Pakistani Students Attend Class Amid Gov’t Effort To Raise Literacy Rate To 60 Percent By 2015
Pakistani students attend a class at a public school in southwest Pakistan’s Quetta on Nov. 5, 2012. Pakistan ranks 113th among 120 countries regarding literacy rate, which is projected to reach 60 percent till 2015 from the existing 55 percent. <Xinhua/Iqbal Hussain>
Cutting my losses
Don’t tell my supervisor but I’m calling in sick Wednesday. I heard the margin in Tuesday’s presidential election will be so tight there may not be a clear winner until the wee hours of the morning. This Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney smackdown is turning into the political olympics. I can’t stop twitching in anticipation […]
Death with dignity
Legal system needed to ensure peaceful deaths A committee under the president has decided to push ahead with a legal system allowing for the cessation of life support for terminally-ill patients in an effort to ensure peaceful and less painful deaths. The National Bioethics Committee held its second meeting for this year Friday and reached […]
Park willing to talk with NK leader
Rep. Park Geun-hye, the presidential candidate of the ruling Saenuri Party, said Monday that if elected, she was willing to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un without any conditions. But Park stood firm against North Korea’s bellicose attacks on South Korea’s sovereignty and territory, such as crossing the Northern Limit Line (NLL) in the West […]
Foreign students at SNU up 27%
The number of foreign students at Seoul National University (SNU) has increased by more than 20 percent in three years, the school said Monday. According to the office of international affairs at the state-run university, there were 2,401 foreign students enrolled as of October, up 27 percent from 1,891 in 2009. The comparable figure was […]
Special prosecutor to question first lady
First lady Kim Yoon-ok will be questioned by the special prosecutor’s team over a controversial property deal for the first family’s now-scrapped retirement home project. A decision on when and how to question Kim will be made soon. Assistant special counsel Lee Chang-hoon said Monday that the team has decided to quiz the first lady […]
‘Dancing together’ with Dokdo issue
This is the 13th in a series of contributed articles by international and Korean experts shedding light on Japan’s claim to Korea’s easternmost islets of Dokdo and other affairs that illustrate Japan’s lack of remorse over misdeeds it has committed. ― ED “Dancing together” is a skill of diplomacy that may apply even between enemies […]
A narrower divide
Living in North Korea, Lee Gwang-cheol’s family background gave him advantages that normal citizens could never dream of. After he defected to the South in 1997, and these privileges were stripped away, he vowed never to take any opportunity for granted. Lee says his grandfather was an anti-Japanese guerilla who fought alongside country founder Kim […]
‘Arirang’ recommended for UNESCO Heritage
Korea’s traditional folk song “Arirang” has been recommended to be listed as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by a UNESCO subsidiary body that has examined nominations from countries around the world. The subpanel of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage recommended Arirang be placed on the list after screening […]
GS to expand business in Singapore
GS Group, Korea’s eighth largest conglomerate by assets, is seeking to expand its energy, retail and construction businesses in Singapore in line with the company’s growth strategy focusing on Southeast Asian nations. GS Group Chairman Huh Chang-soo convened a meeting of heads of affiliates in Singapore from Sunday to Monday, discussing ways for the firm […]
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