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SEOUL, Dec. 18 (Yonhap) -- Korea Aerospace Industries Co. (KAI), the country's sole aircraft manufacturer, on Tuesday unveiled a prototype of a Korean-made light armed helicopter (LAH). KAI began to develop the 4.9-ton LAH in June 2015 and assembled the prototype helicopter last month. It aims to complete the development of the LAH, set to be used by the Army, by 2023, the company said in a statement. "The company will make a series of ground tests from January to see if the prototype plane's engine and other systems work properly before it makes a test flight in May (2019)...

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Attempts to incorporate a key scientific study into global climate talks in Poland have failed. The IPCC report on the impacts of a temperature rise of 1.5C, had a significant impact when it was launched last October. Scientists and many delegates in Poland were shocked as the US, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Kuwait objected to this meeting "welcoming" the report. Instead they wanted to support a much more lukewarm phrase, that the conference would "take note" of the report. The dispute dragged on as huddles of negotiators met in corners of the plenary session here, trying to agree a compromise...

Donald Trump wants North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to know that he likes him and will fulfill his wishes, South Korea's President Moon Jae-in has said, a day after meeting the US president at an economic summit in Argentina. Moon, who is hoping to host Kim soon on the first ever trip to Seoul by a North Korean leader as agreed earlier this year, said Trump had asked him to pass on a message. "The message is that President Trump has very favourable views toward Chairman Kim and he likes him," Moon told reporters aboard a flight from Argentina...

It doesn’t seem like there’s a "ruff" relationship between the two Koreas at the moment. South Korean president Moon Jae-in unveiled puppies that were born from one of the dogs given to the South by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “peace gifts” in September. The Pungsan dog, Gomi, gave birth to six puppies — three females and three males — earlier this month. The official Twitter account for South Korea's presidential Blue House tweeted on Sunday photos of Moon and his wife Kim Jong-sook playing with the furry pups at their home’s courtyard. The office added the puppies...

<p>SEOUL - South Korean officials on Thursday began to dismantle the country's largest canine slaughterhouse complex, as animal rights activists push to end the custom of eating dog meat.</p> <p>About one million dogs are eaten a year in South Korea, often as a summertime delicacy with the greasy red meat, invariably boiled for tenderness, believed to increase energy.</p>

The North and South Korean militaries completed withdrawing troops and firearms from 22 front-line guard posts on Saturday as they continue to implement a wide-ranging agreement reached in September to reduce tensions across the world's most fortified border, a South Korean Defence Ministry official said. South Korea says the military agreement is an important trust-building step that would help stabilize peace and advance reconciliation between the rivals. But critics say the South risks conceding some of its conventional military strength before North Korea takes any meaningful steps on denuclearization -- an anxiety that's growing as the larger nuclear negotiations between...

The United States and South Korea have agreed to launch a joint working group to coordinate their North Korea sanctions, a move that reflects Washington’s attempt to bridge the allies’ diverging approaches to denuclearizing the Kim regime, experts said. “The two governments agreed on establishing a new working group that would further strengthen our close coordination on our diplomacy, on our denuclearization efforts, on sanctions implementations, and inter-Korean cooperation that comply with the United Nations sanctions,” Robert Palladino, the State Department’s deputy spokesperson, said. “So this is an additional step that we’re taking that Special Representative (Stephen) Biegun and his...

<p>President Trump was in Columbia, Missouri last night on his pre mid-term election tour speaking at an airport rally.....</p> <p>Among the other US Senate races an unusual one in Mississippi where there's an "open primary special election" being held next Tuesday. Two Democrats and two Republicans are running with the top two finishers set for a runoff three weeks later.....</p>

A top court ruled Thursday that South Koreans can now legally reject their mandatory military service on conscientious or religious grounds without punishment. The decision by South Korea's Supreme Court is expected to affect the cases of more than 900 conscientious objectors on trial, as hundreds of men, mostly Jehovah's Witnesses, are imprisoned every year for refusing to serve. One of the ways South Korea copes with potential aggression from its neighbor and traditional enemy of North Korea is to force all able-bodied men to serve two years in the military. But under President Moon Jae-in, who was elected last...

