President also highlights first drug bust through international mail screening system

President Lee Jae Myung delivers a memorial address at a Korea-US Korean War remains repatriation ceremony held at Seoul Airport in Seongnam on Friday. [Yonhap]
President Lee Jae Myung delivers a memorial address at a Korea-US Korean War remains repatriation ceremony held at Seoul Airport in Seongnam on Friday. [Yonhap]

President Lee Jae Myung said Friday that normalizing the valuation of shares — one of South Korea's core assets — could serve as a painless tool for pension reform.

Lee made the remarks on his X (formerly Twitter) account, where he shared a news report saying that improved returns from the national pension fund's stock market investments could push back the fund's projected depletion date.

"The normalization of the stock market has greatly reduced the pain of structural adjustments needed to prevent pension depletion," he said, adding that "the normalization of South Korea will continue."

Stronger equity investment returns for the national pension fund could buy time for a more measured approach to structural pension reform, easing the financial burden on contributors in the process.

Lee also shared a report on the government's joint drug investigation task force successfully intercepting narcotics through a postal sorting center for the first time, praising the result. "It has not been long since we installed a system to screen all international mail parcels, and it is already showing results," he said.

He went on to say, "Now, anyone who tries to buy drugs through international mail parcels will get caught."


mokiya@heraldcorp.com