Wednesday, November 6, 2019

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

The Korea Post (http://www.koreapost.com/)

Top U.S. diplomat for Asia to meet Seoul officials amid looming GSOMIA expiry

The top American diplomat for East Asia was set to meet a series of senior South Korean officials in Seoul on Wednesday amid a U.S. push to forestall the looming expiration of a military intelligence-sharing pact between Seoul and Tokyo. Assistant Secretary of State David Stilwell arrived here Tuesday, as the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA), seen as a symbolic tool to foster the U.S.' trilateral security cooperation with its Asian allies, is set to expire on Nov. 23 unless Seoul reverses its decision to end it.

Asia-Pacific trade deal to improve S. Korea's exports environment: minister

A mega Asia-Pacific trade pact will improve South Korea's exports environment, the country's industry ministry said Tuesday. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) will improve South Korean companies' access to markets in the region, according to Sung Yun-mo, minister of trade, industry and energy, in a meeting with officials and business leaders.

HDC, Hanwha Energy join hands for LNG power plant project

HDC Group, a construction-to-retail conglomerate in South Korea, said Tuesday it has joined hands with Hanwha Energy Corp. for its natural gas power plant project in the country's southeastern coast city. HDC plans to build and operate a 1,012-megawatt liquefied natural gas (LNG) combined cycle power plant and a 200,000-kiloliter LNG storage tank in Tongyeong, some 330 kilometers south of Seoul.

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

Moon: 'Meaningful' Meeting with Abe Could Help Resume Bilateral Dialogue

President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday said he had a "meaningful" meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that could help Seoul and Tokyo resume dialogue amid a bilateral row over trade and colonial-era issues. Wrapping up a three-day visit to Bangkok to attend annual regional forums, Moon referred to his eleven-minute conversation with Abe on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Plus Three summit a day before on social media.

S. Korea, US to Hold Scaled-Back Air Training Instead of 'Vigilant Ace'

Anchor: South Korea and the United States plan to hold a smaller-scale joint air drill this winter, replacing the much larger Vigilant Ace exercise for the second year in a row. The move is apparently designed to support diplomatic efforts to denuclearize North Korea.

Choi You Sun has the details.

Top US Diplomat for East Asia Arrives in S. Korea

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs David Stilwell arrived in South Korea late Tuesday for talks ahead of the expiration of a military intelligence-sharing pact between Seoul and Tokyo. Upon arriving at Incheon International Airport, Stilwell said that he looks forward to productive meetings with South Korean officials to reaffirm that the South Korea-U.S. alliance is the “cornerstone of peace and security here in the region.”

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

Audition show producers arrested for alleged vote rigging

A Seoul court approved arrest warrants Tuesday for two producers of a popular K-pop TV show over vote-rigging allegations. Following a hearing earlier in the day, the Seoul Central District Court issued the warrant to formally detain the program director in a scandal involving "Produce X 101," a fan-voted idol competition show that ran on cable channel Mnet. The chief producer of the show was also detained.

Speaker Moon proposes new idea for resolving Japan's wartime forced labor issue

South Korea's parliamentary speaker on Tuesday proposed to Japan that companies and ordinary people of the two nations voluntarily create a fund to resolve a dispute over Tokyo's wartime forced labor. National Assembly Speaker Moon Hee-sang made the proposal at a special lecture in Japan as he is visiting Tokyo as part of parliamentary diplomacy to mend frayed ties between Seoul and Tokyo, highlighted by a trade spat and the history issue.

N.K. official arrives in Moscow

Jo Chol-su, director-general of the North American department at North Korea's foreign ministry, arrives in Moscow on Nov. 5, 2019, to attend a nuclear nonproliferation conference set for Nov. 7-9. His arrival came amid speculation that he could meet with U.S. officials also attending the 2019 Moscow Nonproliferation Conference

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

Assembly introduces resolution to declare end to Korean War

Seventy-one members of the National Assembly on Tuesday rolled out a resolution calling for a formal end to the Korean War. Sponsored by Rep. Kim Kyung-hyup of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, the motion calls on the two Koreas, US and China to declare a formal end to the Korean War and to start discussing signing a peace treaty.

S. Korean coach Park Hang-seo signs extension with Vietnamese nat'l football team

Park Hang-seo, South Korean coach for the Vietnamese men's national football team, has signed a lucrative extension to stay with the upstart program, Park's agency said Tuesday. DJ Management said financial details of the deal, reportedly the largest handed out to a Vietnam men's national football boss, will be announced during a press conference with the Vietnam Football Federation on Thursday.

15 countries, including Korea, to sign trade megadeal

Leaders from 15 Asia-Pacific countries, including South Korea, China, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, declared that they had reached agreement on all 20 chapters of a trade megadeal and expressed their willingness to sign it in 2020, officials said Monday.

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

Trump expects co-efforts with Moon for North Korean issue

U.S. President Donald Trump told President Moon Jae-in that he was expecting to see continued joint efforts between Washington and Seoul in achieving complete denuclearization of North Korea and peace on the Korean Peninsula, Cheong Wa Dae said, Tuesday. "During a meeting with President Moon and U.S. National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien in Bangkok, Monday evening, O'Brien delivered Trump's personal letter in which the U.S. president expressed his condolences over the passing of President Moon's mother.

Korean cinema diversifies with changing needs from moviegoers

In the first half of this year Koran cinemas attracted over 56.9 million moviegoers, according to the Korean Film Council. The total number of movie tickets sold in the first half was 193 million, which is a record for the first two quarters, an increase of 14.9 million from last year. Watching movies has become one of the most popular leisure activities among Koreans. With their growing popularity, the genres that draw moviegoers have diversified.

