SEOUL, April 18 -- North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has attended the test launch of a new tactical guided weapon, the country’s KCNA news agency reported on Thursday. "Kim Jong Un, chairman of the Workers' Party of Korea, chairman of the State Affairs Commission of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and supreme commander of the Armed Forces of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, supervised and guided a test-fire of a new-type tactical guided weapon conducted by the Academy of Defence Science on Wednesday," the agency reported. "The design indexes of the tactical guided weapon whose advantages are appreciated for the peculiar mode of guiding flight and the load of a powerful warhead were perfectly verified at the test-fire conducted in various modes of firing at different targets," the report reads.The report does not reveal the exact type of the weapon. Reuters suggested that the term "tactical" implies a short-range weapon, as opposed to long-range ballistic missiles which the US and its allies see as a potential threat. According to the agency, it was the first weapons test officially announced by Pyongyang since the failed February 28 US-North Korean summit in Hanoi, Vietnam. When contacted by a TASS correspondent, a White House spokesperson said the US administration was not commenting on the report at present.
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SEOUL, March 21 -- South Korean police have arrested two men for using illegal spy cameras at motels to film and livestream videos of about 1,600 guests, raking in roughly 7 million won ($6,200) over the past three months, police said on Wednesday. Illicit filming has surged with growing use of mobile devices and South Korea’s pop music industry is reeling from a scandal over singer and television celebrity Jung Joon-young, accused of having shared videos he took secretly during sex. Police said the men, and two others, posed as customers to secretly install the cameras, obtained online from overseas, in 42 rooms at 30 places around the country since last August. The footage from the cameras, hidden in television boxes, sockets and hair dryer holders, was broadcast live on a website, police added. “It was the first case we caught where videos were broadcast live online,” they said in a statement. More than 6,600 cases of illicit filming were reported to police last year, or about a fifth of all sexual abuse cases investigated, up from 3.6 percent in 2008, prosecutors have said. Last year, tens of thousands of women took to the streets of Seoul, the capital, to protest against the practice and other sexual violence, and demanded stricter punishment. The law was amended last November to toughen penalties not only for illegal filming but also distributing images without consent, which could bring jail terms of up to five years or fines of up to 30 million won. The K-pop scandal also involved Lee Seung-hyun, a member of boy band BIGBANG who is better known by his stage name, Seungri. The 28-year-old is suspected of paying for prostitutes for foreign businessmen to drum up investment in his business. SEOUL, March 12 -- Eastar Jet, one of Korea’s budget carriers, will voluntarily suspend operation of its two Boeing 737 Max 8s due to rising safety concerns, the company said Tuesday. The low-cost carrier (LCC) said the planes will be grounded from Wednesday and said every effort will be made to minimize customer inconvenience. The company is the only airline in the country that operates the jet made by U.S. aerospace giant Boeing. It plans to add four additional B737 Max 8s to its fleet this year. The decision comes as the same plane operated by Ethiopian Airlines crashed on Sunday, with another that flew with Indonesia’s Lion Air having crashed a few months ago in October 2018. On Monday, the transport ministry sent a team of officials to Eastar Jet to conduct an emergency safety checkup on the pair of B737 Max 8s, but it didn’t issue a suspension order for the planes. The plane is more fuel efficient compared to other planes in the B737 family of planes. Local airlines such as Korean Air Lines, Jeju Air and T’way Air have also signed contracts to add the B737 Max 8 to their fleets in the coming years. SHANGHAI, January 3 -- China's domestic mobile phone brands topped 2018 sales lists, while the country's market recorded an overall sluggish year, data from Sino Market Research has shown. The data also showed that Honor, a smartphone brand owned by Huawei, overtook Apple's shipments to claim fourth spot with a 13 percent increase. Oppo registered a total shipment of 76.37 million units, beating all other brands, although this was a 6 percent year-on-year drop for the company. Oppo was followed by Vivo, Huawei, Honor and Apple in terms of aggregate sales. Over the past year, China's domestic mobile phone shipments reached 414 million units, dropping 15.6 percent year-on-year, said the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, a government think tank, in a report earlier this