President Yoon Suk-yeol answers reporters' questions as he arrives for work at the presidential office in Seoul last Thursday, amid a controversy over MBC TV's reports on his hot-mic remarks made during a trip to New York the previous week. The ruling bloc berated the reports as "maliciously manipulated." (Yonhap)

President Yoon Suk-yeol's approval rating fell for the first time in four weeks after his remarks caught on a hot mic in New York caused an uproar here, a survey showed Monday.

In the poll of 2,522 voters conducted by Realmeter from Monday to Friday last week, 31.2 percent positively assessed Yoon's job performance, down 3.4 percentage points from the previous week.

Yoon's disapproval rating was 66 percent, up 3.8 percentage points.

The drop could be attributable to the hot mic controversy and Yoon's accusation of media manipulation after he came under fire for using vulgar words in private remarks to aides caught on a hot mic during his trip to New York last month, according to Bae Cheol-ho, a senior analyst at Realmeter.

Though the recording of Yoon's remarks was not clear due to noise, many thought that he used foul language while talking about US Congress and US President Joe Biden. Yoon's office rejected the claim, saying he was referring to South Korea's opposition-controlled National Assembly and did not mention US Congress or Biden.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level. (Yonhap)