Headlines, February 7, 2019

The Korean daily media headlines and humor

Thursday, February 7, 2019

Round-up of important news from major Korean dailies and from international media today

The Korea Post media (www.koreapost.com) in English, (www.koreapost.co.kr) in Korean.

Cheong Wa Dae welcomes 2nd summit between U.S., N. Korea

South Korea's presidential office on Feb. 6, 2019 welcomed the announcement by Washington confirming the second summit between the United States and North Korea. Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom said South Korea hopes the U.S. and North Korea can make substantial and concrete steps forward in Vietnam. Earlier, U.S. President Donald Trump announced in his State of the Union address that he will meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un from Feb. 27-28 in Vietnam for their second summit talks.

Samsung chief visits China during Lunar New Year's holiday

Samsung Electronics Co.'s Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong headed to China this week, apparently to inspect the construction site of the tech giant's new chip production facility, industry sources said on Feb. 6, 2019. The de facto head of the world's No. 1 semiconductor and smartphone producer left for China on Monday to check Samsung Electronics' business in the country, a source said.

Pompeo sees 'every opportunity' for N.K. denuclearization

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Feb. 6, 2019 that there is "every opportunity" that North Korea will dismantle its nuclear weapons program as promised. In an interview with Fox Business, Pompeo said the U.S. is going into a second summit with North Korea late this month with hope that the regime will fulfill its denuclearization pledge.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

KBS (http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/)

Police to Send Fmr Skating Coach's Sexual Assault Case to Prosecution

Police will forward the sexual abuse case regarding former national speed skating coach Cho Jae-beom to prosecutors on Thursday, with a recommendation for indictment. The Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency concluded Wednesday that Cho sexually assaulted Olympic short track champion Shim Suk-hee multiple times from August 2014 to December 2017 at locations including national team training venues.

US, N. Korea to Continue Working-level Talks in Pyongyang

The U.S. and North Korea will continue working-level talks in Pyongyang for a second day on Thursday to prepare for the summit between their leaders, set for February 27th and 28th in Vietnam. U.S. Special Representative for North Korea Stephen Biegun and his North Korean counterpart Kim Hyok-chol reportedly launched talks in Pyongyang on Wednesday, which sources project will continue for days.

Two Koreas to Hold Talks on 'Ssireum' Exchanges Next Week

South and North Korea will hold talks next week to discuss ways to boost exchanges in the art of traditional Korean wrestling, known as "ssireum." According to Seoul's Korea Ssireum Association(KSA) on Wednesday, its chairman Park Pal-yong and vice chief Kim Jeong-ki will embark on a two-day trip to the North's Mount Geumgang next Tuesday to meet with North Korean officials.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yonhap (http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr)

Samsung remains top semiconductor buyer in 2018: Gartner

Samsung Electronics Co. remained the world's largest buyer of semiconductor chips for the second consecutive year in 2018, but its market share slightly fell amid the rise of Chinese rivals, an industry report showed Thursday. The South Korean tech giant bought US$43.4 billion worth of semiconductors last year, up 7.5 percent from a year earlier, according to a recent report by U.S.-based research firm Gartner. Its U.S. rival, Apple, came next with $41.9 and China's Huawei took the third spot with $21.1 billion.

Fire at housing unit kills 3 people in central S. Korea

Three members of a family were killed and one seriously injured after a multiplex housing unit was engulfed by a fire in central South Korea on Thursday, police said. The fire broke out around 6:37 a.m. on the third floor of the three-story housing unit in Cheonan, South Chungcheong Province, before being extinguished in 26 minutes.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Korea Herald (http://www.koreaherald.com)

Host S. Korea falls to Latvia to open men's hockey tournament

South Korea lost to Latvia 6-2 in the opening match of a men's ice hockey tournament at home on Wednesday, after blowing a pair of first-period leads. South Korea is hosting the Legacy Cup at Gangneung Hockey Centre in Gangneung, 230 kilometers east of Seoul, through Friday. The tournament, which also features Kazakhstan and Japan, celebrates the first anniversary of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. Gangneung Hockey Centre was one of two hockey venues during the Olympics and hosted the men's and women's gold medal games.

