President posts on X that South Korea's dignity is at stake and cannot be overlooked; diplomatic friction seen continuing for now

President Lee Jae-myung [Yonhap]
President Lee Jae-myung [Yonhap]

President Lee Jae-myung on Friday demanded that Ukraine acknowledge a confidential agreement reached during the repatriation of North Korean prisoners of war and issue a public apology, warning of "additional measures" if Kyiv refuses and signaling that diplomatic friction between the two countries will continue for now.

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Lee expressed strong displeasure over the dispute. "If Ukraine continues to refuse to acknowledge the facts and issue a public apology, we will take additional measures," he said, adding that the matter "concerns the dignity of the South Korean people and the nation and cannot be overlooked."

Lee laid out his account of events in detail. "Regarding the repatriation of North Korean prisoners of war, Ukraine requested that the matter be kept confidential, and we agreed. Ukraine then unilaterally made it public. When the South Korean president expressed regret as courteously as possible, they turned around and called the head of state a liar by denying any agreement existed. When we asked them to acknowledge the agreement and apologize, they instead invoked the specter of an imminent inter-Korean military clash — effectively wishing for war on the Korean Peninsula. I express serious displeasure toward Ukraine," he said.

The statement was Lee's latest salvo in an ongoing dispute between Seoul and Kyiv over whether a confidential agreement existed, a row that erupted after Ukraine publicly disclosed that two captured North Korean soldiers had been transferred to South Korea.

Earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky disclosed at the UN General Assembly last month that two North Korean soldiers captured by Ukrainian forces had been sent to South Korea.

The two countries have since traded conflicting accounts of the alleged confidential agreement. The South Korean government maintains that Ukraine was the first to request confidentiality from the outset of discussions on the prisoner transfer, and that a non-disclosure agreement was reached through multiple diplomatic channels.

Amid the dispute, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said he preferred not to call the situation an "incident," describing it instead as a "diplomatic misunderstanding," and expressed hope that it would be resolved soon. "I sincerely hope and am working toward a resolution in the near future," he said.


sang@heraldcorp.com