South Korea president admits ‘shortcomings’ in rare address

Yoon said he would ask lawmakers to” engage in the establishment of the Ministry of Low Birth Rate Counter Planning.”

In order to build a more aggressive and potent handle tower, he said,” we will be setting up a low-birth planning office.”

” In order to beat the low birth rate, which can be considered a national crisis, we will completely mobilise all of the country’s functions”, he added.

According to preliminary data released by Statistics Korea in February, the government’s fertility rate, which is the number of children a person is expected to have in her life, dropped to 0.72 in 2023 from 2022.

That is far below the 2.1 children required to maintain the 51 million people that, according to experts, will almost double by the year 2100.

ARMS POLICY

Yoon, who has taken a hard line against the nuclear-armed North, claimed that North Korea’s relations to Moscow had been strained by what Seoul and neighbour Washington claim are arms supplies to Russia from North Korea.

According to Yoon,” North Korea’s trade of unpleasant weapons evidently violates UN Security Council sanctions resolutions relating to North Korea’s nuclear weapons, in addition to supporting the unlawful waging of war against Ukraine.”

Yoon stated that he wants to “manage our relationship with Russia as smoothly as possible” despite the hostilities with Moscow regarding the allegedly illegal arms supplies.

He added that Seoul would n’t be changing its longstanding policy of not selling weapons in active conflicts, which had prevented it from providing military assistance to Ukraine.

Seoul has huge sought to join the ranks of the nation’s leading arms exporters– aiming to be the third largest, behind the United States, Russia and France– something that is then possible, business research indicates.