Korea Times

CANNES — Spanish superstar Javier Bardem, who is winning rave reviews for his latest film role, slammed the "toxic masculinity" of Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday which he said was responsible for their wars. Bardem plays an overbearing film director with an explosive temper in "The Beloved" by Rodrigo Sorogoyen, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday to widespread praise from critics. In an expletive-laden outburst at a press conference on Sunday,

The leaders of the ruling and main opposition parties were placed under police protection earlier than planned amid allegations of online assassination threats targeting the ruling party chief ahead of the June 3 local elections, police said Sunday. The move came after the ruling Democratic Party of Korea requested police protection for its leader, Rep. Jung Chung-rae, saying it received reports of assassination threats against him in group chatrooms on social media. The Seoul Yeongdeungpo Polic

DUBAI — A drone strike targeted the United Arab Emirates' Barakah nuclear power plant Sunday, setting an electrical generator ablaze on its perimeter and again straining the shaky ceasefire in the Iran war. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, which caused no radiological release nor injuries, authorities in the UAE's capital, Abu Dhabi, said. However, suspicion immediately fell on Iran, which has been increasingly threatening the UAE over recent days as the country hosted I

TEHRAN — Iranian media on Sunday said the United States failed to make any concrete concessions in its response to Iran's proposal for negotiations to end the war. Fars news agency said Washington gave a five-point list which included a demand for Iran to keep only one nuclear site in operation and transfer its stockpile of highly enriched uranium to the U.S. Mehr news agency meanwhile said: "The United States, offering no tangible concessions, wants to obtain concessions that it failed to obtai

LONDON — London police said Sunday officers arrested 20 people the previous day at a march organised by far-right activist Tommy Robinson and 12 people at a counter-demonstration fused with a pro-Palestinian protest. The city's Metropolitan Police — which had already disclosed making 43 arrests Saturday after tens of thousands people attended the duelling events — added 11 of those detained were either non-affiliated or their links was unconfirmed. The force had mounted its biggest operation in

Foreign Minister Cho Hyun held phone talks with his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi, on Sunday and urged Tehran to clarify its stance on a recent attack involving a Korean-operated vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, the foreign ministry said. During the talks, Cho explained that the Korean government is conducting an additional investigation into the attack on the HMM Namu, a Panama-flagged cargo ship operated by Korean shipping firm HMM Co., and asked the Iranian side to clarify its position o

The presidential office said Sunday that the government will advance key policies in welfare, labor and other areas by prioritizing the protection of people's lives and livelihoods. Cheong Wa Dae spokesperson Kang Yu-jung highlighted the Lee Jae Myung government's national vision of a "life-saving administration" during a press briefing. "The president repeatedly emphasized that protecting the lives and safety of the people is the state's foremost responsibility," Kang said. "The government aims

President Lee Jae Myung and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will hold a bilateral talk in Andong, North Gyeongsang Province, Tuesday. They are expected to discuss the implications of the economic and security issues addressed by the U.S.-China summit last week, according to analysts Sunday. The topics will likely include tensions over Taiwan between the U.S. and China, as well as a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz stemming from the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran, which analysts say conce

A by-election for a parliamentary seat in Busan, to be held alongside the local elections on June 3, is drawing keen attention for fielding heavyweight candidates, including a former senior presidential aide from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), a former minister from the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) and a former PPP leader who was expelled from the party. The focus is on whether the PPP candidate and former PPP leader will decide on a single candidacy for a united conserv

A single post uploaded May 8 by a Korean civil servant on Blind, the anonymous workplace community app, quickly set off a frenzy online. The post included a screenshot of his brokerage account showing he had poured a staggering 2.3 billion won ($1.7 million) into shares of semiconductor giant SK hynix, one of the key driving forces behind Korea’s roaring stock market. Even more striking, 1.7 billion won of that investment was financed through margin loans borrowed from his brokerage. “I believe