Samsung to solidify lead in hyper-connected with 5G, AI, IoT

Samsung Electronics is seeking to take the lead in the "hyper-connected world" where everything is connected via internet and mobile apps, by enhancing its fifth-generation (5G) networks, artificial intelligence (AI) capability and internet of things (IoT) technologies, the head of the company's smartphone unit said Tuesday.

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

Nutrition in N.Korea Improves Despite Sanctions

Nutrition in North Korea has improved this year despite heavy sanctions against the reclusive state because its relations with China improved, a study suggests. The Institute for Peace and Unification Studies at Seoul National University interviewed 116 North Koreans who defected to South Korea last year and found that more than two-thirds ate rice instead of grain as their staple food.

Kim Jong-un's Uncle 'to Be Recalled to Pyongyang'

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's uncle Kim Pyong-il, who has spent decades in virtual exile as the country's perpetual ambassador in Eastern Europe, is expected to return to Pyongyang soon, South Korea's spy agency said Monday. In a report to the National Assembly Intelligence Committee, the National Intelligence Service also predicted that the North's ambassador to Austria Kim Kwang-sop, the husband of Kim Pyong-il's elder sister Kyong-jin, will be recalled.

Stars to Be Banned from Liquor Advertising

Celebrities will be banned from advertising soju and beer under new regulations being mulled by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, a ministry spokesman said Monday. Current law bans "expressions that overly glamorize drinking" but does not single out celebrity endorsements.

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

Kim Jong-un may be looking to hold 3rd summit with US in December, NIS director says

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un appears to have set a target of holding a third summit with the US in December, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) said on Nov. 4. The information was reported by NIS Director Suh Hoon in a closed-door parliamentary audit at the agency’s offices in Seoul’s Naegok neighborhood that day, according to a briefing by Lee Hye-hoon, a Bareunmirae Party lawmaker and chairperson of the National Assembly Intelligence Committee.

Moon and Abe take surprise 11-minute meeting in Bangkok

South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe affirmed an approach of resolving their issues through dialogue in their first conversation in 13 months. While the conversation was taken as signaling a chance for positive change in the two sides’ chilly relations, analysis said a lot of ground remains to be covered before they find solutions, which involve a complex mixture of factors such as a resolution on the forced labor issue, export controls, and Seoul’s pending termination of its General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) with Japan.

US, China tariffs would slow S. Korean growth by 0.34 percentage points

Amid a continuing trade dispute between the US and China, a report finds that, if the US and China enforce all the tariffs they’ve threatened to impose by this December, South Korea’s economic growth rate could fall by 0.34 percentage points. That was the conclusion of a report titled “Assessment of Risk Factors in the Chinese Economy and Implications” that was released by the Korea Development Institute on Nov. 4. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Home to great talent, S. Korea makes perfect R&D partner

Last Friday, Boeing opened its Boeing Korea Engineering and Technology Center (BKETC), which will develop aircraft manufacturing technologies. Asked why the U.S. aircraft manufacturer chose Korea for its new R&D center, Boeing Korea President Erik John said Seoul was an obvious choice as it is home to super advanced people.

Video combining pansori and novel to be featured on YouTube

A pansori-based online content “Dalmoon, such a nice guy” will be released on YouTube. The Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture announced on Tuesday that it will unveil a dynamic pansori video based on novelist Kim Tak-hwan’s novel on its official YouTube channel “SFAC TV” at 3 p.m. on Friday. A new episode of this work of collaboration between a novel and Korean traditional music will be released every Friday.

Ryu Hyun-jin named an NL Cy Young Award finalist

Ryu Hyun-jin who recently became a free agent after finishing the season as a pitcher of the Los Angeles Dodgers has been nominated as one of the three final lists for the National League Cy Young Award announced by the Major League Baseball on Tuesday. He is the first South Korean baseball player to earn a Cy Young vote. Jacob deGrom of the New York Mets and Max Scherzer of the Washington Nationals are the two other pitchers who made the list.

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

Different Responses to the Summit by South Korea and Japan

President Moon Jae-in, currently in Bangkok, Thailand to attend a summit with ASEAN countries, spoke with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on October 4, the first time in thirteen months. Although it was a brief encounter of eleven minutes, it was meaningful for it was the first conversation the two shared since the South Korean Supreme Court ruling on reparation to victims of forced labor.

Moon Hee-sang, "Build Fund for the Compensation of Forced Labor with Donations from South Korean and Japanese Companies and People"

On November 4, Chairman of the National Assembly Moon Hee-sang (pictured), currently in Japan, announced that a bill has been drawn to provide reparation for the victims of forced labor with donations from the companies and the people of South Korea and Japan.

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

Korea’s hottest stock HLB to file NDA for cancer drug rivoceranib in US next April

South Korea’s HLB will file its planned new drug application (NDA) with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration late April next year, said HLB Chairman Jin Yang-gon in a recent interview with Maeil Business Newspaper. The company which owns Elevar Therapeutics, the original developer of rivoceranib, a small-molecule angiogenesis inhibitor in gastric cancer, also expects marketing approval could be granted sometime between October and December next year given the FDA’s customary review period.

Samsung Electronics folds CPU core design business in US

Samsung Electronics Co. has decided to shut down part of the central processing unit (CPU) research division at Samsung Austin Semiconductors LLC, its U.S. semiconductor subsidiary, a move that can make some 300 employees redundant.

KEPCO to hold rate-fixing meeting monthly to address widening losses

South Korea’s state utility firm Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO) will hold rate-setting board meeting monthly from November, taking steps towards its plan to rationalize power rates amid ballooning losses from the government’s energy policy of phasing out of fossil and nuclear fuel.

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