Pro-China Remarks Haunt S. Korea's Presidential Hopeful Lee Jae-myung

Saying 'xie xie' to Beijing does not play well at a time of tensions between the countries

- Wendy Teo

SEOUL - No thanks to his "xie xie" gaffe from a year ago, former opposition leader Lee Jae-myung, who is widely regarded as the front runner in South Korea's snap presidential election on June 3, is now in a bit of a tight spot.

In the run-up to the country's April 2024 general election, in an attempt to disparage then President Yoon Suk Yeol's tightening alliance with the US and Japan, which had invited criticism from China, Mr Lee had said Seoul could avoid antagonising Beijing further, especially over Taiwan Strait tensions, by simply saying xie xie, or "thanks" in Mandarin, to China and Taiwan.

These remarks have come back to haunt Mr Lee as simmering tensions between South Korea and China bubbled to the surface recently over Chinese-built structures in the jointly managed West Sea Provisional Maritime Zone (PMZ), where both countries' exclusive economic zones overlap.

The two countries met at a high-level dialogue in Seoul on April 23 to discuss China's unilateral installation of three structures in the West Sea PMZ between 2018 and 2024, amid rumours that China was preparing for a fourth structure.

Failing to reach a consensus at the meeting, both sides have agreed to hold the next round of talks in China at a mutually convenient time.

Amid the rising tensions, Mr Lee's political rivals are lampooning his previous pro-China comments in a bid to discredit the presidential hopeful, who is known for his strength in domestic politics but weakness in foreign policy.

At the time when he made the comments, critics and political rivals had slammed the lawyer-turned-politician's lack of foreign policy acumen for not recognising the impact of the situation in the nearby Taiwan Strait on the Korean Peninsula's security and South Korea's economy.

Tension is high between China, which claims the island as its territory, and Taiwan, which wants to maintain its de facto independence.