Japan is considering development of safer, smaller nuclear power plants, signaling renewed emphasis on nuclear energy

Aug 24, 2022

Japan is considering development of safer, smaller nuclear power plants, signaling renewed emphasis on nuclear energy

TOKYO (AP) — Japan is considering development of safer, smaller nuclear power plants, signaling renewed emphasis on nuclear energy.

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Esports team DRX seeks to broaden territory into digital entertainment

The esports industry continues to expand, drawing large audiences across game titles and appealing to an increasingly diverse range of people. The Business Research Company expects the global market to grow at an average annual rate of about 20 percent, from $3.02 billion in 2025 to $7.71 billion in 2030. However, few esports team operators have managed to turn that popularity into profits, as player salaries continue to rise while revenues from competition, such as prize money and league revenue sharing, remain volatile. DRX has remained profitable since 2024, helped by a diversified portfolio across multiple esports titles and a stable revenue base built through its advertising agency subsidiary. During an interview with The Korea Times, CEO Yang “Can” Sun-il said he is seeking to transform DRX into a broader digital entertainment company, expanding beyond esports through intellectual property (IP) and its esports academy, particularly in Southeast Asia. “K-culture has certainly become much more sophisticated and valuable than it was 10 years ago,” Yang said. “If you go to co

Esports team DRX seeks to broaden territory into digital entertainment

87% of dog meat farms closed ahead of February ban

With the country’s ban on dog meat trade slated to take effect on Feb. 7 next year, 87 percent of dog farms have been shut down, a pace faster than the government had anticipated, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs said Sunday. A total of 1,537 dog meat farms were registered nationwide when the government announced the ban in February 2024 and began accepting closure notices from farm owners. As of Sept. 21, 198 farms remained in operation. The number of farms that had closed was 30 percent higher than the government had expected by that point. The number of dogs kept in cages stood at 468,000 in August 2024, the final month of a six-month period during which the government encouraged farm owners to submit closure notices and plans. As of last month, an estimated 7,600 dogs remained at farms still operating. The ministry is encouraging the remaining farm owners to close their businesses before the ban takes effect next year. In collaboration with local governments, it will conduct a special inspection campaign from November to December to check whether closed farms ha

87% of dog meat farms closed ahead of February ban

Hyundai Motor's cumulative India sales set to top 10 mil. vehicles this year

Hyundai Motor's cumulative vehicle sales in India are expected to top 10 million this year, nearly three decades after the South Korean automaker began local sales, industry data showed Sunday. The company had sold 9.88 million vehicles in India through the third quarter of this year, having begun local production with the Santro minicar at its Chennai plant in 1998, according to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM). At the current pace, Hyundai's cumulative sales in India are expected to surpass the 10 million mark by the end of this year. Over the past three decades, Hyundai has introduced a range of models in India, including the i10 and i20 hatchbacks, the Verna subcompact, the Creta SUV, the all-electric Creta EV, the Exter SUV and the Alcazar SUV. Hyundai's annual sales in India surpassed 500,000 units in 2016 and reached 605,433 units in 2024, according to SIAM data. Last year, the company sold 398,937 SUVs in India, accounting for about 70 percent of its total sales in the country. At its 2026 CEO Investor Day in August, Hyundai Motor Chief Executive Officer Jose M

Hyundai Motor's cumulative India sales set to top 10 mil. vehicles this year

More support needed for ethnic minority children with special needs, charity says

A non-profit children’s education organisation in Hong Kong has urged the government to expand support services for preschool-aged ethnic minority children with special needs to more districts, after a pilot project found that 95 per cent of participants showed improvement. Heep Hong Society said on Sunday that many ethnic minority families faced multiple barriers when seeking support for children with special educational needs (SEN), including language difficulties, financial constraints and...

More support needed for ethnic minority children with special needs, charity says

Hangzhou is doubling down on tech – minus the viral hype

A year ago, a Unitree robot kickboxing could light up social media. When DeepSeek released its latest open-source artificial intelligence (AI) model, developers around the world rushed to test it. This year, however, Hangzhou’s latest technology bets have barely made a ripple. The city’s “New Eight Steeds” – eight deep-tech companies in fields ranging from smart glasses and inference graphic processing units (GPUs) to compute-in-memory chips and space computing – are a very different proposition...

Hangzhou is doubling down on tech – minus the viral hype

Bar Association urges proxy cap, electronic voting to curb building bid-rigging

The Hong Kong Bar Association has suggested capping the number of proxies a person can hold at homeowners’ meetings, without restricting who may act as a proxy, stressing that improving transparency and introducing an electronic voting system could help to deter abuse in large-scale maintenance procurement. Speaking to the South China Morning Post, association chairman Jose-Antonio Maurellet expressed reservations about a government proposal to restrict an owner’s representative to a relative or...

