Lee Jae-myung: "'Itaewon Tragedy' Caused by Government Incompetence and Negligence... Responsibility Must Be Determined to Prevent Recurrence"

Lee Jae-myung on the 'Itaewon Disaster': "A Clear Man-Made Tragedy... Due to Government Incompetence and Negligence"

Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, is delivering opening remarks at the 'Supreme Council Meeting People's Podium - Household Debt and High Interest Rates Edition' held at the National Assembly on the 26th. Photo by Yoon Dong-joo doso7@

[Asia Economy Reporters Koo Chae-eun and Park Joon-yi] Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, stated at a party meeting on the 1st that the ‘Itaewon disaster’ was indeed a tragedy caused by government incompetence and negligence.

Lee mentioned, “Last year, the police were dispatched to the scene to maintain order and actually engaged in protecting residents by separating the road and sidewalk and monitoring crowd movements.”

He added, “This year, although it was expected that even more citizens would participate, there was absolutely no plan to maintain order.” Lee questioned, “If police officers had been dispatched to maintain order at the scene, would this incident have occurred?”

He criticized, “Before this, even with more participants, no safety accidents occurred. So how can the authorities keep repeating that they bear no responsibility?”

Lee stated, “The most important task now is to investigate the cause of why my family, relatives, and neighbors had to die without knowing the reason, even though this was not a natural disaster.” He added, “We must determine who is responsible. Only then can such an incident be prevented from happening again.”

Park Hong-geun, floor leader, also said, “We have spent several days in grief and despair,” and added, “Right now, the urgent priority is to manage the aftermath of the accident. The Democratic Party has promised bipartisan cooperation to prioritize follow-up measures after handling the disaster, so I hope thorough efforts will be made for the subsequent actions.”

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