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South Korea

May 2006Percentage of South Korean youth who say their country should back North Korea in the event of war with the U.S.: 48
Source:

The Korea Times/Hankook Ilbo (Seoul)

Mar 2006Number of copies sold in Japan since last summer of a comic book about the worthlessness of Korea: 370,000
Source:

Shinyusha (Tokyo)

Oct 2003Amount, in inches, by which the average North Korean 7-year-old is shorter than the average South Korean 7-year-old : 2.9
Source:

Sunyoung Pak, Seoul National University (South Korea)

Jun 2002Ratio of the amount of food thrown out by South Korea last year to the amount consumed by North Korea: 1:1
Source:

Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs (Seoul)

May 1999Head of cattle that Hyundai's founder brought from South Korea last fall on a visit to North Korea's Kim Jong Il: 1,000
Source:

Hyundai Motor America (Fountain Valley, Calif.)

Feb 1999Percentage change since 1997 in the number of South Korean suicides: +36
Source:

Korean Institute of Criminology (Seoul)

August 5, 2008It was discovered that a woman who paid a South Korean company to create five clones of her pitbull Booger was Joyce McKinney, a former Miss Wyoming who escaped British authorities in 1977 after abducting a Mormon missionary, securing him to a bed with mink-lined handcuffs, and raping him three times. “They are perfectly the same as their daddy,” said McKinney, in Seoul, of Booger's clones. “I am in Heaven here.”
Source 1:

Salt Lake Tribune

Source 2:

Daily Mail

Source 3:

The Register

June 28, 2008Police in South Korea fired water cannons at protesters as Condoleezza Rice visited Seoul. “We don't need U.S. troops,” read a protest slogan, “we don't need U.S. mad cows.”
Source:

BBC News

September 1, 2007 South Korea was scandalized by resume cheats. “Before, we struggled more with fake luxury goods,” said Moon Moo-il, a prosecutor who combats credentials fraud. “Now that we have entered the knowledge-based society, we have to deal with an overflow of fake knowledge.”
Source:

NY Times

June 1, 2007A robot was assigned to guard duty at a South Korean school. The robot, said DU Robo CEO Kang Jung-Won, “will alert officials when it detects someone trying to seduce a student.”
Source:

AFP via The Age

May 21, 2007For the first time since the Korean War a train traveled between North and South Korea and a North Korean cargo ship docked in a South Korean port.
Source:

ABC Radio Australia

January 19, 2007 United States/South Korea trade talks came to a halt after the Koreans refused to accept shipments of U.S. beef that contained bone fragments.
Source:

International Herald Tribune

November 27, 2006 South Korea's Agriculture Ministry announced plans to kill all the cats and dogs in Iksan, Korea. Minister Kim Chang-sup defended the action, undertaken in response to an outbreak of avian flu, by saying, “Other countries do it. They just don't talk about it.”
Source:

New York Times

November 3, 2006In South Korea, where miniskirts will soon be legalized, police have begun using “cyber terror units” to curb the rise of online bullying by the mob.
Source 1:

Reuters via Yahoo! News

Source 2:

BBC News

October 19, 2006 South Korean scientists announced the development of a new genetically altered strain of adenovirus capable of destroying cancer cells.
Source:

AFP via Breitbart

October 7, 2006 South Korean soldiers fired 60 warning shots after North Korean soldiers crossed into the demilitarized zone, but it was not clear if North Korea's action was a deliberate provocation or an attempt to go fishing.
Source 1:

CNN

Source 2:

Chicago Sun-Times

Source 3:

CNN.com

August 17, 2006 South Korean DNA tests on tissues obtained during a 2003 hysterectomy indicated that a Frenchwoman was the mother of two rotting infant corpses found in a freezer at her home in Seoul, but she and her husband denied any relationship to the dead babies.
Source:

Digital Chosunilbo

May 12, 2006In South Korea stem-cell researcher Hwang Woo-suk was indicted for fraud, embezzlement, and violation of bioethics laws.
Source:

CNN.com

May 4, 2006 Scientists in Korea revealed a new, attractive female robot that understands 400 words and can blink. "We are working," said one roboticist, "on upgrading the android with the aim of making it move its legs by the end of this year."
Source:

The Korea Times

November 24, 2005In South Korea geneticist Hwang Woo-suk, who cloned an Afghan hound named Snuppy, resigned as chairman of the World Stem Cell Hub after it was discovered that he had used the eggs of women from his research team in experiments. “We needed a lot of ova for the research,” he explained, “but there were not enough ova around.”
Source:

BBC News

October 3, 2005Eleven people were killed during a stampede at a South Korean concert of songs popular with the elderly.
Source:

SFGate.com

August 9, 2005A South Korean man played video games for 50 straight hours, then died.
Source:

