Leaked US intelligence documents suggesting Washington spied on South Korea have put the country’s president in a delicate situation ahead of a state visit to the US, the first such trip by a South Korean leader in 12 years.
The documents contain purportedly private conversations between senior South Korean officials about Ukraine, indicating that Washington may have conducted surveillance on a key Asian ally even as the two nations publicly vowed to reinforce their alliance.
Since taking office last year, conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol has put a bolstered military partnership with the United States at the heart of his foreign policy to address intensifying North Korean nuclear threats and other challenges. The April 26 summit with President Joe Biden is seen as crucial to winning a stronger U.S. security commitment and resolving grievances over the Biden administration’s economic and technology policies.
The leaked documents were posted online as part of a major U.S. intelligence breach. The papers viewed by The Associated Press indicate that South Korea’s National Security Council “grappled” with the U.S. in early March over an American request to provide artillery ammunition to Ukraine.
South Korea, a growing arms exporter, has a policy of not supplying weapons to countries at war. It has not provided arms directly to Ukraine, although it has shipped humanitarian aid and joined US-led economic sanctions against Russia.
Yoon’s government said it discussed the leaked papers with the United States, and they agreed that “a considerable number” of the documents were fabricated. The South Korean government avoided any public complaints about the U.S. and did not specify which documents were faked.
“There’s no indication that the US, which is our ally, conducted (eavesdropping) on us with malicious intent,” Kim Tae-hyo, Seoul’s deputy national security director, told reporters Tuesday at Dulles Airport near Washington at the start of a trip aimed at preparing for the summit.