Sankei provokes Koreans
Kim Yu-na / Yonhap
Mao Asada / Yonhap
Japanese newspaper Sankei Shimbun ran an article on Feb. 13 criticizing Koreans for its wayward obsession over gold medals in the Olympics, Chosun Ilbo reported.
According to the newspaper, Sankei illustrated the past Olympics as an example evidencing how Koreans are unreasonable, uncontrolled, impulsive and irascible.
One is how Koreans bombarded the IOC website with complaints against the wrongful disqualification of South Korean Skater hero Kim Dong-sung in the Salt Lake 2002 Winter Olympics.
Kim’s disqualification happened as a result of U.S. skater Apolo Anton Ohno’s “Hollywood action,” with him claiming that he was blocked by Kim’s arm movement.
Ohno won the gold, and the whole controversy was turned into a full-on war based on anti-American sentiments, some of them resulted in a threat lodged against Ohno.
Korean soccer team avenged Kim the same year in the Korea-U.S. World Cup match. Ahn Jung-hwan celebrated his score by imitating Ohno’s “Hollywood action” drawing nationwide support which was deemed as “some sort of justice having been served.”
In the eye of Japanese newspaper Sankei, however, all this was “irrationality-dominated Korea.” “The way Koreans vilify and demonize Anton Ohno is the same as they do with us [Japan],” the paper was quoted as saying.
Sankei even called for “more maturity in reaction on Korea’s part,” and ended the article with their hopeful scenario of Asada Mao beating Kim Yu-na in women’s figure skating in the Sochi Olympics.