Washington (AP) – President Donald Trump I greeted South Korea’s new president, Lee Jae Myungby claiming that “purges or revolutions” are taking place there and threatened not to do business with Seoul as they prepare to host a new leader at the White House later Monday.
Trump said later Monday that he was referring to the church and the new South Korean government’s attack on US military bases.
“I heard something bad,” Trump told reporters in the oval office on Monday morning. “I don’t know if that’s true or not. I’ll discover it.”
Warning Shot previewed the potentially hostile conflict later Monday, when Lee, a liberal leader and longtime critic of Seoul’s conservative establishment, sat down with Trump to discuss Seoul-Washington’s recent trade deal and continued defence cooperation. Lee leads a country that has been in political turmoil for the past few months after former leader, conservative Yoon Sook Yeol, temporarily imposed martial law in December. His stunning expulsion from the office.
Trump did not identify any specific attacks. But earlier this month, South Korean police raided a church led by a conservative activist pastor who authorities allegedly had a surge in January, according to Yonghap Newsletter. A special prosecutor’s team investigating allegations of corruption against Yoon’s wife, former First Lady Kim Ke-on-hee, has stormed the Unification Church facility after allegations that one of the officials gave Kim’s luxury goods.
Meanwhile, the Osan Air Base, co-run by the US and South Korea, was also the target of an attack last month by investigators investigating how Yoon’s martial law revitalization occurred, according to a Chosun Ilbo newspaper. South Korean officials claim the attacks are in areas controlled by Seoul.
“What’s going on in Korea? It sounds like a purge or a revolution. We have it and we can’t do business there,” Trump posted on social media on Monday morning. “Today we’re looking at a new president at the White House. Thank you for being aware of this issue!!!”
Yoon, who was elected for a five-year term in 2022, is believed to be more ideologically consistent with Trump. I started playing golf again He tries to build a bond with the US president after he was re-elected last November.
Liberal Lee, an outspoken critic of Seoul’s conservative facilities, who lost slightly to Yoon in the 2022 election, led the South Korean Congress efforts to overturn Yoon’s martial law while engaging him each. The country’s Constitutional Court officially rejected Yoon in April.
Before Trump’s Truth Social Post on Monday morning, the first in-person meeting between Trump and Lee was expected to help Seoul embody the details of the July trade deal between the two countries, which have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in the United States.
Trump has declared that South Korea is “completely open to trade” with the United States, and will accept goods such as cars and agricultural products. The car is the top export to the US in Korea
Seoul has one of the biggest trade surpluses between Washington’s NATO and its Indo-Pacific allies, with countries where the US holds a trade deficit elicited certain outrage from Trump, who wants to eliminate such trade imbalances.
Lee’s office said it announced the visit that the two leaders will discuss cooperation on key manufacturing sectors such as semiconductors, batteries and shipbuilding. The latter was a specific area of focus for the US president.
On the defense, one potential topic is the continued presence of US troops in South Korea and concerns in Seoul that the US will seek high payments in return.
Prior to his visit to Washington, Lee traveled to Tokyo For his first bilateral visit as president on a very iconic trip for two countries that have suffered long-standing historic wounds. That was the summit with Japanese Prime Minister Isba Interpreted by an analyst As a way to demonstrate unity and potential leverage as Japan and South Korea face new challenges from the Trump administration.
Lee was the first South Korean president to choose Japan for his first bilateral visit since the two countries were normalized in 1965.
Elected in June, Lee was a former child worker who led the Liberal Democrats through South Korean political class and had a malformed arm to win the presidency after multiple attempts.
Lee faced an assassination attempt in January 2024. He told investigators he was stabbed in the neck by a man who said he wanted Lee’s signature and later tried to kill a politician.
Lee arrives in the US on Sunday and leaves Tuesday. He spotted dinner on Sunday evening with about 200 local Korean Americans in downtown Washington.
