South Korea has decided to recall its ambassador to Ukraine, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday, in an unusually strong diplomatic move as tension continues to mount between Seoul and Kyiv.
"The government has decided to recall the South Korean ambassador to Ukraine," the ministry said in a brief statement posted on its official website.
"The government hopes that various pending issues between the two countries will be resolved smoothly and will continue consultations with the Ukrainian side to that end," it added.
Relations between Seoul and Kyiv have deteriorated over a series of disputes related to the war in Ukraine.
Tensions emerged over the transfer of two North Korean prisoners of war captured by Ukrainian forces to South Korea. Seoul has said the two sides had an understanding that the transfer would remain confidential, while Kyiv has disputed that such an agreement existed.
The issue surfaced after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy disclosed the transfer during his address to the United Nations General Assembly last month, prompting Seoul to raise concerns with Kyiv over how the matter had been handled.
The dispute was followed by fresh friction over claims that petroleum shipments from South Korean ports had reached Russia, which has faced fuel shortages caused by Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries.
Vladyslav Vlasiuk, Ukraine's presidential commissioner for sanctions policy, said Tuesday that shipments from South Korean ports had helped Russia alleviate fuel shortages and offset losses in refining capacity caused by Ukrainian attacks, citing a Guardian report earlier that day.
The South Korean presidential office rejected the claim Wednesday as "inaccurate and inappropriate," saying Seoul had consistently implemented sanctions and export controls against Russia in close coordination with the international community since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Seoul also reaffirmed that its position on sanctions and export controls against Russia remains unchanged, while saying it is verifying the facts surrounding the petroleum shipments and reviewing whether any domestic export-control rules were violated.
The move marks South Korea's first recall of an ambassador since 2008, when it brought home its top envoy to Japan in protest over Tokyo's renewed territorial claim to the Dokdo islets.
flylikekite@heraldcorp.com
