S Korean PM resigns over govt response to ferry disaster

South Korean Prime Minister Chung Hong-won attends a meeting at the Finnish Parliament in Helsinki, in this file picture taken October 24, 2013. South Korean Prime Minister Chung resigned on April 27, 2014 over the government's response to the April 16, 2014 Sewol ferry disaster. The Sewol ferry sank on a routine trip south from the port of Incheon to the traditional holiday island of Jeju. Chung was booed and someone threw a water bottle at him when he visited grieving parents the day after the disaster. More than 300 people, most of them students and teachers from one high school on a field trip, have died or are missing and presumed dead. The confirmed death toll on April 27, 2014 was 187.[Photo/Agencies]

SEOUL - South Korean Prime Minister Chung Hong-won resigned on Sunday over the government's response to the April 16 ferry disaster.

The Sewol ferry sank on a routine trip south from the port of Incheon to the traditional holiday island of Jeju.

"Keeping my post too great a burden on the administration," a sombre Chung said in a brief announcement.

Chung was booed and someone threw a water bottle at him when he visited grieving parents the day after the disaster.

More than 300 people, most of them students and teachers from one high school on a field trip, have died or are missing and presumed dead. The children were told to stay put in their cabins, where they waited for further orders. The confirmed death toll on Sunday was 187.

Tempers have frayed over the slow pace of the recovery and frequent changes in information provided by the government, including at one time by a local government that everyone had been rescued.

Bodies in Korean ferry reveal desperate attempts	Death toll rise to 181 in S.Korean ferry disaster