month. It further said that 4G mobile phones accounted for 94.5 percent of the shipments, with total sales of 391 million units, a 15.3 percent drop. Bucking the trend were Huawei, Honor, Vivo and Xiaomi, which all saw shipment growth in 2018, while the figures for Apple, Meizu and Samsung all dropped – 5 percent, 46 percent and 32 percent, respectively, Sino Market Research reported. The top-five mobile phone brands by sales value were Apple, Huawei, Oppo, Vivo and Honor, a separate list from the researching firm showed. SEOUL, January 25 -- South Korea will steer away from medal-driven elite sports and pursue healthy sports values in the wake of a series of allegations of sexual abuse in the country's competitive and hierarchical sports. "We will not associate sporting success with national pride," Do said at a briefing in Seoul, announcing measures to prevent physical abuse and sexual assault in sports. The ministry will launch a nationwide investigation with the state human rights commission and the gender ministry to uncover sexual assault and human rights abuse in sports. It will meet some 63,000 young athletes across the country during a year-long probe on the country's closed and competitive sports community. The South Korean sports community has been hit by sexual assault and harassment revelations by female athletes against coaches and powerful figures in sports. "The government will also review the current system that rewards athletes who won at Olympic Games or world championships to see whether it instigates too much competition for international sporting success," he said. South Korea offers prize money to athletes who win gold medals at international games and exempts male winners from the country's mandatory military service. "We can't push athletes to extreme competition under the goal of advancing national pride and let human rights violations happen in the course. We will work to change the way we view sports," said Do. The government will consider closing the junior national sports competition, which they say encourages fierce competition at a young age. "The way young athletes train at a young age and develop their skills has exposed them to violence in the competitive training environment. We will review the current system thoroughly," said Education Minister Yoo Eun-hye, at the briefing. The government will also seek to revise the sports law within the first half of this year to strengthen punishment for sexual assault offenders, as well as those who attempt to conceal sexual abuse. It will also conduct a probe on the faculty of the Korea National Sport University, the nation's prestigious school in sport, which has been mired in allegations of sexual abuse and assault involving coaches and athletes from the school. SEOUL, January 18 -- The increasingly erratic climate patterns are accelerating the melting of glaciers in the South Pole.
A joint research team from University of California, Irvine and Utrecht University found that as much as 252 billion tons of continental icebergs in the Antarctic are vanishing every year. The pace has made a six-fold increase over the past four decades (from 40 billion tons per year). The findings were published on Monday in an international science journal called Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS). Unlike the North Pole where all the ice is floating on the seas, the melting of Antarctic icebergs directly translates into a rise of sea levels in the South Pole. Experts are concerned that the sea levels could rise by more than five meters in the next couple of decades, which is fast becoming reality. Alarmed, scientists across the globe are scrambling to the South Pole for research. The International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration (ITGC), led by the United States, the United Kingdom, and South Korea, is launching a probe into the Thwaites Glacier in west Antarctica, which is disappearing most quickly among the glaciers in the South Pole. The goal of the investigation is to identify the remaining time for the glacier to melt away. The ITGC project has been chosen by the international scientific journal Nature as one of the research projects worth the most attention in the year of 2019. The American and British research teams launched explorations in October last year, and South Korea is joining forces with them late this year. The Korea Polar Research Institute (KOPRI) is planning to make a concentrated observation into the borders between the Thwaites Glacier and the seas by mobilizing the Korean RV Araon and unmanned submarines. The researchers will identify topographical and geological traits under the glacier through air radar monitoring and analyze the movement of the glacier and the adjacent waters by installing seismometers and GPS sensors onto the ice. The area near the Thwaites Glacier is susceptible to climate change as it is lower than the sea level by more than 500 meters, making itself exposed to warmer waters. The land is covered by glacier 2,500 meters thick, and the bottom of it