Taiwan will not send an official delegation from Taipei to attend South Korean President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol’s inauguration ceremony next week due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but will instead send representatives from Taiwan’s office in Seoul, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Thursday.
MOFA spokeswoman Joanne Ou (???) said the government originally wanted to send a delegation to be led by the Legislative speaker to the ceremony that will take place on May 10 at the plaza in front of the National Assembly in Seoul.
However, due to the fact that both Taiwan and South Korea are experiencing domestic COVID-19 outbreaks and Taiwanese lawmakers will have to undergo a seven-day quarantine when returning to Taiwan, the government decided to drop the idea after consulting with lawmakers.
Instead, the Taipei Mission in Korea, which represents Taiwan’s interests in South Korea in the absence of official diplomatic ties, will be sending its officials to the ceremony, she said.
Ou, however, would not disclose if the mission would be sending the nation’s top envoy to Seoul for the occasion, saying only that the ministry would not disclose further details due to a mutual understanding between both governments.
Former Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (???) led a legislative delegation to attend former South Korea leader Park Geun-hye’s inauguration in 2013.
When President Moon Jae-In’s inaugural ceremony was held in May 2017, no guests were invited from overseas as he took office just a day after the election.
His predecessor Park had resigned over a corruption and abuse-of-power scandal after being impeached by parliament.
Yoon, a conservative former top prosecutor, won the presidency in the March 9 election by a narrow margin with 48.56 percent of the votes, while his opponent Lee Jae-Myung took 47.83 percent of the vote.
Yoon’s presidential election victory was achieved with the closest margin in South Korean history.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel