Tokyo  - A South Korean freighter and its crew went missing Tuesday off the central Japanese Izu-Oshima island after it collided with a Panama-registered vessel, Japanese media reports said.

The 4,255-ton Orchid Pia of South Korea and the 10,833-ton Cygnus Ace of Panama collided early Tuesday in the Pacific Ocean, about 120 kilometres south of Tokyo, the Japan Coast Guard said.

The search continued after the coast guard lost contact with the Orchid Pia, which has seven South Korean and nine Indonesian crew members.

Hanoi  - The captain of a South Korean freighter anchored off the Vietnamese coast killed his chief mechanic in a fight before committing suicide, news reports said Monday.

Sailors told the Vietnamese Coast Guard that the ship's captain Hong Dong Kwon, 45, had killed mechanic Heo Seong Kyu, 45, during a fight with several sailors. After Heo died, the sailors confined Hong in his own cabin.

Seoul  - South Korea on Friday condemned North Korea for "a military threat" and "an inhumane act," a day after Pyongyang said it could not guarantee the safety of South Korean civilian aircraft flying in or near its airspace.

"A military threat to the normal operations of civil airplanes not only violates international rules but is also an inhumane act that can never be justified," the Unification Ministry in Seoul said.

Seoul  - North Korea on T

Seoul - North Korea accepted a proposal to meet Friday with the US-led UN Command on reducing tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

Pyongyang agreed Thursday to the proposal for the meeting of generals from both sides after consultations between officers of North Korea and the UN force at the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjom, the South Korean-based UN Command said.

Seoul  - Shares surged 3.3 per cen