South Korea's president has denied making insulting remarks about the United States, his main security ally, saying through his office that they were mistranslated, prompting Friday September 23 a new wave of disbelief.
A TV camera caught Yoon Suk-yeol making disparaging remarks about US lawmakers after a meeting with US President Joe Biden at the International Global Fund (IMF) in New York on Wednesday.
Compromising recording
“
How could Biden not lose face if these motherfuckers don’t get it through Congress?
“, seems to say the South Korean president on this recording broadcast by the South Korean channel MBC, about Joe Biden’s proposal to increase his financial assistance to the Global Fund, which requires the approval of Congress.
Presidential spokeswoman Kim Eun-hye, however, claimed that the South Korean president "
had no reason to talk about the United States or say the word Biden
".
During a press briefing in New York on Thursday, Ms Kim argued that Yoon Suk-yeol did not mention '
Biden
' but actually said a similar-sounding Korean word, and was referring to South Korean lawmakers. , not Americans.
Posted on YouTube, the video has been viewed more than five million times in less than a day, and the word "
fuckers
" used by Mr. Yoon was Thursday the most popular hashtag on Twitter in South Korea.
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A ruling party parliamentarian said the television channel, which was the first to report the remarks, should be prosecuted for having "
damaged the irreplaceable alliance between the United States and South Korea
".
Online, however, many expressed doubts about the government's response.
“
It is utterly shameful and disturbing to our children that the presidency has come up with such an excuse
,” wrote one user on YouTube, when another posted: “
I have listened to this for ten times.
It's Biden, that's for sure.
»
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Yoon's official denial amounts to telling South Koreans that they are "
deaf
", opposition Democratic Party parliamentarian Chun Jae-soon said on Friday.
Washington has about 27,000 soldiers stationed in the country to deal with the threat posed by North Korea, which has nuclear weapons.
Mr. Yoon, a former prosecutor, is struggling with a low approval rating, at 28% according to a latest poll released on Friday.