adjoining the sea level, causing the ocean water to penetrate deep into the depth of the glacier. Consequently, the glacier takes the form of an ice shelf floating on the waters with its edge connected to the continent ice. If the endangered glaciers in west Antarctica vanish in their entirety within this century, the sea levels would rise by 57.2 meters globally. This will leave Seoul, a city at the altitude of 38 meters, fully inundated. With the research value of South Pole growing more than ever, an increasing number of countries are introducing large-sized icebreaking research vessels. China will introduce a polar icebreaker with 13,990 tons of displacement capacity called Xue Long 2 that can penetrate 1.5 meter-thick ice, and Australia will have a 25,500 ton-icebreaker named Nuyina that can break the ice 1.65 meters deep. The UK and Germany will have a new fleet of polar icebreakers go into commission in 2020 and 2023, respectively. South Korea pushed for a project to build the successor of the Aaron, an icebreaker that can break into the ice one meter deep with 7,500 tons of displacement capacity, but failed a preliminary feasibility study in May last year. SEOUL, January 12 -- Chinese President Xi Jinping is highly likely to visit North Korea in April, followed by a visit to South Korea in May, the Korean Herald reported, citing South Korea's ruling party leader. "It seems like Chinese President Xi Jinping is slated to visit North Korea in April, and there is a high possibility that he will visit South Korea in May," Democratic Party leader Lee Hae-chan was quoted as saying on Friday (Jan 11) during a meeting with new presidential chief of staff Noh Young-min upon his courtesy call on the National Assembly. "A summit between China and North Korea, followed by a second US-North Korea summit and inter-Korean summit will foster peace in North-east Asia," Lee said. Lee added the leaders of the countries appear likely to meet frequently in the first half of the year. He also said the path for inter-Korea economic exchanges and cooperation is now visible, which could revitalise the economy. Xi had met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Beijing this week, which was their fourth summit meeting, during the latter's four-day visit to the Chinese capital. China is considered the best buffer North Korea has against US pressure and sanctions as Kim prepares for a second meeting with Trump. He also consulted with Xi before and after his first meeting with Trump, which took place in Singapore in June. The June meeting produced a vaguely worded agreement to "work towards complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula" and "new" relations between North Korea and the United States, which have been adversaries for seven decades. But talks have since stalled over how to implement the Singapore deal. Washington wants North Korea to start dismantling its nuclear facilities and weapons, while the North has demanded that the United States first build trust with corresponding measures, starting with the easing of sanctions. When Xi met Kim on Tuesday, the Chinese leader urged North Korea and the United States to meet each other "in the middle" TOKYO, January 1 -- Japan seeks talks with South Korea over court decision on WWII forced labor. A South Korean court said on Wednesday it would freeze the local assets of a Japanese steel company involved in a compensation dispute with wartime Korean laborers, leading to a diplomatic spat between the two neighbors. Japan quickly called the asset seizure "extremely regrettable" and said Tokyo will push for talks with Seoul on the issue. In a landmark ruling in October, South Korea's top court ordered Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp to pay 100 million won ($88,000) each to four plaintiffs forced to work for the company when Japan colonized the Korean Peninsula during 1910-45. But the company had refused to follow that ruling, siding with Japan's long-held position that all colonial-era compensation issues were settled by a 1965 treaty that restored diplomatic relations between the two governments. Japanese officials said they could take the issue to the International Court of Justice. On Wednesday, the Daegu District Court's branch office in the southeastern city of Pohang said it had approved a request by lawyers for the plaintiffs to seize Korean assets held by the Japanese company as it was refusing to compensate the former laborers. The Japanese company holds 2.34 million shares, or around $9.7 million, in its joint venture in Pohang with South Korean steelmaker POSCO. In Tokyo, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that Japan has "grave concern over the development". Seoul's Foreign Ministry said it has no immediate comment on Suga's statement. SEOUL, January 8 -- Samsung Electronics has surprised the market today with an estimated 29% drop in quarterly profit. The company blamed weak chip demand in a rare commentary issued to "ease confusion" among investors already fretting about a global tech slowdown. The