Yoon Seok-yeol: "Moon Administration Used China-Biased Policies, but Most Youth Dislike China"

"Returning to Principle vs. Principle Helps Communication"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jun-yi] Yoon Seok-yeol, the presidential candidate of the People Power Party, said, "The current government has pursued China-leaning policies, but most Korean people, especially the youth, dislike China."

On the 28th, at a meeting of the American Chamber of Commerce in Korea held at a hotel in Yeouido, Seoul, Yoon responded to a question stating, "25% of Korea's exports go to China, so there could be a high concentration or dependence on a specific country," by saying this.

He also claimed, "Most Chinese people, especially Chinese youth, dislike Korea," adding, "It was not like this in the past."

He cited the current government's China-leaning stance as the cause of the strained relationship between Korea and China. Yoon diagnosed, "When Korea had a strong trilateral cooperation with the U.S. and Japan and based on that engaged with China, both sides had a very favorable impression, resulting in good outcomes in business and cultural cooperation, and the citizens of both countries were amicable. However, under this government, China-leaning policies were pursued, and although it was said that Korea played a mediator role between the U.S. and China, the relationship ultimately ended badly."

He explained, "The most important thing is that countries sharing constitutional ideals and values pursued by their nations can share secrets in security and other areas. In cases where this is not so, it is necessary to clearly define each other's identities and smoothly carry out the necessary cooperation."

Regarding Korea-Japan relations, he added, "This government has almost deliberately destroyed them through historical ideologies," and said, "Since the normalization of diplomatic relations, Korea-Japan relations were not originally bad. I believe that if we proceed as in the past, Korea-Japan relations can be normalized without difficulty."

He mentioned the 1998 Kim Dae-jung?Obuchi declaration, saying, "Based on that spirit, let's bring the Korea-Japan historical issues into the future and cooperate for future development between Korea and Japan, and on that basis, resolve historical issues as well," and stated, "If the relationship is not close, it is difficult to settle historical issues."

After the meeting, in response to a question from reporters asking, "Is the rise in anti-China sentiment due to the current government's biased policies?" Yoon explained, "Even though policies favoring China were pursued, such results have come out, so communication among the people is not something that can be resolved solely by government policy," and added, "Returning to principle versus principle would help improve communication and relations among the people."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.