South Korea summons Russian envoy over criticism of President Yoon

South Korea has summoned Russian ambassadors to protest Moscow’s condemnation of President Yoon Suk Yeol for comments he made regarding North Korea’s development of a nuclear weapons.

The deputy foreign minister for political affairs of South Korea, Chung Byung-won, called Ambassador Georgy Zinoviev on Saturday and informed him that Moscow’s outrage at Yoon’s comments would only worsen ties between the two nations, according to the ministry.

“Deputy Minister Chung said that it was very regrettable that Russia ignored the truth and unconditionally protected North Korea while criticising the leader’s remarks in extremely rude language, and emphasised that this would only worsen Korea-Russia relations,” South Korea’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

Since North Korea invaded Ukraine in 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin has strengthened relations with Seoul’s adversary, North Korea. The United States and its allies have denounced what they claim are substantial North Korean missile shipments to Russia in support of that country’s military campaign.

Yoon told a meeting on Wednesday of defence and security officials: “The North Korean regime is going through fire and water solely for the sake of maintaining its hereditary totalitarian regime, while blatantly ignoring international law and U.N. Security Council resolutions by trading arms with Russia.”

The next day Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called Yoon’s remarks “blatantly biased”.

She told reporters the comments “look particularly odious”, given rising tensions on the Korean peninsula, “primarily due to the brazen policy of the United States and its allies, including (South) Korea and Japan”.

Seoul’s foreign ministry said on Sunday that Chung had met on Friday with Russia’s visiting Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko and conveyed Seoul’s stern stance on the military cooperation between Pyongyang and Moscow. Kim Gunn, Seoul’s nuclear envoy, also met with Rudenko, the ministry said.

According to the statement, Chung and Rudenko also spoke about other topics, such as Russia’s conflict in Ukraine.

(With agency inputs)