Daily Kor for February 13, 2010: Drive safely

If you're in South Korea, enjoy the holiday, especially if you were lucky enough to snag a train ticket. If you're staying in Seoul, enjoy the peace and quiet (though the capital is less and less like a ghost town each passing year, especially with the shorter holiday period). Whatever you're doing, be safe. Maybe the snow is a good thing, because it forces people to drive slower, meaning the accidents are less likely to be lethal (yeah, there's evidence of that from past snowy Lunar New Year holidays). 새해 복 많이 받으세요! (First!)

1. UN envoy Lynn Pascoe says North Korea not eager to return to six-party denuclearization talks (Reuters via WaPo, AFP, CNN, Yonhap)
• Pascoe says he's "very satisfied" with talks (Yonhap)
2. North Korean nuclear envoy will make rare trip to the US (Reuters via WaPo, Bloomberg, Korea Times)
3. Annual Sŏllal (Lunar New Year) exodus to the provinces begins amid snowy conditions (Korea Times, Korea Herald)
• Snow won't hinder transportation (Chosun Ilbo)
4. UN is investigating North Korean shipment of chemical safety suits possibly being sent to Syria (Bloomberg)
• US says it respects Thailand's decision to deport crew of North Korean shipment (Bloomberg)
5. US President Obama pledges to press for ratification of ROK-US free-trade agreement later this year (Yonhap, Korea Herald)
6. OECD report puts South Korea at next to last in social welfare spending, at just above one-tenth of GDP (Korea Times, Korea Herald, Joongang Daily)
7. Hanwha agrees to buy South Korea's Prudential units (Reuters)
8. Morgan Stanley says Korean won, Taiwan dollar, and Chinese yuan "most resilient" to risk aversion (Bloomberg)
9. Leftist activists protest doctors trying to nuke unified Korea (Yonhap)

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