Several South Korean newspapers focused on security and investigations in their leading stories for Sept. 28. Seoul Shinmun reported that South Korea’s military and the U.N. Command had failed to reach the site of a blast in the Demilitarized Zone. JoongAng Ilbo compared the timing of the investigation with the 2015 wooden-box land-mine incident: the current probe began six days after the blast, while the earlier investigation began two days after that incident.
The transfer of North Korean prisoners of war and its political implications also featured prominently. Chosun Ilbo said the government was seeking to keep the transfer under wraps despite the achievement. English-language papers Korea Times and Korea JoongAng Daily described the POW transfer and the DMZ blast as complications for President Lee’s peace initiative. Korea JoongAng Daily also highlighted conflicting accounts, with Seoul saying the transfer was secret and Kyiv saying it was not.
On domestic politics, Kyunghyang Shinmun expected Lee to nominate a new investigation agency chief after returning from an overseas trip. Segye Times reported that the agency was set to begin operating without leaders or systems in place despite having received 2,168 cases. Donga Ilbo said the United States and China had opted to manage tensions rather than pursue a grand bargain, extending their trade truce for two more months.
Economic coverage included data, interest rates and taxes. Kookmin Daily reported steady demand for South Korean databases on the dark web. Maeil Business Newspaper said the five-year U.S. Treasury yield had reached 5% as high interest rates became the new normal. Korea Economic Daily wrote that an outdated inheritance tax was affecting middle-class homeowners with a single property. The Korea Herald asked why SK hynix was weighing memory production in the United States.
Other leading stories covered Nepal’s floods and renewed debate over climate justice, as well as an Australian farm seeking rules for coexistence with a neighboring data center, according to Hankook Ilbo. The roundup reflects the subjects highlighted by the newspapers, rather than a single editorial conclusion.