South Korea has refused to join the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Uk in the deplomatic boycott of the upcoming Beijing Winter Olympics next year in China citing a need to work with China.
While in Australia to meet with Australian prime minister Scott Morrison, president Moon Jae-in of South Korea said that he was not considering snubbing the Olympics to protest China’s human rights abuses as some western countries have done.
“We have not recieved a request from any other country including the U.S. to participate in the diplomatic boycott”, Moon Jae-in said.
“Clearly, our relations with China have some conflicting and competing aspects”, Moon Jae-in the South Korean president told reporters after the summit with Scott Marrison the Australian prime minister.
President Moon Jae-in stressed that South Korea wanted to promote a free and open pacific region but also had to consider China’s role in trying to bring peace to the Korean peninsula.
Moon Jae-in says that Seoul wanted a harmonious relationship with Beijing as he stressed that ” we need the constructive efforts of China to enable denuclearisation of North Korea.
There is no doubt that South Korea will need China’s help to enable the denuclearisation of North Korea and start talks to end the 1950-53 Korean war before he leaves office next year.
South Korea also has China as its largest trading partner and unlike Australia which sells iron ore to China and has no replacement so far, South Korea is careful to upset Beijing since most of the South Korean products exported to China can be easily replaced in case of the trade dispute between two nations.
U.S., Canada, UK, and Australia have cited human rights abuses against the Uygur minority in the Xinjiang region of China and eroding of democracy in Hong Kong by China to boycott 22 Beijing winter Olympics.
China has warned all those countries that boycotted 22 Beijing winter Olympics of a heavy price to pay for protesting the games.
Reports from China indicated that all those countries that boycotted the 22 Beijing winter Olympics were not invited by China to attend the opening ceremony which led to many people to start wondering how the US and its allies can boycott an event they were not invited to attend in the first place.
While the U.S and its five eye partners decided to boycott the 22 Beijing winter Olympics, Russian president Putin and many other officals from the UN accecpted the invite to attend the opening ceremony of the games.
Reports indicated that due to strained relations between U.S. and China, China wasn’t planning on inviting the U.S. even if the U.S didn’t boycott the 22 Beijing winter Olympics and the same can be said of Australia, Canada, and the UK.
