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| U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon |
By Lee Han-soo, Park Si-soo
Outgoing U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has declared his bid for the South Korean presidency, saying he is ready to "sacrifice myself" for the country.
He made the remark during a meeting with Korean correspondents in New York on Tuesday (local time). His term as the world's top diplomat expires on Dec. 31.
"If what I have seen, learned and felt as U.N. Secretary-General would help develop South Korea, I am willing to sacrifice myself to achieve this goal," Ban told Korean correspondents at the U.N. "The public is enraged and frustrated by the lack of good politics. I have gotten personal requests about how to improve society that has exposed accumulated problems. I am in deep agony thinking about how to do my part."
He acknowledged the need for a political alliance in Korea, saying politics is not something he can do by himself.
Referring to the Choi Soon-sil scandal, Ban said it is devastating that what he criticized some foreign leaders for has now happened in Korea.
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Ban is expected to meet the acting president, the parliamentary speaker and the chief justice of the Supreme Court when he returns home in early January.
Breakup with scandalized Park Geun-hye?
Ban openly criticized scandalized President Park Geun-hye in a recent high-profile meeting, arguing she could be blamed for throwing South Korea into its "biggest political turmoil since the Korean War."
This is in stark contrast to the long-circulating rumors that he is backed by Park and her loyalists as the ruling party's candidate for the presidency.
"I believe that during my seven-decades-long life as a South Korean citizen, we have not been experiencing this kind of political turmoil, except when the ... Korean War broke out," Ban said. He made the comment at a discussion organized by the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, Saturday.
"The people were very much frustrated and angry about the complete lack of good governance," he said. "And they believed that the trust on and for the leadership of the country was betrayed.
"That's why people became much more frustrated and angry. And I fully understand this situation."
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