Homeplus, an ailing Korean retailer undergoing a rehabilitation process, said Sunday it has once again urged its largest creditor, Meritz Financial Group, to approve a loan to sustain immediate business operations. The discount chain store operator earlier this month made the same request to Meritz but did not receive any response. As part of efforts to secure liquidity, Homeplus recently sold its smaller supermarket unit Homeplus Express, and temporarily suspended operations at 37 of its 104 ma

MOSCOW — At least four people were killed in a major Ukrainian drone attack on Russian regions, including Moscow, which faced its largest assault in more than a year. Three people died in the Moscow region and one in the Belgorod region, authorities said on Sunday. Moscow regional Governor Andrei Vorobyov said a woman was killed when a home was hit in Khimki, north of the capital, adding that rescuers were searching the debris for another person. Two men were killed in the village of Pogorelki i

Prime Minister Kim Min-seok on Sunday hinted at the possibility of invoking emergency arbitration in the labor dispute between Samsung Electronics’ management and unions, urging the two sides to reach an outcome in the additional round of wage talks scheduled for Monday. It was the first time the government had officially mentioned the potential use of the emergency measure, which is often regarded as a last resort in labor disputes. Kim’s remarks served as a strong warning ahead of what may be

The government’s plan to deny support for additional semiconductor industrial complexes in Seoul and surrounding Gyeonggi Province is fueling concerns that it may undermine a chip cluster under construction in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, backed by a combined 1,000 trillion won ($670 billion) investment from Samsung Electronics and SK hynix. Although the Yongin cluster will remain eligible for previously promised support, the new plan triggers suspicions that the government may encourage partner c

HD Hyundai XiteSolution has secured a series of large-scale forklift supply deals in the Middle East and North Africa. The intermediary holding company overseeing HD Hyundai’s construction equipment business said Sunday it recently signed a contract with the Algerian government to supply 316 industrial vehicles worth 37 billion won ($25 million), with deliveries to be completed in phases by August. The order includes 10-ton, 25-ton and 30-ton forklifts used for handling and transporting heavy lo

Tobacco company KT&G is drawing global investors’ attentions as its first-quarter overseas sales reached a record high, while its shareholder-friendly dividend policy also continued to gain favorable reviews. The company said Sunday that Capital Group, one of the world’s largest global asset management firms, earlier this month acquired a 5.61 percent stake in KT&G through its subsidiary, Capital Research and Management Company. This development came just four months after BlackRock, the world’s

The North Korean women's football club Naegohyang Women's FC arrived in South Korea on Sunday for a much-anticipated inter-Korean match this week. Naegohyang will take on Suwon FC Women in the semifinals of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Women's Champions League at Suwon Stadium in Suwon, some 30 kilometers south of Seoul, at 7 p.m. Wednesday. Now in its second year, the Women's Champions League is Asia's top women's club competition and offers $1 million to the champions. Naegohyang's 2

As Korea’s export-driven industries emerge from years of turbulence, a new labor conflict is spreading across the country’s corporate landscape: demands by unions for fixed shares of profits as performance bonuses. What began in the semiconductor sector has now expanded into shipbuilding, automobiles, biotechnology, telecommunications and information technology. Labor unions at some of the country’s largest companies are no longer asking merely for wage increases or discretionary bonuses; they a

When I was pursuing my master's degree here, I had a teacher named Choi Chi-won. He was my guide. The one who taught me much of what I would later come to know about Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism and the Enlightenment period of Korea. He challenged me in the way that all good teachers do: pushing, probing, setting high standards and asking questions to which I didn’t always know the answer. If we are lucky, we will all meet at least one teacher like this in our lives. Someone who transcends the

Korea's investment in startups shot up 24.1 percent from a year earlier in the first quarter, government data showed Sunday. A total of 3.32 trillion won ($2.21 billion) was invested in venture firms and startups during the January-March period, according to data from the Ministry of SMEs and Startups. The figure marked the second-highest first-quarter total on record, following 2022, when startup investment boomed amid a global venture boom. By industry, investment in information and communicat