Armed with a poisoned needle, a North Korean agent posed as a defector in order to reach South Korea. His mission was to kill an anti-Pyongyang activist. But the spy was unmasked by local authorities and arrested. Our reporters, Marie Linton and Guillaume Bression, met with the defector he was supposed to murder.
South Korea’s military carried out live-fire drills on Monday near a disputed maritime border with the North, which vowed not to respond despite previous threats of "catastrophic" retaliation.
South Korea has moved ahead with planned live-fire drills from a border island shelled last month by North Korea, despite threats of retaliation from its northern neighbour.
UN Security Council members held emergency talks Sunday on defusing a dispute between the two Koreas, which one US envoy called a "very, very tense situation". Seoul has vowed to go ahead with planned military drills that have angered Pyongyang.
South Korean troops prepared Saturday for scheduled artillery drills on Yeonpyeong Island even as Russia and China urged the government in Seoul not to spark a further escalation with its northern neighbour.
At a joint press conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak in Seoul Thursday, US President Barack Obama called on North Korea to show “seriousness of purpose” before the resumption of six-nation nuclear talks.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (photo) met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il on his arrival in Pyongyang, according to the official Chinese news agency. The visit raises hopes that Pyongyang will return to nuclear disarmament talks.
Cross-border traffic between North and South Korea resumed Tuesday after Pyongyang lifted tough border restrictions along its heavily fortified frontier following months of hostility.
The UN Security Council has condemned North Korea’s recent missile tests as a violation of existing UN resolutions and a threat to regional and international security.
North Korea test-fired seven missiles off its east coast on Saturday, South Korea's defence ministry says. Ballistic weapon testing has been explicitly banned by the UN. The move has been roundly condemned by world leaders.
