South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol inadvertently expressed his real feelings about President Joe Biden’s United Nations speech Wednesday when he spoke into a hot mic.
Suk-yeol warned that Biden jumped the gun when pledging to provide the United Nations’ Global Fund with $6 billion in American funding.
“We’re going to work with our partners in Congress to contribute another $6 billion to the Global Fund,” Biden announced in the U.N. General Assembly speech.
It didn’t escape Suk-yeol that Congress would have to approve the funds, and he referred to the U.S legislature with profanity.
However, Suk-yeol was seemingly unaware that he was being recorded on a hot mic when he expressed skepticism to his aides.
WARNING: The following quote contains language that some may find offensive.
“How could Biden not lose damn face if these f****** do not pass it in Congress?”
South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol in New York: “How could Biden not lose damn face if these f***ers do not pass it in Congress?” 🍉 pic.twitter.com/veVXYVSWvi
— QUAN Quan 全权 كمال (@QuanQuan_1231) September 22, 2022
The profane remark was widely circulated in South Korea.
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Suk-yeol’s critics pointed to his mic mishap as a diplomatic embarrassment for the country, according to CBS.
The leader of the nation’s opposition Democratic Party accused the nation’s conservative-leaning president of slighting a crucial Pacific ally.
Park Hong-keun said that Suk-yeol’s mic mistake was a “major diplomatic mishap,” according to CBS.
A South Korean government official downplayed remarks that Suk-yeol didn’t intend to express publicly, speaking to the nation’s Yonhap News Agency.
“I think it’s highly inappropriate to draw a link between private remarks and diplomatic accomplishments,” the unnamed official said.
The same official even expressed skepticism towards the veracity of the recording.
“He wasn’t speaking publicly on the stage but in passing, and although I don’t know who recorded it and how, I actually think it should be verified.”
The United States is already the single greatest contributor to the United Nations’ budget, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
The more than $11 billion the U.S provided to the U.N. in 2020 amounted to nearly a fifth of the global organization’s entire budget.
The Global Fund Biden is pledging to fund is designed to fight international diseases such as AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, according to Yonhap.