Speculation rises on Kaesong complex reopening ahead of US-N. Korea summit

Speculation is rising over whether the shuttered industrial complex in the North Korean border town of Kaesong may resume operations following a second summit between the United States and North Korea that is expected to be held later this month in Vietnam. On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump announced that his second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will take place in Vietnam from Feb. 27-28, with the talks to center on dismantling Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program.

Gov't watchdog restricts access to over 230,000 instances of harmful online material in 2018

South Korea's communication watchdog said Wednesday that it ordered over 230,000 examples of harmful online material to be deleted or restricted from access in the country in 2018. The action taken by the Korea Communications Standards Commission represents a three-fold spike over the 84,000 cases found in violation of the rules in 2017 and a 20 percent increase from 2016, when 201,000 cases of illegal and harmful content were barred from being screened on the domestic Internet.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Korea Times (http://www.koreatimes.co.kr)

Seoul taxi's base fare to rise to W3,800 on Feb. 16

The base fare for taxis in Seoul will rise to 3,800 won ($3.40) from the current 3,000 won starting 4 a.m. on Feb. 16, the city government said, Wednesday. The late-night fare from midnight to 4 a.m. will start from 4,600 won, up from 3,600 won. The base fare for deluxe taxis and jumbo taxis will rise to 6,500 won from 5,000 won. It will be the first fare rise since October 2013.

South Korea on alert over falling exports

The Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy are hammering out last-minute details on ways to help revitalize exports by small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME), according to the former, Wednesday. Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki said the two bodies have been working together since January to come up with measures aimed at revitalizing overseas shipments.

2,200 power plant workers to get regular job status

The government and the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) have agreed on providing 2,200 subcontracted workers at state-run power plants with permanent positions, in an effort to improve their poor working conditions and prevent industrial accidents. They announced the measure as a follow up to a revision bill passed in December to strengthen industrial safety. The bill followed the death of Kim Yong-gyun, a 24-year-old subcontract worker who was killed in a conveyer belt accident at a coal-fired power plant in Taean, South Chungcheong Province, Dec. 11.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chosun Ilbo (http://english.chosun.com)

U.S.-N.Korea Summit Could Mean Another Halt to Military Drills

Chances are that scheduled joint military drills between the U.S. and South Korea will be canceled again as a summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un looms. Seoul and Washington had tentatively agreed to start the drills on March 4, less than a week after the scheduled summit on Feb. 27-28.

Korea Becomes World's 5th Biggest Steelmaker

Korea became the world's fifth biggest producer of steel last year. According to the World Steel Association, Korea produced 72.5million tons of crude steel, accounting for 4.6 percent of global production. China was No. 1 producer with 928 million tons, over 51 percent of the world total, followed by India, Japan the U.S., and Korea bumping Russia to sixth.

Restaurant Sales Hit Record Low in 2018

Restaurants and bars last year saw their lowest sales since data was first compiled in 2010. According to Statistics Korea, restaurant and bar sales for 2018 were down 1.8 percent from the year before, even though overall consumption was up 4.2 percent.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HanKyoReh Shinmun (http://english.hani.co.kr)

The “masters of money” behind North Korea’s development projects

The completion ceremony for the Ryomyong Street development project in Pyongyang, North Korea, was held on Apr. 13, 2017. Videos and photographs that showed North Korean leader Kim Jong-un cutting the ribbon were broadcast around the world. Ryomyong Street is an eight-lane street that runs for 3km from the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun to the Tower of Immortality in Pyongyang’s Taesong District.

