NEWS BRIEF

[Anchor Lead]

Amid rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula including a possible nuclear test by North Korea, the top nuclear envoys of South Korea, the U.S. and Japan held talks on Friday to discuss response measures. In the talks held at Seoul’s foreign ministry building, Special Representative for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs Kim Gunn, U.S. Special Representative for North Korea Sung Kim and Takehiro Funakoshi from Japan’s foreign ministry shared assessments on peninsula affairs. The trilateral meeting comes four months after the nuke envoys of the three sides met in Hawaii in February.
The Bank of Korea held a meeting Friday morning to inspect consumer prices. BOK’s deputy governor Lee Seung-heon said inflation last month exceeded 5% for the first time since the global financial crisis and price increases in the 5% range are expected to continue in June and July. Lee said that amid continued high inflation, it’s important to oversee the economic sentiment of market players to continue policy measures on stabilizing consumer prices for the mid to long term.
The main flames of a wildfire in Miryang, Gyeongsangnamdo Province have been brought under control 3 days after the fire first started. The Korea Forest Service said Friday that it took time to extinguish the blaze due to the sheer amount of trees affected by pine wilt disease and the lack of forest trails which made accessing the site difficult. The service said that 20 helicopters will continue to tame residual embers as gusty winds are forecast in the afternoon. Over 760 hectares of woodland are believed to have been destroyed in the Miryang wildfire.