Former South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, embroiled in a broadening corruption scandal, died from a fall today in the mountains behind his rural southern home. He left behind a suicide note, his lawyer said.

Pro-US former businessman Lee Myung-bak took the oath of office as South Korea’s new president today, vowing to revitalise the economy, strengthen relations with the US and deal with nuclear-armed North Korea.

South Korea’s new president-elect Lee Myung-bak said today he would not shy away from criticising North Korea’s authoritarian regime.

SOUTH Korea’s presidential election was won by runaway favourite Lee Myung-bak by a landslide yesterday.

South Korea’s presidential election was won by runaway favourite Lee Myung-bak by a landslide today.

South Koreans voted for a new president today in an election widely expected to end a decade of liberal rule.

North Korea’s premier arrived in Seoul today for the first prime ministerial talks with South Korea in 15 years to discuss a reconciliation agreement by their leaders.

THE leaders of North and South Korea yesterday pledged to seek a peace treaty to replace the Korean War’s 1953 ceasefire and expand projects to reduce tension across the world’s last Cold War frontier.

Leaders of North and South Korea pledged in a reconciliation pact today to finally seek a peace treaty to replace the Korean War’s 1953 cease-fire, and expand projects to reduce tension across the world’s last Cold War frontier.

Leaders of the two Koreas began formal talks today at the first summit between the divided countries in seven years.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il greeted South Korean president Roh Moo-hyun in Pyongyang today to begin the second summit between the two countries since the peninsula’s division after the Second World War.

President Bush today urged Asia-Pacific nations to keep up the anti-terror fight, deploying both military might and democratic ideals to turn the tide against extremists.

Taliban leaders and South Korean officials were continuing negotiations by telephone over the fate of the remaining 19 hostages today, but no new face-to-face talks had been planned, the International Committee of the Red Cross said.

Regional powers applauded today’s announcement by North and South Korea that their leaders plan to meet later this month, saying it will help ease tensions and boost efforts to denuclearise the peninsula.

South Korea today said 22 hostages remained in Taliban captivity after a Korean pastor was killed by the militant group in Afghanistan, drawing outrage from Seoul that warned those responsible would face consequences.

The hard-line Taliban militia claimed today to have killed two German and five Afghan hostages but said it was willing to release 22 South Korean Christians in exchange for the freedom of imprisoned Taliban fighters.

President Roh Moo-hyun held a special meeting with aides today to discuss the US campus shooting, as the public expressed shame over a South Korean citizen being identified as the gunman.

The two Koreas are set to meet today for high-level talks after a seven-month hiatus, paving the way for mending inter-Korean ties that frayed over the communist North’s missile launches and nuclear test.

The two Koreas agreed to resume stalled high-level talks later this month, officials said today, in the first concrete sign of easing tensions on the divided peninsula after the North signed a breakthrough disarmament agreement.

South Korea’s president has dismissed claims from North Korea that US nuclear weapons are deployed in the South, a news report said today.

US President George Bush today backed Pacific Rim leaders in demanding that the communist regime abandon its nuclear weapons programme.

The main US envoy to South Korea said today that Washington will seek to resolve financial restrictions on the North that have hindered nuclear talks, after Pyongyang agreed to return to the negotiations following its nuclear test.

South Korean defence minister Yoon Kwang-ung has offered to resign, Yonhap news agency reported today.

South Korean officials today said they believed North Korea tested a nuclear weapon as it claimed, but determining whether the atomic explosion was successful would take a couple weeks.

THE president of South Korea Roh Moo-Hyun has said North Korea’s nuclear test was forcing a change in his policy of engagement with the communist state.

Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe agreed with US President George Bush to take “decisive action” against North Korea at the UN Security Council over its nuclear weapons test.

North Korea said today it has performed its first-ever nuclear weapons test.

SOUTH KOREA and Russia were yesterday stepping up efforts to prevent North Korea from carrying out a nuclear test.

South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun has ordered his government to send a “grave warning” to North Korea about the consequences of a threatened nuclear weapons test.

Leaders at a 38-nation Asia-Europe summit in Helsinki, Finland, stood in silence today, remembering those killed in the September 11 terror attacks five years ago in the United States.

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi today made a pilgrimage to a Tokyo war shrine reviled by critics as a symbol of militarism, triggering a further erosion in Japan’s ties with its neighbours just a month before he leaves office.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the international community must take “very urgent steps” to deal with the dual problems of North Korea’s and Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Japanese and South Korean negotiators today raced to avert a clash over a set of disputed islets as Seoul accused Tokyo of neo-colonial ambitions and warned of a possible confrontation at sea.

Lee Hae-chan formally stepped down as South Korea’s prime minister today, a day after the president accepted his resignation following strong opposition criticism over Lee playing golf during a national railway strike.

South Korea’s prime minister offered his resignation today after drawing a firestorm of criticism for playing golf rather than overseeing the government’s response to a railway strike, the president’s spokesman said.

South Korea’s president lashed out today at hardliners in Washington seeking to force the collapse of North Korea’s totalitarian regime, as the Foreign Ministry criticised a US account of a meeting on preventing criminal activity by the North.

South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun is expected to accept the resignation of an aide over the scandal surrounding disgraced stem cell scientist Hwang Woo-suk.

Southeast Asian nations pressed Myanmar’s (Burma’s) generals to get serious about democracy as they opened a summit today aiming for broader Asian integration – an uphill task as shown by a feud raging between China and Japan.

South Korea’s foreign minister today said it was inappropriate for him to travel to Japan now because of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s recent visit to a controversial war shrine, scuttling tentative plans for talks in Tokyo later this month.

Japan’s foreign minister today pledged to smooth ties with China and South Korea after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi enraged the two Asian neighbours and sparked business jitters by visiting a war shrine that critics say glorifies Japan’s militaristic past.

Reaction to North Korea’s demand for civilian reactors before dismantling its nuclear programme ranged from harsh to calm today, though none of the parties to international talks said they expected the negotiating process to break down.

The chief US envoy to talks on ending North Korea’s atomic weapons programme met today with his North Korean counterpart seeking to break a stalemate, and said afterward that the negotiations are still “in business".

North Korean officials visited South Korea’s National Assembly for the first time today in a symbolic gesture of reconciliation with their democratic rivals during joint celebrations of the 60th anniversary of the Korean Peninsula’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule.

The Koreas were outlining agreements for aid and boosting cooperation at high-level talks scheduled to wrap up today, with the North Korean delegation also planning a rare meeting with South Korea’s president.