Today's headlines_Jan. 15

- The GNP said “government’s plan to hold an inter-Korean summit within this year seems to aim at distracting people’s attention from government’s mismanagement of the administration and politically exploiting the summit to its advantage in the upcoming presidential election.”

- In an interview with Maeil Business Daily, Construction Minister Lee Yong-seup said the ministry would announce a plan by June to build a new city in order to solve housing shortages in the so-called ‘bubble seven’ region. The planned new city will be about the same size of Bundang.

- A 15-day long strike by militant unionists has been causing a serious problem to the performance of Hyundai Motor. The company said “as of January 11, a total of 13,000 cars couldn’t be delivered to domestic customers, up 44 per cent from the end of last year.”

- Housing supply is set to increase by 100,000 to 500,000 from last year as major construction companies plan to double or triple their supply especially before September when the measure by the government to put a cap on apartment prices takes effective.

- A government official said President Roh’s missing of a gala dinner at the ASEAN+3 summit was due to accumulated fatigue from a cold and ‘psychological war’ with Shizo Abe on the matter of Japanese abduction by the North. Abe insisted to include the abduction issue in the joint press release by Korea-China-Japan, on which Roh expressed his disagreement by saying the issue was irrelevant.

- Final trials on the Samsung Everland case and the Hyundai Motor’s embezzlement case will be held on January 18 and 16, respectively.

- One in five state-run companies are in the red and public debts held by public companies amounted to W122 trillion, up by W20 trillion from a year ago, said the Ministry of Planning and Budget.

- The Seoul Metropolitan government will build its new office complex environmentally-friendly by establishing a renewable-energy system in the building.

- It is reported that the US and North Korean working groups will meet on the fourth week of this month to discuss the BDA issue. An official of the Seoul government said yesterday “we understand the US and North Korea agreed to have working-level talks at the end of January but the exact date and venue have yet to be decided.”

- Ulsan prosecutor’s office said it was obviously illegal for Hyundai Motor Unionists to go on a strike against less-than-expected year-end bonus because the bonus cut had been agreed upon between the two parties, and it would sternly react to any illegal workout based on law and principle.