As South Koreans prepare to vote in a snap presidential election that could reshape Seoul’s defence spending and its approach to a potential conflict over Taiwan, the future of the nation’s foreign policy and its alliance with the United States hangs in the balance.
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On Tuesday, South Koreans will go to the polls to elect a successor to impeached president Yoon Suk-yeol, with Lee Jae-myung of the centre-left Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) widely expected to win by a comfortable margin.
Observers say that Lee, if elected, will walk a tightrope between an increasingly “critical” Washington over Seoul’s part in defence-sharing, while softening the conservatives’ hardline stance on Beijing and avoiding any part in a possible war over Taiwan.
Lee said last week that the 28,500 US soldiers stationed in South Korea played a “very important role in the United States’ containment policy against China” amid talks of a troop drawdown and reassignment elsewhere.
In response to a question about whether he would help Taiwan repel an invasion from mainland China, he sidestepped the issue, saying: “I’ll think about that when aliens try to invade Earth.”
Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China, to be reunited by force if necessary. Most countries, including the US, do not recognise Taiwan as an independent state, but Washington opposes any attempt to take the self-governed island by force and is committed to supplying it with weapons.
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