President George W. Bush ordered Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to review South Korea’s concerns about the U.S. Board of Geographic Names labeling of Dokdo’s status as being disputed, an official at the Korean Embassy said Wednesday (KST).
President Bush’s instructions came ahead of his visit to Seoul amid rising anxiety among some Koreans who perceived the move as Washington favoring Tokyo, which has persistently laid claims to Korea’s easternmost islets situated in the East Sea separating the peninsula from Japan.
The instruction came during a meeting with Korean Ambassador to the United States Lee Tae-sik, the embassy official was quoted by the Yonhap News Agency as saying.
The official said that President Bush expressed his understanding about Seoul’s concerns and told Lee that Secretary Rice would look into the issue.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Chris Hill also said he would try and address the matter, during a meeting with Ambassador Lee.
In Seoul, President Lee Myung-bak said that he was not ready to accommodate increasing calls for Ambassador Lee and other diplomats to be held responsible for their failure to deal positively with the agency’s change in designation of Korea’s easternmost islets. ``We shouldn’t be happy or upset at every development regarding Dokdo, a Chong Wa Dae spokesman quoted Lee as saying.