North Korea demanded $10 billion in cash and half a million tons of food in 2009 as a precondition of holding a summit with the South, former South Korean president Lee Myung-bak said, adding that he refused to pay anything for holding talks.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has confirmed he will attend celebrations in Russia in May marking the Soviet victory over Germany in World War Two, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said on Wednesday, citing a Kremlin spokesman.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye said on Monday an anti-North Korea law was needed because the two countries remained technically at war, after a Korean-American was deported to the United States under the law for making positive comments about the North.
China has sent coastguard vessels to disputed waters in the East China Sea after Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe angered Beijing by sending a ritual offering to a Tokyo shrine that honors the dead from Japan's wars.
