Seoul  - North Korea informed an international shipping organization that it intends to launch a satellite at the beginning of April, South Korean media reported Thursday.

The International Maritime Organization was told that the carrier rocket of the Kwangmyongson-2 satellite would be fired between April 4 and 8, the Yonhap News Agency reported, citing intelligence sources.

Seoul  - In a country like South Korea, a craze for coffee is not the only explanation for the unusual success that Starbucks Corporation is now enjoying there.

The success of Starbucks in South Korea can also be put down to the free internet access in its many outlets. People are now flocking to the chain stores not only to drink coffee, but to study and chat as well.

Seoul  - Shares surged 3.2 per ce

Seoul - Pyongyang on Tuesday reopened its border to hundreds of South Koreans stranded at a joint industrial complex, one day after it cut inter-Korean communications amid rising tension over US and South Korean military exercises.

Border traffic to and from the Kaesong industrial park in North Korea returned to normal, South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman was quoted as saying by the official Yonhap news agency.

Seoul  - North Korean voters returned leader Kim Jong Il to the Stalinist state's rubber-stamp parliament with 100 per cent support, the country's state-run media said Monday.

In the unsurprising result, 100 per cent of the voters of constituency 333 supported Kim in Sunday's election, the Korean Central News Agency said.

All voters "renewed their unshakable determination to devotedly safeguard Kim Jong," KCNA said.

Further details about the composition of the 12th Supreme People's Council were not released.