Epilogue to the Special Series of the Jeju April 3 Massacre

On Jan. 20, I went to see the markers for missing persons at Jeju April 3rd Peace Park in Jeju City’s Bonggae neighborhood. A total of 3,896 markers can be found there, including people who were taken to mainland prisons (like the former Jeju April 3 prisoners effectively exonerated in a retrial on Jan. 17) and never returned, as well as others who went missing on Jeju Island. Standing out among the marker are those with an inscription reading “child of [person’s name]”; these are the markers for those who disappeared shortly after their birth.

KICT develops new wave power system using principle behind bicycle pedal

In a recent article in the journal Nature Communications, a US research team noted that global warming has resulted in an annual increase in the amount of wave energy in the world’s oceans. Based on an analysis using satellite altimeter data and computer modeling, the research team from the University of California, Santa Cruz, concluded that global wave energy had increased by an average of 0.47% each year since 1948, and 2.3% over the past two decades or so.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Dong-A Ilbo (http://english.donga.com/)

Donald Trump to meet with Kim Jong Un in Vietnam

The second summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is scheduled to take place on February 27 and 28 in Vietnam. It has been 260 days since their first summit in Singapore on June 12 last year. The U.S. and North Korea have notified of a concentrated negotiation to achieve substantial denuclearization results by notifying the two days summit in advance. Working-level officials of the both countries met in Pyongyang on Wednesday and started coordinating on the outline of denuclearization that will be included in the "Vietnam Statement."

Kim Jong Un likely to visit Seoul in late March or early April

The South Korean presidential office Cheong Wa Dae is paying a keen attention to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s potential visit to Seoul as a follow-up event for the second summit meeting between Washington and Pyongyang. Many predict that the visit might take place either in late March or early April. The lunch menu for South Korean President Moon Jae-in and his chief secretaries’ Wednesday meeting wasn’t ddeokguk, the rice-cake soup typically enjoyed during the Lunar New Year holidays, but onban, a traditional cuisine consisting of meat soup and rice originated from the North Korean capital of Pyongyang.

Seoul city plans to build memorial place for Sewol victims

The Seoul city government plans to build a new memorial facility for the Sewol ferry disaster after removing memorial tents set up by the bereaved families of the victims. Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon released the plan on Tuesday when he participated in a Lunar New Year memorial service for the 304 victims in Gwanghwamun Square. "The Seoul city government is discussing the plan with the believed families so that the site will turn into a completely new place to commemorate the victims and raise awareness of safety," Park said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JoongAng Ilbo (http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/)

Kim-Trump summit set for Feb. 27-28

The second U.S.-North Korea summit will be held in Vietnam on Feb. 27 and 28, U.S. President Donald Trump announced Tuesday in his State of the Union address. “We continue our historic push for peace on the Korean Peninsula,” said Trump at the Capitol in Washington. “Our hostages have come home, nuclear testing has stopped and there has not been a missile launch in 15 months.” Trump claimed that if he hadn’t been elected president, the United States would have gone into a “major war” with the North.

Foot-and-mouth fight goes into a higher gear

The government is stepping up its fight against foot-and-mouth disease as the Lunar New Year holiday drew to a close with no new outbreaks. The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said Wednesday that it will disinfect all cloven-hoofed animal farms, related facilities, equipment and vehicles across the country today to prevent the spread of the highly contagious viral disease.

75% of mid-January’s fine dust came from outside Korea

A think tank run by the Ministry of Environment announced Wednesday that around 75 percent of the fine dust that enveloped the nation from Jan. 11 to 15 came from abroad, particularly China. Korea’s National Institute of Environmental Research (NIER) analyzed its data on PM2.5 fine-dust particles in the air during the five days in January. It said it used data collected on the ground in Korea and ran it through its internal air quality modeling program to deduce the percentage.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The KyungHyang Shinmun (http://english.khan.co.kr/)

"Special Prosecutor's Investigation of President Moon" vs. "Attempt to Overthrow Election Result," Ruling and Opposition Parties Clash

Opposition parties including the Liberty Korea Party are taking advantage of the arrest of Kim Kyung-soo, governor of Gyeongsangnam-do and aiming at President Moon Jae-in and Cheong Wa Dae. They are even calling for a special prosecutor pointing to President Moon as the person behind the manipulation of online comments by D-ruking. Meanwhile, the ruling Democratic Party of Korea announced a strong response to the attacks by the Liberty Korea Party defining such attacks as "an attempt to reject the results of a presidential election held by the candlelight demonstrations."

