Floods and landslides in North Korea have killed at least 151 people and left 29 missing, the Red Cross said, but the exact death toll could be much higher. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said floods also damaged 23 400 houses and rendered about 17 000 families homeless.
An estimated 60 000 North Koreans were left homeless and 30 000 hectares of farmland destroyed in recent flooding, according to a report from a United Nations relief agency on Monday. The United Nations World Food Programme said the worst-hit area last week was South Pyongan province in central North Korea.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has taken his former secretary as his new wife, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported on Sunday, citing sources familiar with the country. His wife Ko Yong-hi, the mother of two of Kim’s three sons, died of breast cancer in August 2004, the agency said.
Hundreds of people were dead or missing in North Korea after floods and landslides caused by heavy rains destroyed tens of thousands of houses and buildings, official media said on Friday. The rains, brought by a powerful typhoon which lashed the Korean peninsula on July 10, also damaged infrastructure and wrecked vast swathes of farmland.
South and North Korea on Thursday failed to agree on forming a unified team for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, officials said. Negotiators, led by sports and government officials from the two Koreas, held a day of discussions in the North Korean border town of Kaesong.
Negotiators from South and North Korea on Thursday launched talks on the prospect of forming of a unified team for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, officials said. The delegations, led by sports and government officials, were holding the one-day discussions in the North Korean border town of Kaesong, Korea Olympic Committee spokesperson Chun Moon-Young said.
North Korea’s air force on Friday accused a United States reconnaissance plane of intruding into its territorial waters to spy on strategic targets. Its Air Force Command said that a US RC-135 plane being refuelled in the air had spied on strategic targets for hours after flying over its waters off the north-east coast.
A Buddhist humanitarian aid group said on Friday that two troop trains packed with soldiers collided head-on in North Korea in April leaving more than 1 000 dead. The reported accident occurred in Kowon County in the remote and rugged north-eastern province of South Hamkyong on April 23 when a train’s brakes failed on a downhill stretch of track.
World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz on Wednesday congratulated African nations for launching a campaign against corruption but said rich countries have to cooperate to stamp out graft. In a speech to businessmen in Seoul, South Korea, Wolfowitz said rich countries are deeply implicated in corruption in Africa.
Michelle Wie, the hottest thing in women’s golf, will be the star draw at next week’s SK Telecom Open where she will bid to make her first halfway cut against men in eight appearances. The teen prodigy will be the third high profile woman golfer after Laura Davies of England and Japan’s Ai Miyazato to feature on the Asian Tour.
A South Korean protester attempted ritual suicide on Wednesday amid rising anger over Japan’s decision to launch an ocean survey in disputed waters between the two countries. Defying South Korean warnings, Tokyo dispatched two ships to the area claimed by both countries, renewing a feud tied to colonial history that has festered for decades.
United States software giant Microsoft on Monday appealed a ruling by South Korea’s anti-trust watchdog ordering it to strip popular software from its Windows operating systems. The appeal, lodged with the Seoul High Court, was aimed at ”seeking revocation” of South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission decision, the US firm said in a statement.
Samsung Electronics said on Wednesday it had developed a new data storage medium for mobile computers that enables users to process data much faster. The 32-gigabyte flash-based solid state disk can upload and download data quickly and quietly as it uses instantly-accessible static flash memory instead of the rotating discs found in hard drives.
Kim Hyo-bi doesn’t want her picture taken any more. Not after the 22-year-old student’s portrait wound up on a photo-sharing website last summer with her face coloured and distorted to make her look silly, titled alongside the original as ”Before and After”.
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/ 26 January 2006
A South Korean court on Thursday ordered two United States firms who manufactured Agent Orange to compensate thousands of South Korean Vietnam war veterans and their families. Dow Chemical and Monsanto were ordered to pay compensation to around 6 800 people in the first ruling in favour of sufferers from the effects of the defoliant.
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/ 12 January 2006
South Korea’s discredited cloning pioneer Hwang Woo-Suk on Thursday admitted his research into stem cells was faked but claimed he was the victim of a conspiracy — the latest twist in his stunning fall from grace. As the 52-year-old Hwang delivered a rambling apology to the media, criminal investigators raided his Seoul home and laboratory.
