarks on Tuesday, the day after Na Kyung-won, a former four-term lawmaker of the ruling People Power Party, tendered her resignation as vice chai...

South Korea's new COVID-19 cases fell to the lowest Wednesday tally in 11 weeks, while imported cases remained high. The country reported 54,343 new COVID-19 infections, including 120 cases from overseas, bringing the total caseload to 29,654,090, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency said. The tally marked the lowest for any Wednesday since Oct. 26, when the country reported 40,816 n...

Players and coaching staff of the national baseball team for this year's World Baseball Classic will hold their first meeting next Monday in Seoul. The Korea Baseball Organization said Wednesday manager Lee Kang-chul and players currently training in South Korea will gather at a Seoul hotel for an orientation and a press conference. They will pick up their uniforms and go over tournament rules, ...

South Korea reported the largest job additions in more than 20 years in 2022, data showed Wednesday, as the country gradually returned to pre-pandemic normalcy. The number of employed people came to 28.08 million in 2022, up 816,000 from a year earlier, according to the data compiled by Statistics Korea. It marked the largest number since 2000, when the nation reported an on-year increase of 88...

Seoul shares opened higher Wednesday, tracking overnight gains on Wall Street, as investors expect the upcoming US consumer price index may provide signs of a slowdown in inflation. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index rose 15.24 points, or 0.65 percent, to 2,366.55 in the first 15 minutes of trading. Overnight, the Dow Jones Industrial Average moved up 0.6 percent to 33,704.1 points...

WASHINGTON-- The United States continues to keep a close watch on North Korea and others for possible use or proliferation of illegal chemical and biological weapons, a Pentagon spokesperson said Tuesday. Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder also said the US will take all necessary measures to hold any country accountable should they use or spread such weapons. "When it comes to chem-bio capabilities worldwide...

The former chairman of Ssangbangwool Group, who had fled the country in the wake of several high-profile corruption investigations, has been arrested in Thailand, according to legal sources Tuesday. According to the sources, Kim Seong-tae, the former chairman, was apprehended by local police at a golf club Tuesday evening, roughly eight months after he departed for Singapore ahead of a raid by t...

Seoul shares ended higher Tuesday, extending their winning streak to a fifth day despite concerns over the Federal Reserve's aggressive rate hikes following hawkish Fed officials' comments. The Korean won rose against the US dollar. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index added 1.12 points, or 0.05 percent, to close at 2,351.31 points. Trading volume was moderate at 351.76 million share...

South Korea posted the first current account deficit in three months in November as exports sharply dwindled amid growing worries over a global economic recession, central bank data showed Tuesday. The country's current account shortfall amounted to $620 million in November, swinging back from a surplus of $880 million a month earlier, according to the preliminary data from the Bank of Korea. I...