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/ 11 February 2008
South Koreans mourned the loss of a 600-year-old building designated as the nation’s top cultural landmark, which collapsed in ruins early on Monday after catching fire. Police said they are investigating whether arson sparked the blaze at the Namdaemun gate in the heart of Seoul.
At least 30 people were killed on Monday and 10 others missing, feared dead, following a fierce blaze in a South Korean refrigerated warehouse, firefighters said. About 200 firefighters were sent into the basement of the two-storey building in Icheon, 80km south of Seoul, after the fire was put out, and recovered 30 bodies.
Reclusive North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has boasted of being an "internet expert," reports said on Saturday. The communist state keeps itself closed to the outside world to prevent so-called spiritual pollution from subverting its hard-line socialist system.
Nineteen newly freed South Korean hostages were set to fly out of the Afghan capital on Friday after a six-week kidnap drama, sources close to the arrangements said, after a deal critics fear could spur more abductions. Taliban insurgents freed the remaining seven South Korean Christian volunteers late on Thursday.