South Korean firm also said profit would remain subdued in the first quarter due to difficult conditions in memory chips. But it added that the market is likely to improve in the second half of the year as customers release new smartphones. Weaker earnings at the world's biggest maker of smartphones and semiconductors adds to worries for investors already on edge after Apple last week took the rare move of cutting its quarterly sales forecast, citing poor iPhone sales in China. China boasts the world's biggest smartphone market, but a slowing economy, exacerbated by a trade war with the US, has seen demand for gadgets drop across the tech sector. Growing support for domestic champions has also impacted foreign brands, with Samsung's market share falling to 0.9% from a high of 18.2% in 2013. But the South Korean firm's chips still power the handsets of most major makers, including Apple and China's market leader Huawei Technologies. Its memory and processor chips account for over three-quarters of overall profit and about 38% of sales. For October-December, Samsung estimated operating profit of 10.8 trillion won ($9.67 billion), missing the 13.2 trillion won average of 26 analyst estimates in an I/B/E/S Refinitiv poll. It also estimated an 11% fall in revenue at 59 trillion won. Samsung routinely releases estimated earnings figures before posting detailed results and elaboration toward the end of the month. For the just-ended quarter, however, it issued its first commentary since late 2014, when mobile phone profits dropped. It said weaker-than-expected demand from data centre customers adjusting inventories drove down chip prices and hurt earnings in the face of rising macro uncertainty. It did not disclose the customers or elaborate on the macro uncertainty. Data centre demand - mostly from the US - currently accounts for as much as nearly 30% of demand for Samsung's DRAM chips compared with 5% five years ago, analysts said. On the whole, analysts expect Samsung's profit to decline during 2019, with a slowing Chinese economy eroding demand. BEIJING, January 8 -- Kim Jong Un is visiting China from January 7 to 10. At the invitation of Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and Chinese president, Kim Jong Un, chairman of the Workers' Party of Korea and chairman of the State Affairs Commission of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, is visiting China, a spokesperson said on Tuesday. Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of Workers' Party of Korea, reported that Kim is accompanied by Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho and a senior party official charged with negotiations with the United States, Kim Yong Chol. South Korea hailed the visit, expressing hope that it would have a positive effect on denuclearization and peace process on the Korean Peninsula, the country’s Yonhap news agency reported. "The government expects that high-level exchanges between the North and China, including a meeting between Chairman Kim Jong-un and President Xi Jinping, will be able to contribute to the complete denuclearization and establishment of permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula," a foreign ministry official told the agency, adding it's the government's formal response. The diplomat added that his country would continue its efforts to foster the denuclearization process and will assist diplomatic activities involving Seoul and Pyongyang, with the participation of other regional powers. Meanwhile, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported that the leaders of China and North Korea were expected to meet in person during the visit. Chinese Foreign Ministry’s official spokesman Lu Kang said on January 3 that the top-level Chinese-North Korean meeting in 2019 may have a positive effect on peace and stability worldwide, and China expects it to be a success. A historic meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore on June 12, 2018, yielded a joint document where North Korea undertook a commitment to work towards denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in exchange for security guarantees from the United States. Besides, the US president vowed to stop holding joint military drills with South Korea near the North Korean border. SEOUL, January 2 -- Refuting Tokyo's claims in the ongoing military radar dispute, Seoul is calling for an apology for what it calls a Japanese aircraft’s threatening flight against a South Korean warship. In a text message sent to reporters on Wednesday, South Korea’s Defense Ministry expressed deep regret that Japan is repeating unilateral claims after releasing related video footage despite an agreement with Seoul to hold working-level discussions to establish facts. Reiterating its stance that the South Korean destroyer was conducting a normal rescue operation to help a drifting North Korean ship and did not lock its radar on a Japanese patrol aircraft, the ministry said the footage instead shows the aircraft making a low-altitude flight. It called on Japan to stop distorting