Bar Association urges proxy cap, electronic voting to curb building bid-rigging

How a museum masterpiece’s life-size replica sparked rare US-China collaboration

For anyone who has visited the Chinese galleries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, there is one work that stops them in their tracks. Stepping into Gallery 206, home to Chinese Buddhist art, visitors are met by a monumental wall – over 15 metres wide and 7.5 metres tall (nearly 50 feet by 25 feet) – covered in a Buddhist assembly so vast and majestic that it momentarily erases the Manhattan bustle outside. Here stands the Medicine Buddha, a 14th century Yuan dynasty (1279-1368)...

How a museum masterpiece’s life-size replica sparked rare US-China collaboration

Korea Post to issue Faker commemorative stamps

The Korea Post will issue commemorative stamps honoring esports player Lee Sang-hyeok, better known as Faker, on Oct. 23, celebrating his career and contributions to Korean esports. The state-run postal service under the Ministry of Science and ICT said on Saturday it will release 140,000 stamp sheets alongside stamp albums and other commemorative products. The stamps depict milestones in Lee’s career, including portraits of him celebrating at award ceremonies. Lee, who debuted in 2013, has won six League of Legends World Championships, 10 League of Legends Champions Korea titles and two Mid-Season Invitational titles, according to the authority. He also won gold at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, defending the title he won at the 2023 Hangzhou Games. In 2024, he became the first player inducted into the game's Hall of Legends. In January, Lee became the first esports player to receive the Cheongryong Medal, the highest honor of Korea’s Order of Sport Merit. To mark the release, Korea Post opened a special exhibition dedicated to Faker at its stamp museum inside Seoul Central Post

Korea Post to issue Faker commemorative stamps

Fast food fulfills dreams in aging society

One thing Shin Jeong-ok, a team leader at a McDonald’s restaurant in Seoul’s Seongbuk District, enjoys about her job is being looked up to by friends and acquaintances in their 60s and older. In Korea, where the population is rapidly aging, seniors face increasingly fierce competition for employment as they outnumber younger job seekers. As of this year, more than 11 million people in Korea, or 21.6 percent of the population, are aged 60 or older. Many are baby boomers born between 1955 and 1963, a generation larger than those that came before them. Now entering retirement, they are increasingly seeking jobs, but age-related health issues and physical limitations restrict their employment options. Fortunately for Shin, her current job title is a hard-earned position she began in her early 50s. Now, the 63-year-old says she cannot imagine a life without working five times a week at McDonald’s Jongam SK branch in northern Seoul. “When I tell my neighbors or friends that I work at McDonald’s, I see the envy in their eyes. Being able to say that I have a job and seeing their admira

Fast food fulfills dreams in aging society

Are Chinese military aircraft already using a new joint air facility in Laos?

Chinese military aircraft may already be using a new joint aviation facility in Laos, with satellite imagery showing twice as many K-8/JL-8-family trainer aircraft there as the Laotian air force is assessed to possess. Eight of the two-seat trainer and light-attack aircraft were visible at Ban Keun Airport in commercial satellite imagery taken on September 30, according to Reuters, which first reported the images. More than two dozen military and support vehicles were also visible. The image was...

Are Chinese military aircraft already using a new joint air facility in Laos?

Comedy takes root in Korea's Russian-speaking community

Lyazzat Khan, a proud resident of Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, has quietly been building an empire of laughter. Originally from Kazakhstan, she is the mastermind behind Event Max, a business that brings Russian-speaking comedians to Korea. For Korea’s Russian-speaking population of nearly 200,000, there is a growing market for entertainment services. Most of these residents are Koryo-saram, or ethnic Koreans from former Soviet Union countries. Many are employed in the country’s light and heavy industry factories, working grueling hours. Leisure services for this group of workers remain underdeveloped, mostly because of the language barrier to accessing Korean entertainment. Over half of Korea’s Russian-speaking population lives in Ansan and Incheon, where in some neighborhoods, it is common to hear Russian spoken on the street. Restaurants and lounges catering specifically to Russian-speakers have sprung up in these neighborhoods since the early 2000s. However, a demand for more community-centered entertainment is on the rise as many businesses were shuttered during the pandemic. Ent

Comedy takes root in Korea's Russian-speaking community

She studies lonely deaths — and shared her door code with a neighbor

Researcher Song In-joo's father had been adamant that he did not want to die in a hospital, so she stayed by his side at home through his final days. "I realized that death isn't a momentary event, but a long, painful process. You have to work hard to die," Song said. "Everything is going as it should," her father said two days before he died. "I believe my father died peacefully, thanks to the care and human touch he received," Song said. "Death inevitably requires the help of others." That was in 2016. Song, then a senior research fellow at the Seoul Welfare Foundation and now head of Ssro Lab, began researching lonely deaths that year in hopes of preventing people from dying without care or human contact. To do so, she first had to determine who dies in isolation, why they become isolated and how they spend their final days. Since she could not ask the dead themselves, she analyzed police records on 20,000 unattended deaths and interviewed family members and neighbors to examine the circumstances surrounding lonely deaths — a process known as a "social autopsy." Song recently publishe

She studies lonely deaths — and shared her door code with a neighbor

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