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/ 10 January 2006
Stem cell-therapy remains the best long-term hope for suffers of many incurable diseases despite the medical hoax perpetrated by South Korea’s researcher Hwang Woo-Suk, analysts said on Tuesday. A panel of experts found earlier on Tuesday that Hwang (52) had faked his entire body of research on stem cells which won him international acclaim and millions of dollars in funding.
Samsung’s market value surged past -billion on Wednesday as its stock jumped 5,1%, putting it among Asia’s largest companies by market capitalisation. The value of Samsung’s common stock rose to about 103-trillion won, or -billion, after its share price rose to a record high 699 000 won () on Wednesday.
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/ 29 December 2005
South and North Korea on Wednesday opened cross-border commercial communications lines for the first time since their division in 1945, officials said. The links were activated in a ceremony attended by North and South Korean government officials at an industrial zone in North Korea’s border city of Kaesong, the information ministry in Seoul said.
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/ 23 December 2005
While South Korea’s most famous scientist was resigning on Friday in scandal after his university said key research was faked, one of his greatest purported breakthroughs — Snuppy, an Afghan hound that researcher Hwang Woo-suk said he cloned — was cavorting in the snow on the grounds of Seoul National University’s animal hospital, where the dog is now kept.
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/ 20 December 2005
North Korea announced on Tuesday it intended to build an unspecified number of light-water reactors, saying the United States had reduced a 1994 deal on mothballing nuclear power plants to a ”dead document.” Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency said that the Stalinist regime would also resume the construction of two graphite moderated reactors frozen under the 1994 accord.
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/ 7 December 2005
South Korean regulators ruled on Wednesday that United States software giant Microsoft abused its market dominance and violated fair trade rules, fining the firm 33-billion won (-million). Microsoft, which denies any wrongdoing, was also ordered to remove parts of bundled software from its Windows operating system.
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/ 11 November 2005
United States software giant Microsoft said on Friday it has sealed a -million deal with South Korean internet portal Daum Communications to settle an anti-trust suit and put the two firms in a new partnership. The deal ends a legal battle with Daum, which had accused Microsoft of violating anti-trust rules.
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/ 1 November 2005
A series of explosions erupted on Tuesday after fire broke out in a highway tunnel south of Seoul, South Korea, and trapped military trucks carrying missile parts, firefighters said. Army trucks and about 50 other vehicles were trapped in the tunnel, but all occupants of the vehicles managed to escape unhurt.
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/ 28 September 2005
The Samsung group was in hot water on Wednesday after its patriarch was told to appear before South Korea’s Parliament. The parliamentary move coincided with an attack by President Roh Moo-Hyun, who charged the group is seeking to sidestep a government drive for corporate governance reform.
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/ 21 September 2005
In a second day of bluster following a landmark disarmament accord, North Korea on Wednesday threatened retaliation if the United States carries out what the North claims are plans to annihilate it in a nuclear attack. At six-nation talks in Beijing on Monday, North Korea had promised to give up its nuclear-weapons programme.
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/ 6 September 2005
South Korea has sent a letter of protest to North Korea after water released without warning from a dam north of the border flooded farmlands in the south, officials said on Tuesday. Seoul said the Imjin River burst its banks last week causing more than 80-million won in flood damage to South Korean farmers and fishermen.
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/ 4 September 2005
A United States lawmaker who just visited North Korea said on Sunday the North’s chief negotiator at nuclear disarmament talks told his delegation that the communist nation is continuing work to build reactors that could create material for atomic bombs.
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/ 2 September 2005
A team of South Korean scientists said on Friday that they had developed a new technology that could open the way to make new devices that could replace current silicon-based semiconductors. The team led by Kim Hyun-Tak of the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute said they had successfully manufactured what is known as a ”Mott insulator.”
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/ 1 September 2005
South Korea has expressed concern about a service offered by United States internet search company Google that shows satellite photos of sensitive facilities in the country, the president’s office said on Thursday. ”As [Google’s] satellite photos are beyond our control, we are in discussion with US authorities,” said presidential spokesperson Kim Man-Soo.
Samsung Electronics, South Korea’s top high-tech company, said on Tuesday its new graphics memory chip can transmit data equivalent to half a million pages of news print per second. The company said it will begin commercial production of the world’s fastest memory chip around the end of this year.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il said on Friday that the communist country was willing to return to nuclear disarmament talks in July if the United States ”recognises and respects” his country. He added, however, that his country needs ”further consultations with the United States.”