The Effects of Income-Driven Growth Are Now Showing

When the Bank of Korea announced that the Korean economy grew 2.7% in 2018, the conservative media criticized the Moon Jae-in government's economic policy claiming that the economy grew at the slowest rate in six years despite 5.6% more government spending than the previous year--taxes poured to stimulate the economy.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

AJU Business Daily (http://www.ajudaily.com)

Pompeo sees 'every opportunity' for N.K. denuclearization

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that there is "every opportunity" that North Korea will dismantle its nuclear weapons program as promised. In an interview with Fox Business, Pompeo said the U.S. is going into a second summit with North Korea late this month with hope that the regime will fulfill its denuclearization pledge.

Hyundai Motor agrees to invest in mini SUV joint venture at home

In a deal hailed by South Korean President Moon Jae-in as a win-win, Hyundai Motor agreed to invest in the construction of a new plant in cooperation with a municipal government to produce compact SUVs in the southern city of Gwangju. As a non-management investor, Hyundai will invest 53 billion won ($47 million) to acquire a 19 percent stake in the joint company, with the Gwangju city government owning 21 percent. The plant will assemble compact SUVs with one-liter engines under an original equipment manufacturing (OEM) contract.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maeil Business News Korea ( http://www.pulsenews.co.kr/)

Korea’s top 4 chaebols to pay record dividends to foreigners for 2018

South Korea’s top 4 conglomerates would pay out record high dividend of 9.2 trillion won ($8.2 billion) to foreign investors for full 2018, data showed Sunday. According to Seoul-based business tracker Chabul.com, foreign investors would collect 9.2 trillion won in dividends from the listed companies of Korea’s top 4 chaebol conglomerates – Samsung, Hyundai Motor, SK, and LG for fiscal 2018, up 43.0 percent from a year earlier.

White, most popular color for cars in Korea in 2018

South Koreans’ favorite color was white when it comes to buy a car, a report showed Tuesday. According to Global Automotive 2018 Color Popularity Report by international automotive paint supplier Axalta Coating Systems on Tuesday, 32 percent of total passenger cars sold in Korea last year was white. In particular, solid white accounted for 19 percent and pear white 13 percent.

S. Korea’s default risk at lowest since 2007

South Korea’s default risk fell to its lowest level in more than 11 years amid growing preference for safe assets and easing geopolitical tension in the Korean peninsula ahead of the proposed meeting between the leaders of the United States and North Korea. According to the Korea Center for International Finance (KCIF) on Saturday, the premium credit default swap (CDS) for Korea’s benchmark five-year foreign exchange stabilization bonds averaged 32 basis points as of Friday.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What’s ticking around the world at this second?
See what the world media around the world have to report:

Use us!
The Korea Post media are more than eager to be used, and to serve you—with the following five news outlets, 34 years old this year!

Korean-language Internet edition: http://www.koreapost.co.kr
English-language Internet edition: http://www.koreapost.com
Korean-language print newspaper:
http://pdf.koreapost.co.kr/38/3801.pdf
http://pdf.koreapost.co.kr/38/3802.pdf
http://pdf.koreapost.co.kr/38/3803.pdf
http://www.koreapost.co.kr/pdf/list.php?category=&syear=2018&smonth=03&sday=26&hosu=40
English E-daily: http://www.koreapost.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=8429
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lee Kyung-sik edt@koreapost.com