facts and apologize for the aircraft's threatening flight while repeating that the two countries should continue working-level talks on the issue. Video footage @ Japan shows clip of alleged South Korea radar lock-on The North Korean leader acknowledges the two Koreas have escaped the danger of war and have “established ties of harmony and trust that are irreversible.". Kim regrets not being able to visit Seoul, whilst for the South Korean president, “There will be a lot of difficulties going forward. But our hearts will be opened to each other.” SEOUL, December 31 -- North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent a letter to South Korean President Moon Jae-in asking for more peace talks in the new year. Moon yesterday welcomed North Korea's renewed commitment to the denuclearisation of the peninsula, which could give new impetus to the stalled negotiations with the United States over Pyongyang’s nuclear programme. According to Moon, Kim has acknowledged that the two Koreas have escaped from the danger of war and “established ties of harmony and trust that are irreversible”. The North Korean leader, Moon added, “has expressed his willingness to actively carry out agreements reached at the inter-Korean summits and the US-North Korea summit”. “Chairman Kim said he wants to meet [with me] frequently in the new year again in order to discuss practical issues related with peace and prosperity and the issue of denuclearisation. I heartily welcome this.” Whilst the Office of the President did not fully disclose Kim’s letter, Moon’s spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom said that Kim expressed regret that he could not make a planned visit to Seoul, South Korea’s capital, by the end of December as the two leaders had agreed at their last summit in September in Pyongyang. In September, the Koreas agreed to a number of goodwill gestures to reduce their conventional military threat, such as removing mines and firearms from the border village of Panmunjom, destroying some front-line guard posts and creating buffer zones along their land and sea boundaries and a no-fly zone above the border. “Kim said the leaders by meeting three times in a single year and implementing bold measures to overcome the long period of conflict lifted our nation from military tension and war fears,” Moon’s spokesman noted. In addition, he leader expressed his willingness to “keep a close eye on the situation and expressed strong will to visit Seoul.” Still, “There will be a lot of difficulties going forward. But our hearts will be opened to each other depending on how much effort we make,” Moon said.
TOKYO, December 29 -- Japan released video footage on Friday to prove that a South Korean warship allegedly locked its fire-control radar onto a Japanese warplane off the country's northern coast, the latest move in an escalating row between the two Asian neighbours.
The Defense Ministry's just over 13-minute footage, filmed from the P-1 patrol aircraft and published on its website, contained Japanese crewmembers asking the destroyer for clarification but getting no response.
Japan alleged that last Friday a South Korean destroyer repeatedly locked its targeting radar on the Japanese aircraft inside of Japan's exclusive economic waters off the Noto Peninsula. A lock with a fire-control radar is considered a hostile act and only one step away from actual firing. Relations between Japan and South Korea have degraded to their worst in recent years over compensation issues related to Japanese atrocities such as sexual abuse of "comfort women'' and Korean forced labour during Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 through 1945. The radar flap has added to the strain.
"Korea South Naval Ship, Hull Number 971, this is Japan Navy. We observed that your FC antenna is directed to us. What is the purpose of your act, over?'' a crewmember asked the destroyer in English several times using three different frequencies but the destroyer remained silent. The voice grew slightly tense as the crew kept calling. The video starts showing the gray destroyer sailing near a North Korean vessel. About six minutes later, one of the crewmembers can be heard saying: "FC detected'' and that it was coming from the destroyer. Seoul has denied the allegation, saying its warship used an optical camera while rescuing a North Korean fishing boat in distress. Defense Minister Takeshi Iwaya told reporters earlier Friday that he decided to release the footage and data to let the people in and outside Japan know that the Japanese Self-Defense Force operated appropriately. "It is most important that an incident like this should never be repeated between Japan and South Korea,'' Iwaya said, adding that relations between the two sides are crucial for regional national security. "Even though difficult issues remain between Japan and South Korea,'' he said, "I hope to overcome those problems and push forward our mutual understanding and exchange between our two militaries.'' |
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