South Korea’s women have begun to rebel against impossible standards of beauty in a country known as the plastic surgery capital of the world. Women who call themselves “beauty resisters” have been destroying their cosmetics, cutting their hair and denouncing the pressures imposed on them by a patriarchal society which emphasises flawless beauty as the key to career and marital success. The trend, which has spread across social media and has been dubbed the “remove corset” movement, is the latest in a series of feminist initiatives in South Korea since the MeToo campaign began. Lina Bae, a beauty YouTuber, racked...

The US and South Korea decided Friday to suspend another major joint military exercise to give the diplomatic process with North Korea "every opportunity to continue." "Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis and Minister of National Defense Jeong Kyeong-doo decided to suspend Exercise Vigilant Ace to give the diplomatic process every opportunity to continue," chief Pentagon spokesperson Dana White said in a statement. The decision was made during Mattis' meeting with his counterpart in Singapore. The exercise was due to take place in December. Last year's iteration of the Vigilant Ace involved 12,000 US troops and some 230 military aircraft...

South Koreans have now found the perfect cheese to go with their wine. With craft beer becoming so popular across South Korea, the U.S. Meat Export Federation found “Beer Week Seoul” a prime opportunity to introduce the perfectly paired snack ... U.S. pork sausages. Funded by the USDA Market Access Program and the National Pork Board, the promotional effort included offering tasting samples of Johnsonville and Oscar Mayer sausages to the more than 25,000 visitors. “Our goal was to establish American pork sausages as an easy-to-cook and easy-to-eat choice that goes great with craft beer,” says Jihae Yang, USMEF director...

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US President Donald Trump’s statement that Seoul would not lift sanctions on Pyongyang without America’s “approval” did not go down well in South Korea, prompting criticism from activists and politicians from across the political spectrum. A group of student activists climbed up the Statue of King Sejong in central Seoul on Friday afternoon in a protest against Trump’s speech as they flew a banner that read, “South Korea is not a US colony” and chanted, “Trump needs to apologize.” The protest, which saw six people arrested, comes after Trump said Wednesday, “They won’t do it without our approval. They do...

SEOUL (Reuters) - North and South Korea agreed on Monday to begin reconnecting rail and road links, another step in an improving relationship that has raised U.S. concern about the possible undermining of its bid to press the North to give up its nuclear program. The agreement on transport links came during talks in the border village of Panmunjom aimed at following up on the third summit this year between South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, last month. “The South and North reached the agreement after sincerely discussing action plans to develop inter-Korean relations...

U.S. President Donald Trump criticized Seoul on Tuesday for failing to finance the U.S. deployment of a missile defense system on the Korean Peninsula. Last year, the U.S. deployed two Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, launchers to South Korea in response to North Korea's increased missile and nuclear tests. "I said, so let me get this, we have a system that's very expensive and we shoot down rockets that are shot from North Korea to South Korea," Trump said to a crowd in Council Bluffs, Iowa. "Okay, so we're protecting South Korea, right? Why aren't they paying?" Trump...

South Korean President Moon Jae-in called on the U.S. to officially declare an end to the Korean War during an interview Friday, adding that the North had “promised complete denuclearization.” “If North Korea takes certain measures, the end-of-war declaration would be a political statement that would announce that the long-standing hostile relations between Pyongyang and Washington had ended,” Moon told the BBC, adding that he wanted the declaration to happen at the “earliest possible date.” The Korean War, which began in 1950, technically never ended, as only an armistice was signed in 1953. It will only officially be declared over...

SEOUL, Oct. 11 (Yonhap) -- More than 48,000 foreigners came to South Korea last year to get cosmetic surgery, spending some 215 billion won (US$189.12 million), health ministry data showed on Thursday. The numbers provided to Rep. Nam In-soon of the ruling Democratic Party for a parliamentary audit showed 397,882 foreign patients visited South Korea last year and paid 639.9 billion won in medical fees. The numbers are down 6.5 percent for the volume of patients and down 25.6 percent for the amount of money spent. Corresponding figures for plastic surgery patients, however, increased. There were 968 more foreigners who...

A South Korean court has sentenced former President Lee Myung-bak to 15 years in prison over a slew of corruption charges. His conviction is yet another blow to conservatives in South Korea. His conservative successor Park Geun-hye is serving a 33-year prison term over a separate corruption scandal. The Seoul Central District Court issued the sentence on Friday after convicting Lee of bribery, embezzlement and other charges. Lee, who has denied most of the charges leveled on him, has one week to appeal. Lee, who served as president from 2008-2013, has been held at a detention center in Seoul since...