Reuters

August 7, 2005And North Korea would not make changes to its nuclear program, despite the efforts of China, Japan, Russia, the United States, and South Korea.
Source:

VOA.com

August 3, 2005In South Korea, scientists cloned an Afghan hound. The clone is named Snuppy, for Seoul National University Puppy.
Source:

AP

June 29, 2005A South Korean pastor announced that he had raised enough money to send 1.2 million rabbits to North Korea.
Source:

Reuters

May 15, 2005The grand opening of a new post office at a United States air base in South Korea was postponed, and a nearby shopping mall evacuated, when a mail-scanning device mistook a package of sauerkraut for a dangerous chemical.
Source:

Stars and Stripes

February 4, 2005 South Korea downgraded North Korea from "main enemy" to "military threat."
Source:

BBC News

October 4, 2004 Korean and Italian researchers developed a tiny robot with multiple legs designed to crawl through a patient's guts.
Source:

New Scientist

August 16, 2004 Korean researchers found that leukemia deaths are 70 percent higher among people who live near AM radio broadcasting towers.
Source:

Wired

June 25, 2004A South Korean hostage was beheaded.
Source:

New York Times

May 14, 2004 South Korea's constitutional court reinstated President Roh Moo Hyun, who was impeached in March.
Source:

New York Times

April 14, 2004Three crewmen died on a South Korean freighter after inhaling rotten squid gas.
Source:

Mainichi Shimbun

February 12, 2004 South Korean scientists created 30 human clone embryos and harvested embryonic stem cells from one of them; the stem cells were then injected into mice, where they formed cartilage, muscle, bone, and other tissues.
Source:

New Scientist

February 12, 2004 South Korea cracked down on lewd candy and cakes.
Source:

Agence France-Presse

January 17, 2004 South Korea was incinerating tons of American beef products.
Source:

New York Times

December 30, 2003Eight aides to President Roh Moo Hyun of South Korea were indicted for illegal fund-raising.
Source:

Reuters

September 20, 2003A South Korean farmer set himself on fire during a memorial for another Korean farmer who committed suicide (by stabbing himself in the heart with a Swiss Army knife) at the World Trade Organization meeting in Cancun, Mexico.
Source:

Reuters

July 18, 2003 North and South Korean troops had a gunfight at the border.
Source:

Sydney Morning Herald

June 9, 2003It was announced that U.S. troops will be pulled back from the "tripwire" along the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.
Source:

International Herald Tribune

February 11, 2003 South Korea was wondering what to do with a gigantic rice surplus.
January 7, 2003 South Korea's president-elect said that he was skeptical about President Bush's policies on North Korea, particularly the new notion of “tailored containment” that was suggested this week. “Success or failure of a U.S. policy toward North Korea isn't too big a deal to the American people,” he said. “But it is a life-or-death matter for South Koreans.”
December 4, 2001 South and North Korea exchanged fire in the demilitarized zone separating the two countries.
September 18, 2001 South Korea banned Japanese beef after a Holstein cow on a farm near Tokyo tested positive for mad cow disease.
August 14, 2001A 20-mm Vulcan anti-aircraft cannon on top of a hotel in Seoul, South Korea, went off accidentally during an inspection.
June 19, 2001 South Korea called out the army to fight a drought.
May 29, 2001 South Korea's advertising review board banned a Kim Jong Il impersonator from television ads, apparently worried that the public was not yet ready to buy soap from the Dear Leader of North Korea.
May 1, 2001 South Korea announced that it would send 200,000 tons of fertilizer to the North.
March 20, 2001 North and South Korea exchanged mail for the first time since the Korean War.
March 20, 2001Apparently offended by President Bush's comments last week about dear leader Kim Jong Il, North Korea cancelled peace talks with South Korea and denounced the United States as a “nation of cannibals.” South Korean scientists discovered over 100 endangered species thriving in the Demilitarized Zone along the border with North Korea.
March 13, 2001 President Bush told South Korean president Kim Dae Jung, who recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, that the United States would not continue the Clinton Administration's efforts to make peace with North Korea. Bush said: “We're not certain as to whether or not they're keeping all terms of all agreements.” A White House spokesman later admitted that North Korea has not violated its single agreement with the U.S. and explained that although the president did not use the future tense he was in fact referring to future agreements. “That's how the president speaks,” the spokesman said.
March 6, 2001 South Korean president Kim Dae Jung pleased Russian president Vladimir Putin by declaring his opposition to the United States' plan to build a national missile defense system that would violate the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty.
0, 2000 South Korea bioengineered four fluorescent beagles.
Source:

AP via Google News

October 3, 2000The defense ministers of North and South Korea met and decided to fix a railroad.
September 26, 2000 South Korea urged Japan to get friendly with North Korea.

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